“I hired you to look good in your underwear holding a gun”: The Brutal Sexism Zoe Saldaña Faced Makes Her Hollywood Record Even More Important

Zoe Saldaña is one of the few Hollywood stars whose reputation undoubtedly precedes her. As such, her work not only stands out as a product of her excellent ethics but also an irrevocable personality that drives her to achieve perfection in every single role she embodies. But such quality of work doesnʼt breed out of compliance and pleasantness.

For the Avatar star, it took incredible strength and bravery to pursue work in an industry that makes it their daily mission to promote misogyny. Saldaña has hardly kept quiet in the past about the difficult working environment on Pirates of the Caribbean sets and she isnʼt about to do so now as she makes explosive revelations about the openly vile nature of studio execs.

Zoe Saldaña Blows the Lid Off the Brutal Sexism of Execs

Accusations and allegations are all it takes to destroy careers and march someone down Hollywood Boulevard in a ceremonial Walk of Shame. However, without names, there is not much that can be done about a situation in which the accuser has been gravely victimized and traumatized by a person in power beyond reproach.

In an incident that has become all too common in the acting and music industry, Zoe Saldaña revealed the misogyny and sexism directed at her on a particular movie set by an anonymous exec that forever stained her rose-tinted impression of the industry she adopted as her second home. In a July 2016 interview with Allure, Saldaña claimed:

“A producer said, ‘I hired you to look good in your underwear holding a gun.’ I was told walking into this project that they really wanted me for the part, and that any input or ideas I had to please share them.

That’s what I was doing, and this producer was so bothered by the fact that he had to disrupt his vacation to call me and tell me to stop being a difficult b—ch. I thought, ‘Wow, it’s real. It really happens.’”

Despite not naming any names, it is evident from Zoe Saldañaʼs filmography and the extant of her work that she was speaking about her experience on the set of The Losers. The 2010 action film directed by Sylvain White and starring Idris Elba, Chris Evans, and Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Saldaña is featured in a scene where she wields two handguns while dressed in black lingerie.

Zoe Saldaña Recalls Being Made to Feel “Difficult” on Set

It doesnʼt take much to achieve equilibrium on set to make lives better for every actor on the call sheet. But despite decades of advocacy, protests, and debate, female actors are still paid radically less than their male counterparts for equal work. In her Allure interview, she further revealed that her demands for justifiably equal treatment made studios wary of her: “The tone changed in the negotiations. I was starting to feel that I was difficult.”

In the past, Zoe Saldaña has made her voice heard on the issues of disparity on set, including pay gap, maternity benefits, and disproportionate perks awarded to male co-stars as compared to actresses (via USA Today).

Such differences stand out even more in the face of Saldañaʼs impressive Hollywood record that none of her fellow co-stars and industry actors have been able to break. As of 2024, Zoe Saldaña holds the record of being the only actress to star in 4 critically acclaimed films that crossed the $2 billion mark at the box office, namely Avatar (2009), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Avengers: Endgame (2019), and Avatar: The Way of Water (2022).

Avatar and its late sequel Avatar: The Way Of Water, both directed by James Cameron, have amassed $2.92 billion and $2.3 billion at the box office respectively. Avengers: Infinity War made $2.04 billion while Avengers: Endgame currently stands at $2.79 billion. The above data has been accumulated via The Numbers.

All four films are currently available for streaming on Disney+