It kind of feels like All The Money In The World is a doomed project. The first obstacle was the revelation of sexual misconduct claims against co-star Kevin Spacey before the film’s release. Fearing that the film would face a lot of negativity in the media, the decision was made to replace Spacey in the role with Christopher Plummer. This feat was huge at the time because the film was already completed with a release date a month away before the reshoots began. Despite the hurdle, Ridley Scott got it done and only had the release date pushed back three days. The bit of good news after this was that the film received good reviews and high praise for its star Michelle Williams and the 11th-hour change of Christopher Plummer.
In order to get this done, reshoots took place over 10 days during the Thanksgiving day break and while it was initially announced that Michelle Williams and Mark Wahlberg, a co-lead in the film, did their reshoots for free, it turns out that was not the case. In fact, Michelle Williams was paid chump change in comparison to Mark Wahlberg and now SAG-AFTRA is looking into the matter.
USA Today reported on Tuesday that Wahlberg was paid $1.5 million to re-shoot scenes with Plummer and that Williams was only paid her per diem – less than $1,000. If true, that could possibly be a violation of the union’s contract if she wasn’t working on a flat-fee deal. It was also reported yesterday that Wahlberg took an 80% cut on what he normally earns ($15 million-plus a movie) in order to work with Ridley Scott and because it was a potential awards contender. Much of the film’s foreign sales are said to have hung on Wahlberg’s involvement.
Neither Wahlberg nor Williams had reshoot clauses built into their contracts. When it was decided rather quickly that Imperative Entertainment was going to finance the reshoots (Sony did not front the bill on this one) after Plummer replaced Spacey, Wahlberg was already working on his next project Mile 22. He had the ability to negotiate since he already had taken a pay cut. Williams was said to have wanted the project to work and waived her fee.
In a statement SAG-AFTRA said:
“We’re looking into it. The guild’s contract only covers minimums that actors can be paid. If Williams was paid at least scale for the reshoots, there’s nothing SAG-AFTRA can do about it, and anything Wahlberg may have negotiated above scale is OK with the union. The fact they’re both represented by the same talent agency — WME — could raise questions, if true, about fair and equal representation.”
Whether this is an example of the gender gap in Hollywood or simply an actor working his right to negotiate after already taking a pay cut, it’s still poor timing since the #MeToo and Times Up movement is a prevalent force in the industry right now. Damage control needs to done and maybe if the proper channels look into it, they can get to the bottom of it.
