Pay parity is a recurrent issue in the global entertainment industry. In recent years, it has been louder than ever due to the payment gap between the male and female leads. Recently, on a podcast with Soha Ali Khan, her brother Saif Ali Khan, and husband Kunal Kemmu shared their perspectives on this issue.
Saif Ali Khan on Pay Parity
On International Women's Day, Soha Ali Khan hosted Khan and Kemmu on her podcast, All About Her. The three discussed multiple topics such as career choices, views on marriage, same-industry couples, feminism, aging pressure on men, nepotism, and much more. One of them was pay parity.
Soha Ali Khan asked the two whether or not they would endorse the concept of pay parity. She gave an example of a romantic comedy where two people have the same stature, to which Saif quickly replied by saying, "I mean, if they are of equal stature, then they should get an equal amount of money, I feel. The short answer is yes, they should get paid the same." Additionally, he explained the workings of economics and how the free market works. He added, "If you are putting seats in the theatre, you get paid, and everyone knows - there's no hiding."
Highlighting the gender pay gap, Saif said, "Just because you are a certain gender, you don't deserve to get paid more or less. It is a balanced economic system where people are quite clear that this person is a superstar because they are filling the theatre." He then said, "They are also aware, and they will charge that price and get paid."
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Kunal Kemmu Agrees With Saif
Kunal Kemmu agreed to Saif's points. He then highlighted the 'math' in this system. Apart from a film working or not, he discussed how selecting actors and risks would work earlier. "The distributors would know if I have this actor, I will sell this territory for so much money, and this will be the recovery. Everything is a risk anyway."
He also explained how actors nowadays are 'charging the moon'. This results in actors charging more than what the film is taking in terms of money. He added, "In this conversation, if we were a country where the audiences were going and supporting a film which is a female-led action film, like Pathan or Jawan, then there would be no conversation about this."
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Saif Ali Khan concluded by saying, "The world is balancing it out now." This was in comparison to the past actors like Dharam Ji and Zeenat Aman, when the patriarchy was much stronger.
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