Jennifer Lopez Was Almost Denied Record-Breaking Paycheck For ‘The Wedding Planner’

Jennifer Lopez revealed that she had to really fight for her history-making $9 million salary in The Wedding Planner.

The actress appeared in Variety‘s latest Power of Women issue alongside former agent and current producing partner Elaine Goldsmith-Thomas, i.e. the very woman who helped her negotiate the salary.

The payday was the highest for a Latina actress in Hollywood.

In the conversation they spoke about how the studio executives pushed back on giving her the big check.

“I was like, ‘I don’t want [their prior pay offer].; I had to kind of break out of that, and convince somebody to put me in the first romantic comedy, which was The Wedding Planner,” J.Lo said.

But when she asked for a higher salary than any Latina actress had ever been given before, she and Elaine faced backlash.

“I remember [director] Adam Shankman put me in that movie. You were my agent, and you were asking for a certain price that you thought I merited, and they were buckling back,” she said to Elaine. “Then [Adam] came to one of my record signings, and he said, ‘Give her whatever she wants.’ The line was around the block.”

“It was just the idea that somebody like me, from my background, who was a woman, could garner that type of price in this industry, and it was a big deal,” she added of the historical moment. “I don’t know if people know this, that you were Julia Roberts’ agent, and you got her the $20 million salary, which broke the glass ceiling for women in the industry to make as much as men did. And for me, because I am the [first] Latin woman who has made the most on a movie, you pushed just as hard.”

She earned it, too! We love you, J.Lo.