Thursday, January 18, 2018
The Larger Lessons of Mark Wahlberg's $1.5 Million Salary on 'All the Money in the World'
The Atlantic: When All the Money in the World was fast-tracked into reshoots to replace scenes featuring Kevin Spacey (who has been accused of sexual assault), Michelle Williams saw it as a powerful sign that Hollywood was changing. At the director Ridley Scott’s insistence, the studio was spending upwards of $10 million to recast Spacey with Christopher Plummer in the role of the oil tycoon J. Paul Getty. As the film’s lead actress, Williams immediately signed off on the decision. “They could have my salary, they could have my holiday, whatever they wanted,” she said at the time. “Because I appreciated so much that they were making this massive effort.” To Williams, the reshoots were a statement, but to her co-star Mark Wahlberg, they were an opportunity.
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3 comments:
As this on going struggle continues it is good to see that people legitimately care. In this particular event, I feel like everything was handled quite well. Things could have gone smoother, but at the same time the end resulted in 2 million dollars more going to charity than would have if Mark Wahlberg hadn’t requested money. As all of this continues I’m glad to see that we are going in the proper direction. Ridley Scott made a huge and expensive choice when he decided to reshoot every scene with Kevin Spacey and totally remove his image from the movie. For that he has gained much respect from me, and I’m sure from many others. I hope that other directors follow suit if something similar happens to any of their actors or actresses. I don’t think that we are out of the woods yet, but I think that we might be starting to see the sunlight through the leaves.
I just do not see this issue as one of pay inequality. Sure it Wahlberg did make way more money than Williams did on those reshoots, but as far as I can see, it had nothing to do with either of their genders, but rather with what each of them felt they owed the production and the director. I think it is pretty gross that Wahlberg made so much money off of the Spacey scandal, but again, not because he is a man trying to one up his costar (which I do not think was the case). And I would agree with Williams when she said that this ordeal is a sign that people are ready to make the changes that need to be done. The fact that this production team decided to spend millions more to cut Spacey from the project shows that people are beginning to realize what correcting this problem is really going to take, These people have to be brought to light and once they are they have to be dealt with accordingly, and the repercussions as well, regardless of how much money it will take.
This is such a powerful lesson in the importance of image and taking the high road. Mark Wahlberg wanted to get as much money as possible from Sony for the reshoots and used the time crunch to negotiate a higher salary for himself. Michelle Williams took the high road initially by refusing to take any pay, because she wanted to help the people making the movie. Wahlberg, subsequently valued his time and wanted to make sure he was getting paid to do more work. Wahlberg did not do anything wrong, however, he rectified the situation for the sake of his image and took the high road. Hopefully this will prompt a further conversation about the importance of gender equity in the workplace. Not only that, but this entire process was started because of the revelations about Kevin Spacey sexual abuse of minors. Had the #MeToo movement not come out in full stride this would not have even happened in the first place.
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