{"id":133363,"date":"2025-09-10T09:04:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-10T09:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/133363\/"},"modified":"2025-09-10T09:04:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-10T09:04:07","slug":"nina-dobrev-talks-fight-for-equal-pay-to-vampire-diaries-male-co-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/133363\/","title":{"rendered":"Nina Dobrev Talks Fight for Equal Pay to Vampire Diaries Male Co-Stars"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tDespite being the only actor playing multiple characters during the early seasons of The Vampire Diaries<\/a>, Nina Dobrev<\/a> has revealed that she was paid less than her fellow male co-stars Ian Somerhalder<\/a> and Paul Wesley<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe actress opened up about the behind-the-scenes equal pay battle in Entertainment Weekly\u00a0editor Samantha Highfill\u2019s new book,\u00a0I Was Feeling Epic: An Oral History of The Vampire Diaries. Dobrev not only played Elena Gilbert in the hit CW series<\/a>, but also her character\u2019s evil doppelg\u00e4nger, Katherine Pierce, starting in the season one finale.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cCandice [King],\u00a0Kat [Graham], and I were the three lowest-paid series regulars in the first two seasons,\u201d Dobrev said. \u201cIt was a bit of a tricky situation because my contract only said to play Elena, but I was playing multiple characters, which doubled my workload. I had to be on set for double the amount of time, I had to memorize double the amount of lines.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the book, Highfill wrote that actors are typically able to start negotiating their contracts in season three, which means Dobrev was making less than Somerhalder\u00a0(Damon Salvatore) and\u00a0Wesley\u00a0(Stefan Salvatore) for the first few seasons.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI wanted to play Katherine, but I wanted to be compensated fairly for that, and I wanted to be an equal to the boys,\u201d Dobrev added. The actress eventually got more money, Highfill wrote, but she never received equal pay to her male co-leads.<\/p>\n

\n\tShe recalled being told that \u201cout of principle\u201d the studio \u201cwouldn\u2019t bump me up to being equal to the boys, and so that was probably the most hurtful because it felt like I was really working hard and we shot eighteen-hour days sometimes, and nights, and I was putting my absolute heart and soul, blood, sweat, and tears into it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI remember feeling like the studio didn\u2019t appreciate what I was bringing to the show, and it felt like they were saying that all the hard work I was putting into it didn\u2019t matter to them and that I wasn\u2019t an equal to my male counterparts, and so that was upsetting to me,\u201d Dobrev continued.<\/p>\n

\n\tVampire Diaries co-creator Julie Plec<\/a> also shared in the book that things \u201cgot really heated\u201d with the studio when they told the show\u2019s writers they couldn\u2019t use Katherine anymore because it meant the studio would have to pay Dobrev more each time.<\/p>\n

\n\tHowever, Plec said that \u201cwas not something that I felt was right or fair,\u201d leading them to \u201cbeg the network to let us even write story for Katherine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tPlec said that the writers were eventually allowed to write for Katherine but recalled, \u201cI literally think we had to say, \u2018We\u2019ll kill Katherine,\u2019 in order to get permission to use her.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cOver time, between Nina being generous and gracious and the tension simmering down a little bit, we were granted a certain number of episodes,\u201d the co-creator said. \u201c[But] I literally think we had to say, \u2018We\u2019ll kill Katherine,\u2019 in order to get permission to use her.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDobrev exited the show after season six, when her character Elena was put under a sleeping spell by villain Kai Parker (Chris Wood), which linked Elena\u2019s life to that of her best friend\u00a0Bonnie Bennett. But since Elena wasn\u2019t killed off, this left the door open for her to return (which she did in the series finale, titled \u201cI Was Feeling Epic.\u201d)<\/p>\n

\n\tHowever, her return for the eighth and final season sparked another battle over pay, as revealed in Highfill\u2019s book. Plec and co-creator Kevin Williamson said they initially intended to have Dobrev return for the entire final season.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI really wanted Elena and Stefan to end up together,\u201d Williamson admitted, \u201cthat would\u2019ve been my preference, but we didn\u2019t have Elena to bring that relationship back around. You couldn\u2019t bring them back together in one episode.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBut Dobrev stood her ground and was only going to return if she was paid the same as Wesley and Somerhalder, who had gotten multiple raises since her departure from the series.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was always open to coming back for the finale, and storyline-wise it made sense. I felt like it was important and it needed to happen for the show, it needed to happen for the fans,\u201d the actress explained. \u201cIt was just really important to me that at the end of the show, as a woman, I wanted to make sure that I was compensated and that I was an equal to my male counterparts on the show, and so it came down to that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDobrev shared that the studio\u2019s offer for her to return for the show\u2019s finale \u201cwas five times less\u201d than what she made when she left at the end of season six.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s the only reason why at one point I almost didn\u2019t come back,\u201d she added. \u201cI needed to be paid parity to the boys. I had to put my foot down and say if it didn\u2019t happen I wouldn\u2019t be able to come back,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd it wasn\u2019t about the money \u2014 I didn\u2019t give a shit about the money at all \u2014 it was the principle.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tPlec defended Dobrev, saying in the book, \u201cShe should\u2019ve been making what those boys made all along, and nobody should\u2019ve blinked at that request, but at the time it was very shocking. To her credit, she advocated for herself and she stuck to her guns.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen Dobrev declined the studio\u2019s less-than-equal offer, she said that\u2019s when Plec stepped in and \u201cput her foot down and spoke to everyone.\u201d Though the studio eventually only agreed to pay for one episode at the actress\u2019s requested rate. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe reason we couldn\u2019t have her for more than the one episode is because they just wouldn\u2019t pay,\u201d the co-creator shared. \u201cIt took a lot of work before they finally relented, but it came back that it was one episode only that they\u2019d say yes for.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDobrev added, \u201cFor the fans I felt horrible and I wanted the story to be told in the best way possible, and it was heartbreaking that the artistry had to suffer because elf this, that we didn\u2019t get to maybe have the few episodes at the end of the show that Julie wanted. \u2026 I\u2019m very happy that we were able to make it work and that I came back, because I wanted to be part of the goodbye.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tI Was Feeling Epic: An Oral History of The Vampire Diaries is now available for purchase.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Despite being the only actor playing multiple characters during the early seasons of The Vampire Diaries, Nina Dobrev…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133364,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75,72615,72616,72617,72618,72619],"class_list":{"0":"post-133363","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-celebrities","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-ian-somerhalder","13":"tag-julie-plec","14":"tag-nina-dobrev","15":"tag-paul-wesley","16":"tag-the-vampire-diaries"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133363\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}