The truth behind The Good (Fight and Wife, respectively) crossover that never came to be is finally out. Julianna Margulies revealed that she have been happy to reprise her Good Wife role as Alicia Florrick for the CBS All Access spinoff, The Good Fight, but says she was unable to negotiate adequate pay.
"CBS wouldn’t pay me," Margulies told Deadline, point blank, this past weekend. Margulies had previously addressed the disagreement with CBS at the Series Mania festival in France last week. "The showrunners had found a nice away to reintroduce my character, a story that was to span three episodes," she said, Deadline reports. "I was really excited about the idea, but CBS refused to pay my (ask)."
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The actress, who recently starred in the AMC series Dietland, elaborated on her comments to the outlet, stressing that she deserved more than the guest star rate that was offered to her due to her significance on the original show.
“I’m not a guest star; I started the whole thing with The Good Wife,” she explained. “I wanted to be paid my worth and stand up for equal pay. If Jon Hamm came back for a Mad Men spinoff or Kiefer Sutherland wanted to do a 24 spinoff, they would be paid."
The Good Fight stars Christine Baranski as Diane Lockhart and takes place a year after the events of the final season of The Good Wife. There's not a single fan of either series who wouldn't want to see Alicia and Diane reunite after the final slap they shared back in the O.G. show's 2016 finale. But for Margulies, the lack of pay felt like a slap of its own.
"To be perfectly honest, I was shocked," she said. "I was more surprised than hurt. I thought, what are you worth? If you are worthless, if you are not valued for your work, than what’s the point?"
CBS did not immediately respond to Refinery29's request for comment.