Leslie Jones is an incredibly well-known comedian and actress. She has made a name for herself starring in many massively successful projects like Coming 2 America, The Angry Birds, and Our Flag Means Death. She also starred in the very unfortunate reboot of the iconic franchise, Ghostbusters.
The female-led take on the cult classic phenomenon that was this franchise did far worse than anyone could have anticipated. The entire cast received quite a lot of hate and backlash for being a part of the project. But the brunt of it was seen by Jones. It would seem that that on its own was also not worth it, as the comedian’s compensation for the project seems ridiculous compared to her co-stars.
Leslie Jones Was Paid A Lot Lesser Than Her Co-Stars
In her recent memoir, Leslie F*cking Jones, Leslie Jones revealed behind-the-scenes details about the box office failure that was her 2016 film, Ghostbusters. The comedian revealed, according to Rolling Stone that the entire process of filming the movie was awful for her, adding that she would consider leaving and remind herself that she didn’t have to be part of this.
“It was made clear to me at times during the process that I was lucky to even be on that movie, but honestly, I was thinking, ‘I don’t have to be in this muthafucka,’ especially as I got paid way less than Melissa McCarthy and Kristen Wiig,” Jones wrote. “No knock on them, but my first offer was to do that movie for $67,000. I had to fight to get more (in the end I got $150K),”
While she had many reasons for this, she emphasized that the biggest one was the fact that she was getting paid considerably, less compared to her co-stars Melissa McCarthy and Kristen Wigg. McCarthy earned $14 million out of the $154 million budget of the film, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Jones on the other hand was only offered $67,000 initially which was later negotiated and the actress was paid $150k.
It Only Got Worse For Leslie Jones
Leslie Jones also revealed in her memoir, according to Rolling Stone, how she was made to feel while working on the project. She stated that it was explicitly made clear to her that she was lucky to even be part of the film with her appearance, being posted in a way that would be beneficial to kickstart her career.
“The message was clear: ‘This is gonna blow you up — after this, you’re made for life,’ all that kind of shit, as though I hadn’t had decades of a successful career already.”
While this may have seemed like a sweet sentiment for someone who is just starting out, that was not the case for Jones, who has been part of the industry for years now and has had quite a successful career in comedy. To make this, even more worse, the comedian ended up receiving immense criticism and racism online due to the poor performance of the film, which forced her to delete her Twitter account for 24 hours.
Source: Rolling Stone
