Jimmy Kimmel Breaks A Hollywood Golden Rule & Reveals How Much He Got Paid For Oscars Hosting Gig - Telling Wanda Sykes She's 'Getting Robbed'

It’s time for some pay transparency in Hollywood!

In Hollywood and beyond, there are a lot of unspoken rules that ultimately benefit the people up top. Keeping quiet about salaries is one of them – for those fighting for equal pay, the culture of silence around salaries can be oppressive. And sometimes, it’s just good to pull back the curtain and see how things really work, especially in the entertainment biz.

An example is Wanda Sykes’s recent appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, where she promoted her Oscars hosting gig this weekend alongside Amy Schumer and Regina Hall. She explained her roster was pretty full (filming Netflix’s The Upshaws and working on Mel Brooks’s History of the World Part II) when she got the call to host the award show, but she couldn’t turn it down. After saying yes, she admitted:

“I was really excited about that, but then I realized that out of all the jobs that I have, this one is actually gonna cost me money.”

Jimmy Kimmel, a two-time host himself, agreed:

“It is going to cost you money — will you say how much you get paid for this?”

The comedian replied:

“I don’t even know, it’s, like, scale probably.”

“Scale,” for the record, is the minimum SAG-AFTRA union members can get paid for a job. But Jimmy said:

“It’s less than that. I got paid $15,000 to host the Oscars. And there’s one of me! You guys will probably have to split that.”

Wait, what?! He added:

“It sounds like a lot for one night but it’s months of work leading up to it. … Yeah, you’re getting robbed.”

Dang! Now remember, Jimmy’s show is on ABC, the same network that broadcasts the Academy Awards. You might call it biting the hand that feeds you, but perhaps they’re justifiably holding the network’s feet to the fire.

After all, the Oscars are having a LOT of issues. Ratings for the program have been dropping for years, but the battle to draw in viewers is alienating real film fans and Hollywood insiders. Most recently, the network controversially decided to cut a lot of technical categories from the live broadcast, undermining the work of so many behind-the-scenes workers. One Academy told The Hollywood Reporter:

“It’s complete fiasco. It’s another example of the Academy bowing to the network. There are a lot of very unhappy people.”

Worse, the solution proposed was for those awards to be given out while most of the “big stars” are still walking the red carpet. One major player — Best Actress nominee Jessica Chastain — has already said she’d skip the red carpet in order to support her makeup artists on The Eyes of Tammy Faye during their category. It’s a pretty huge loss for the show if Jessica freakin’ Chastain doesn’t walk the red carpet!

All in all, the program had no shortage of controversies before Jimmy went and spilled all their business. Adding fuel to the fire, he joked that Wanda should “hold out right now because they need hosts, you know?”

The 58-year-old replied:

“Well, I’ve already decided, I’m just gonna steal an Oscar.”

She added that she planned to get drunk backstage, snarking:

“I’m here to have some fun. It’s not like I’m getting paid, you know. You get what you pay for. You want sober Wanda, you’ve got to add some zeroes and move that comma. You’re getting free Wanda.”

Damn! Sounds about right. Maybe if ABC and the Academy treated everyone involved with the respect they were due, they’d create a better show… You can watch Wanda and Jimmy’s full conversation (below):