I don’t deserve equal pay, says BBC drama star
Richard Gere’s British co-star, Helen Mccrory, says his Hollywood status makes him worth more
HELEN MCCRORY says she does not deserve the same high wage packet as Richard Gere, her co-star in a new BBC drama, because they are “not equal”.
While many women who work for the BBC have argued that they should be paid the same wage as men for the same job, the actress said she did not agree in her own case.
The Peaky Blinders star is due to take a leading role alongside Gere in MotherFatherSon.
When asked whether she should be paid the same as Gere, 69, she told The Mail on Sunday: “This is a really complex issue. It depends.
“Say you’re making an independent film. If you think it’ll get bums on seats by using Richard Gere’s name, or it will help you raise the finance to make the film, is it then right or not to say, ‘I’m going to give him a million now because I know he’s going to get me £4million at the box office’? That’s the debate that’s raging now.”
When asked if she would expect gender equality during filming of MotherFatherSon, she replied: “No, I wouldn’t. If you take the argument that with experience and success comes increased salary, maybe I believe in reward for longevity.
“We all know we’re not equal. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have equal opportunities. But we’re not equal.”
She added: “I suppose if we were of equal status and age … I have absolutely no idea how much he was paid. I’ve no idea how much any of us is paid.” Mccrory, 50, has spoken out about pay equality in television and film in the past, saying in 2016: “If you’re doing the same job, indisputably you should have the same money.”
Mccrory plays Kathryn, the aristocratic estranged wife of Gere’s powerful media mogul character Max in the eight-part drama, which starts on BBC Two on Wednesday March 6. The drama centres on a family which is reunited when their son, Caden, played by Billy Howle, suffers a breakdown.
This will be the first time Hollywood star Gere will appear in a television show in 30 years – and the writer of the drama said he took some convincing to take the part. Child 44 author Tom Rob Smith said he had to embark on a “long wooing process” to secure the actor.
Mccrory, however, said she had to “gate-crash” the auditions in order to get the part. She said: “My agent, Nick Forgacs, called me up to say there was a fantastic project floating about, but the only names that were reading it were big film stars.
“He couldn’t tell me anything about it, nor were they sending it to me, but Nick’s excitement was palpable: ‘If I can get you into the room I think you’ve got a chance… but I’ve got to get you into the room first’.
“So we gatecrashed the auditions basically. I even declined a lead role in another series purely on the chance of getting this, because Tom Rob Smith’s writing is brilliant and it is one of the most original scripts I’ve ever read.”