Leslie Jones Reveals How Much She was Paid for 'Ghostbusters' Remake, Talks Racist Hate She Received

Leslie Jones looked back on her experience with the all-female Ghostbusters remake and the racist hate that she faced after starring in it.

The 56-year-old Saturday Night Live alum shared the screen in the ghostly remake with Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon and Kristen Wiig.

She reflected on the experience in an except from her forthcoming memoir Leslie F-cking Jones: A Memoir, which was published by Rolling Stone.

In the segment, Leslie addressed the small amount that she was offered for the role, things that she learned from her co-stars and the horrible hate that she received on social media.

Read more about Leslie Jones’ Ghostbusters reflections…

Leslie wrote that she was initially offered $67,000 for her role in the movie, adding that she was able to “fight” to increase her salary to $150,000. It was still “way less” than Melissa and Kristen were offered. It’s not immediately clear how much her co-stars were paid, but Cosmopolitan reported that Melissa netted at least $10 million.

“The message was clear: ‘This is gonna blow you up—after this, you’re made for life,’ all that kind of s-it, as though I hadn’t had decades of a successful career already. And in the end, all it made for me was heartache and one big-ass controversy,” Leslie wrote about the offer.

Despite being paid less, Leslie said she was “the one who got taken through the ringer” online.

“I wonder why . . . Oh, right, because I was a Black girl. I was being sent films of being hanged, of white guys jacking off on my picture, saying, ‘You f-cking n****r. We going to kill you,’” she recalled, wondering how people could be so cruel.

Online hate was so bad that Leslie said then Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was attempting to help her.

“He was aware that I was being brutally attacked with racial slurs and worse, and started putting people on my account — this was basically the start of Twitter taking this shit more seriously,” she wrote.

Leslie said that she leaned on Kate during one hard night. She also revealed that she learned things from the other women she shared the screen with.

“Fortunately, I learned a lot from Melissa on that shoot. If she looked at a shot and she didn’t think it was right, she’d suggest that it be shot from a different side or angle,” she said. “Back then I didn’t know you could change your shots until I saw Melissa and Kristen do it. And these days I do the same kinds of things that they did on Ghostbusters.”

Through it all, Leslie struggled with why people were being so horrible. “How do y’all all get together to bully a person? It wasn’t as if I’d committed a crime or something — I was being bullied over a movie, over playing a part in a movie,” she wrote, adding, “I can’t believe I have to say this out loud.”

“Why would the world be so against a female Ghostbusters — it’s iconic,” she added. “What does that say about everyone? I think if we’d made it now, things might — might — be different, who knows. (Oh, no — I forgot about the reaction to the Black mermaid. . . )”

If you missed it, Leslie recently addressed Chris Rock and Will Smith‘s viral moment at the 2022 Oscars.