I think that Christine Emba is drawing the wrong conclusions in her Washington Post column about Mark Wahlberg and Michelle Williams relative to Mark Wahlberg’s getting paid for reshoots in All the Money in the World while Michelle Williams did not. The question she should be asking is why did the agent that both of them use, Ari Emanuel, negotiate a contract for Michelle Williams that included reshoots while Mark Wahlberg’s contract did not?
Is Ari Emanuel (brother of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Obama Administration medical consultant Ezekiel Emanuel) a sexist? Or was there something else at work?
Show business is a business.
One is a bigger star than the other? (Don follow Hollywood enough to know who Williams is.)
Steve
Got her start on TV in Dawson’s Creek. The Station Agent, Brokeback Mountain, Synecdoche, New York, Shutter Island, My Week with Marilyn , Manchester By the Sea, The Greatest Showman. A good candidate for the best actress of her age cohort.
The point of this post is that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. You don’t need to resort to sexism or racism to explain why Hollywood behaves as it does. And you don’t blame the producers for compensation levels. The responsibility for that is firmly on the shoulders of the agents.
I recall similar issues in vastly different contracts for the male and female leads for the x-files reboot. It seemed to me that Ducovney had long said no to revisiting the part while Anderson said yes. Getting a series going became about what it would take to sign him first and then her second.
At some point, the coincidences begin to form a pattern, but I do not know if we have/have not reached that point.
Supposedly, business decisions are profit-oriented, but profit can take many forms. A PE Investor may think profit is a long-term goal. He/she might invest to improve a company, and thereby, profits will made. A CEO may think profit is a short-term goal. He/she might pump-and-dump a company, and thereby, profits will be made.
In some quarters, the sine qua non of one’s well-being is economical motivation, but economic motivation (or non-motivation) is a means not an end.
There are many TV series that have lost the original main character(s) due to income disagreements, and some have continued as before. They are not all females, but I do not know the breakdown. Females may be less willing to get too close to the ‘red line’, or Hollywood may be more willing to draw ‘red lines’ for females.
I would suggest that the past 2-2.5 years has refuted conventional wisdom more than supported it, and what was once impossible is now possible.
@Dave Schuler
… a cigar is just a cigar …
But, it is always a phallic symbol. Perhaps, a little time in re-training program may ‘get your mind right’.
Now that I know they have the same agent I wonder why she didn’t get a better deal. Three things stick out, though. First, he is a bigger star than she is. Based on that, I would expect him to get more. But probably not this much more! Second, how big are the respective roles? I don’t know as I haven’t seen the movie and haven’t cared enough to read up on it. Third, perhaps HE pushed back more on the contract negotiations at the start than she did.
A fourth thought: Perhaps he had other projects underway, and he wanted aggravation money to take time off from those for reshoots?
But really, don’t we all expect the entertainment industry to screw over everyone and anyone in order to maximize profit? That’s pretty much what they do. Ask Dave Chappelle, to sight one of legions of examples.
Sometimes a phallic symbol is just a cigar, TB.
Cite, not sight. God, Twitter has ruined my ability to spell. Never Twitter!