Huma Qureshi says female actors are seen as ‘replaceable’, talks about why male actors are paid more: ‘Bigger budget for the hero because of his gender’

Huma, who performed a graceful dance number — Shikayat — in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Gangubai Kathiawadi, added, “Alia Bhatt will draw more money than others even if her part is small. I am assuming that she was the highest-paid actor in Gangubai Kathiawadi.”

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She laments that despite the star power that female actors bring to the screen, male actors get the bigger chunk of the pie. “Unfortunately, in our films, women are often not paid as much as men are even if they’re at the same level of stardom. There is a bias that a male actor needs to be paid more because the film’s story is always revolving around the male protagonist. It is quite unfortunate,” she rued.

Huma has floored the audience with her work in films like Gangs of Wasseypur, Badlapur, Monica, O My Darling, Ek Thi Daayan, and D Day, among others. She also turned producer with her film Double XL. She stressed that even as a producer, she has to listen to the studios as far as the pay for male and female stars is concerned, and therefore, it is imperative that mindsets change at a deeper level for female actors to be paid fairly.

“As a producer, if I am making an action film, with a male star or a female star and they’re at the same level of stardom, I will probably get a bigger budget for the male hero because of his gender. That’s a fact. The studios do this. If a change has to happen, it has to be systemic and at a corporate and studio level. The change cannot come by just two people speaking about pay parity in their interviews,” the Mumbai Saga actor added.

She revealed that the disparity is not only in terms of pay but also the kind of infrastructure that female actors are provided. She said that the rooms and vanity vans given to female actors are different from that of male stars. She added that inequality is also prevalent among the supporting actors. “In a film, if two actors are playing my parents, the guy playing my father will probably get paid a little more than the female actor playing the role of my mother. The mentality is ‘Yeh toh aise hi chalta aa raha hai (This has been going on like this)’ and comes from the idea that women are replaceable. They think ‘koi na koi heroine toh mil hi jaegi (We will find some or the other actress)’.”

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Huma has always voiced her opinion on the topic and never minced her words when it came to addressing income gaps in the industry. Speaking at Agenda AajTak 2022, in the past, she had said, “Equal pay for equal work. If there are two people who are working at an equal level in terms of their career and box office, they should be paid the same amount, which they don’t. It is very sad. It is often said that female-led action films don’t work but male-led action films do. If you take a look at the ratio of films made with male leads and female leads, it’s very off. But now, several female stars are working.”