Priyanka Chopra says she had pay parity with her male co-star only in Citadel: ‘First time I got equal pay in 22 years’

Priyanka Chopra said that Citadel, co-starring Richard Madden, is the first time she’s had ‘pay parity with her male co-star in 22 years’.

Priyanka Chopra during a conversation with Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke at the South by Southwest Film Festival (SXSW 2023) on Friday said that Citadel, her new Russo Brothers action drama co-starring Richard Madden, is the first time she’s had pay parity with her male co-star.

After Priyanka was crowned Miss World 2000, she joined films and made her acting debut in the Tamil movie Thamizhan (2002), followed by her first Bollywood film, The Hero: Love Story of a Spy (2003). She will be next seen alongside Richard Madden in Prime Video’s upcoming series Citadel backed by Russo Brothers. The show is billed as an ‘action-packed spy series’ that spans the globe. Priyanka spoke about having ‘pay parity’ for the first time on the show.

“I might get into trouble for [saying this], depends on who’s watching. I’ve been working in the entertainment industry for now 22 years, and I have done about almost 70-plus features and two TV shows. But when I did Citadel, it was the first time in my career that I had pay parity. I’m laughing about this, but it’s kind of nuts,” Priyanka Chopra said.

The actor further said, “I put in the same amount of investment and work, but I get paid much less. But the ease in which Amazon Studios said, ‘That’s what you deserve, you are co-leads, that’s just fair,’ and I was like, ‘You’re right, it’s fair.’ And I wonder: Did that happen because there are very few female decision-makers in Hollywood? Would that have been a different conversation if a woman didn’t make that decision? Those are not conversations that happened very easily.” To which, Jennifer Salke replied that she can’t speak to what would have happened if she wasn’t in charge, yet praised her executive team. She said she has ‘great male and female allies’ at her company.

The first trailer for Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra Jonas’ spy series was released recently. Apart from Prime Video’s web series Citadel, Priyanka’s upcoming projects include Love Again with Sam Heughan and Celine Dion. Written and directed by James C Strouse, the film is an English-language remake of the 2016 German film SMS fur Dich, which was based on a novel by Sofie Cramer.