Time will tell where Catt Sadler winds up after her exit from “E! News,” but she can be sure of one thing: She has Jennifer Lawrence on her side.
“The Hunger Games” star Lawrence offered a show of support for Sadler, who said Tuesday that she had exited E! over a “massive disparity in pay” between Sadler and her male co-host.
“Thank you Catt for sharing your story,” Lawrence wrote in a Facebook post that shared Sadler’s message detailing her reason for leaving E!
In a message on her website Tuesday, Sadler — who in addition to appearing on “R! News” also appeared on E!’s “Daily Pop,” said that an E! executive told her about the pay disparity, and when she was approached to renew and extend her deal with the network, ” I learned that he wasn’t just making a little more than I was. In fact, he was making close to double my salary for the past several years.”
“Information is power. Or it should be. We are living in a new era. The gender pay gap is shrinking, although admittedly we have a long way to go,” Sadler continued. “And well, I learned this first hand. My team and I asked for what I know I deserve and were denied repeatedly.”
Lawrence is well familiar with the concept of gender pay disparity in show business. In 2015, the actress wrote an essay titled “Why Do I Make Less Than My Male Co-Stars?” In it, Lawrence said that she learned that she had been paid less than her male “American Hustle” co-stars, and was disappointed with herself for not fighting for more money.
“When the Sony hack happened and I found out how much less I was being paid than the lucky people with d—s, I didn’t get mad at Sony. I got mad at myself,” Lawrence wrote at the time. “I failed as a negotiator because I gave up early. I didn’t want to keep fighting over millions of dollars that, frankly, due to two franchises, I don’t need.”