Rosamund Pike is convinced Hollywood’s inequality issues can be wiped out if leading men take on more supporting roles alongside women.
The Gone Girl actress feels her male counterparts are more open to play supporting roles opposite another actor, but many are still hesitant when it comes to taking second billing to a woman.
“Male actors now have to decide that they are willing to play supporting roles to female leads,” she tells Radio 4’s Film Programme, “and often it seems men don’t want to. They’re more than happy to play a supporting role to (my Western Hostiles co-star) Christian Bale – another man – (but) less happy to play supporting roles to a lead woman.”
Pike thinks if actors are calling for more female-centered films, they should be willing to play a supporting role in them.
“Many, many actors are coming out saying, ‘We want more female-driven stories, we want fantastic roles for women…,’ so the next consequence is, if you want those to come, then the boys have to play second fiddle,” she says. “That’s just the way it is. Until that happens, there will be fewer films with female leads made.”
Rosamund is set to star in her own female-driven film when she appears in A Private War as late journalist Marie Colvin, who covered conflicts all over the world, and was forced to wear a patch after she lost her left eye in Sri Lanka. She was killed in Syria in February, 2012 after illegally crossing into the country on the back of a motorbike to cover the nation’s civil war.
In the film, leading man Jamie Dornan will take on a supporting role.
Pike is also reportedly attached to play scientist Marie Curie in Radioactive.
