Octavia Spencer Says LeBron James Helped Her Get Higher Pay for Madam C.J. Walker Project: ‘We Need All of Our Male Counterparts’

LeBron James may be considered the world’s greatest basketball player, but he did a stellar job of going to bat for Octavia Spencer and helping her get higher pay in a project they’re working on together.

The Academy Award-winning actress and the NBA star are executive producers for a limited series about Madam C.J. Walker, the civil rights activist, entrepreneur and Black hair care visionary who was one of the first Black self-made millionaires in the United States.

Spencer will also star in the project and play the part of Sarah Breedlove, otherwise known as Madam C.J. Walker.

In July 2018, it was announced that Netflix bought the project, and last Saturday, Jan. 26, Spencer said that James helped her negotiate the higher pay.

In fact, in January 2018, Spencer said actress Jessica Chastain did the same thing for her when they were announced last year as co-stars in a holiday-themed comedy movie project, according to Variety. 

But despite the two women bonding together, Spencer said it takes both genders to fill the pay gap, which is why she’s so grateful for James’ help.

“I have to say, when I was negotiating my deal for ‘Madam C.J.,’ LeBron James had to intervene,” Spencer recalled while speaking at the Sundance Film Festival last weekend in Park City, Utah. “We need all our male counterparts to be in the fight with us.”

Netflix’s “Madam C.J. Walker” will be based on the book “On Her Own Ground,” written by Walker’s great-great-granddaughter A’Lelia Bundles, and it’ll recount a lot that isn’t known about the history-making renaissance woman.

A release date hasn’t been announced for the project, and James has yet to respond to Spencer’s kind words about him.