Jennifer Lawrence scores major Hollywood pay day

Jennifer Lawrence has reportedly joined the $20m club. Photo/AP

Hunger Games star Jennifer Lawrence is bridging the Hollywood pay gap by earning double what her male co-star Chris Pratt will take in her next movie.

Lawrence spoke out against gender inequality after it emerged she earned less than her male counterparts in Oscar-nominated hit American Hustle.

But it's emerged that she'll join an elite group of movie-stars that can command a US$20 million fee (NZ$27m) for her next movie, Passengers - double what Guardians Of The Galaxy leading man Chris Pratt will reportedly receive.

Just five years ago, Lawrence was earning just $3000 a week for her breakthrough role in Winter's Bone, a low-budget drama about a struggling teenager with a criminal father.

But she's been catapulted to success with some high-profile performances in box-office smash hits that have turned her into Hollywood's darling, popular with audiences and critics alike.

She was reportedly paid just $1 million for her role as Katniess Everdeen in the original Hunger Games movie, which grossed more than $400 million.

But she got $10 million for the sequel, Catching Fire, and $15 million for the two-part finale, Mockingjay, the second of which is due to open in November.

She was thrust to the forefront of the equal pay debate after leaked emails between Sony executives revealed that she and Amy Adams, the female leads in American Hustle, received less than their male costars.

The women got seven per cent shares of the profits while director David O Russell and the three leading men, Bradley Cooper, Chrisitan Bale and Jeremy Renner, got nine per cent.

The news sparked fury among many prominent actresses, including Charlize Theron, who then demanded that she was paid an equal amount to costar Chris Hemsworth in their next film Snow White And The Huntsman.

"If you're doing the same job, you should be compensated and treated in the same way," she told Elle Magazine.

But now she's got the perfect revenge, negotiating the $20 million fee for her latest movie Passengers, a space travel romance, also with Sony.

It's a large proportion of a film that the studio's budgeted $80-95 million for, in which she plays an interstellar traveller, awoken early from deep sleep long before she is due to arrive at a new planet.

But in the wake of the stolen email scandal, Sony reportedly tried to renegotiate the deal due to questions over profitability because of limited scope for sequels.

But she reportedly threatened to walk out unless the fee was met, and director Morten Tyldum allegedly said he would go with her. Her management now says the deal is "watertight".

Lawrence is no undoubtedly a Hollywood A-lister, joining the elite and dwindling group of actors who can command a $20 million fee, including Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert Downey Jr and Matt Damon.

She received critical acclaim for her role alongside Bradley Cooper in Silver Linings Playbook which was a touching story of two people who find romance while struggling with mental health issues.

She won the Best Actress Oscar for the role.

It shows the versatility of the star, who made it big with The Hunger Games trilogy which is popular with teens.

Chris Pratt, her co-star in Passengers, is an up and coming actor whose biggest role was the lead in smash hit Guardians Of The Galaxy, which quickly made him hot Hollywood property.

He's due to star in big budget Jurassic World, a sequel to Jurassic Park, released this year.

- Daily Mail