As Vanity Fair reports: “The success of the first ‘Wonder Woman’ film — for which Gadot was paid only $300,000, a figure that caused outrage in some circles as it paled in comparison to what many male action stars take home — helped catapult her onto the list of the highest-paid actresses in Hollywood. For ‘Wonder Woman 1984,’ she reportedly earned $10 million — a hefty sum that is still less than half of what some leading male action stars get, yet another sign that in Hollywood, as elsewhere, the gender pay gap still has a long way to go to close.”
Gadot’s $10 million “Wonder Woman 1984” salary was first reported by Variety last year. While the payday is a massive bump from Gadot’s $300,000 salary on the 2017 original, director Patty Jenkins stresses the actress is not in this business for the money. As Jenkins told Vanity Fair, “Gal is someone whose primary focus is doing good with her character, and that is such a special thing, to have a Wonder Woman like that in the role. She’s not looking for glory or fame — she’s always asking, ‘What can we do with this that will be good for the world?’” “Whenever I see this part of the movie, I always get teary — like good, excited tears,” Gadot told Vanity Fair. “One of the biggest things that I believe is that you can only dream about becoming someone or something after you’ve seen it visually. And for boys — lucky them — they got to experience, since the beginning of the movies, that they were the protagonist, they were the strong ones, they saved the day. But we didn’t get this representation.” Gadot continued, “I think it’s so important — and of course it’s ultra-important for me because I’m a mother of two girls — to show [girls] the potential of what they can be. And it doesn’t necessarily mean that they have to be athletic or physically strong — that too — but that they can be bigger than life.” Warner Bros. is set to open “Wonder Woman 1984” in theaters December 25. Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Sign up for our Email Newsletters here.