{"id":90287,"date":"2025-09-12T08:48:04","date_gmt":"2025-09-12T12:48:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/?p=90287"},"modified":"2025-09-30T08:49:57","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T12:49:57","slug":"nina-dobrev-says-she-almost-didnt-return-to-the-vampire-diaries-due-to-pay-parity-on-set","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/nina-dobrev-says-she-almost-didnt-return-to-the-vampire-diaries-due-to-pay-parity-on-set\/90287\/","title":{"rendered":"Nina Dobrev says she almost didn\u2019t return to The Vampire Diaries due to pay parity on set"},"content":{"rendered":"

The story of Elena Gilbert and Damon Salvatore has always fascinated fans of The Vampire Diaries<\/em>, but what went on behind the scenes was just as intense. Nina Dobrev and Ian Somerhalder\u2019s real-life relationship once made them the \u201cit couple\u201d before they went their separate ways. For years, rumors floated around that their breakup was the reason Nina walked away from the show. Now, however, a new book is shedding light on a very different reason \u2014 one that had nothing to do with romance and everything to do with pay.<\/p>\n

In I Was Feeling Epic: An Oral History of The Vampire Diaries<\/em>, it\u2019s revealed that Nina Dobrev, along with Candice King and Kat Graham, were among the lowest paid cast members, despite being part of the core group. Nina, in particular, carried double the load since she was playing both Elena Gilbert and Katherine Pierce, which meant twice the screen time, twice the lines, and twice the effort. Yet her paycheck didn\u2019t reflect that.<\/p>\n

Nina opened up about the imbalance, saying she had pushed for fair pay that matched her male co-stars, Ian Somerhalder and Paul Wesley. Together, the three were at the heart of one of television\u2019s most iconic love triangles, yet Nina was not treated as an equal. \u201cI wanted to play Katherine, but I wanted to be compensated fairly for that,\u201d she shared. \u201cIt felt like they were saying that all the hard work I was putting into it didn\u2019t matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Instead of paying her more, the studio reportedly decided to write Katherine off entirely so they wouldn\u2019t have to increase Nina\u2019s salary. This sparked a clash between the show\u2019s creators and the studio, ultimately leaving Nina to fight a lonely battle for recognition.<\/p>\n

Her exit from the show, once thought to be linked to her personal life, now looks far more complicated. It highlights a long-standing issue of pay disparity in Hollywood, where even lead actresses often struggle to be valued the same as their male counterparts. For Nina, the decision to walk away wasn\u2019t just about leaving a role but also about standing up for herself in an industry that didn\u2019t treat her equally.<\/p>\n

Would you like me to also write this in a softer, more \u201cstorytelling gossip-mag\u201d style, like a piece you\u2019d read in Cosmopolitan<\/em> or People<\/em>?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The story of Elena Gilbert and Damon Salvatore has always fascinated fans of The Vampire Diaries, but what went on\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":294,"featured_media":90288,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[14778],"class_list":["post-90287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-celebrity-news","tag-nina-dobrev"],"reading_time":"2 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/294"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}