Jessica Chastain

Actress Jessica Chastain has one rule that she follows before she signs any film — she always makes sure to ask the producers about how much her male counterpart is getting paid for the same movie.

In an interview with Variety, the Oscar-nominated actress said she negotiates her contracts to make sure her wages are on par with her male co-star.

“I am not taking jobs anymore where I am getting paid a quarter of what the male co-star is being paid. I am not allowing that in my life. What I do now, when I am taking on a film, I always ask about the fairness of the pay.

“I ask what they are offering me in comparison to the guy. I don’t care about how much I get paid; I am in an industry where we are overcompensated for the work we do. But I don’t want to be on a set where I am doing the same work as someone else and they are getting five times what I am getting,” Chastain said.

The 40-year-old actress said she may be losing a lot of money by not accepting some offers but she is glad that she has created a “boundary,” which will educate people in how to treat female actors.

“There was something huge that I recently turned down. For me, it was not about the money; it was an old-fashioned problem of the wage gap. I turned it down, and they did not come back.

So what you are doing is creating a reputation: Don’t bring Jessica something where she’s not being fairly compensated compared to the male actor. Even though I lost that film, I have created a boundary,” she added.