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Culture > Entertainment

Octavia Spencer Teared Up Describing How Jessica Chastain Helped Her Raise Her Salary by 500%

Erica Kam

As we all know by now, feminism and sexism have been taking center stage in conversations surrounding Hollywood, with everything from workplace harassment and assault to the gender wage gap. Of course, it’s important to remember intersectionality in these conversations — as Octavia Spencer did at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

In a panel, Spencer said she had been talking with her friend and co-star Jessica Chastain about the issue of equal pay for men and women, while working on a new comedy movie together. She described them “dropping F-bombs” and being generally angry at the inequality, when Spencer brought up the difference in struggle for women of color.

 

A post shared by Jessica Chastain (@jessicachastain) on

“Women of color on that spectrum, we make far less than white women,” she recalled telling Chastain. “So if we’re gonna have that conversation about pay equity, we gotta bring the women of color to the table.”

I am glad to see Spencer pointing this out, because she’s totally right: black and Hispanic women make even less than the 77 cents that white women make to the dollar that a man earns.

“She had no idea that that’s what it was like for women of color,” Spencer added. But while this racism might be uncomfortable for some white women to discuss, Chastain took the opportunity to produce real change. “She said, ‘Octavia, we’re gonna get you paid.’”

 

A post shared by Jessica Chastain (@jessicachastain) on

Hearing the determination in those words — coupled with seeing Spencer tear up at this point in the story — would make anyone get emotional (myself included!). And so would the happy ending of this story: Spencer revealed, “Fast-forward to last week, we’re making five times what we asked for.”

It is so great to see women in solidarity with one another, especially in such a public and influential industry. Here’s hoping we’ll be blessed with more female empowerment in 2018!

Erica Kam is the Life Editor at Her Campus. She oversees the life, career, and news verticals on the site, including academics, experience, high school, money, work, and Her20s coverage. Over her six years at Her Campus, Erica has served in various editorial roles on the national team, including as the previous Culture Editor and as an editorial intern. She has also interned at Bustle Digital Group, where she covered entertainment news for Bustle and Elite Daily. She graduated in 2021 with a bachelor’s degree in English and creative writing from Barnard College, where she was the senior editor of Columbia and Barnard’s Her Campus chapter and a deputy copy editor for The Columbia Spectator. When she's not writing or editing, you can find her dissecting K-pop music videos for easter eggs and rereading Jane Austen novels. She also loves exploring her home, the best city in the world — and if you think that's not NYC, she's willing to fight you on it.