Rebel Wilson has claimed studio executives wanted to replace the cast of Pitch Perfect for the third film.

The Australian actress played the character Fat Amy alongside Anna Kendrick, Brittany Snow and Anna Camp in the 2012 musical comedy and reprised her role in the 2015 and 2017 sequels.

However, she revealed in her new memoir Rebel Rising that getting the crew back together for the third film was not straightforward because the producers allegedly wanted to replace the original cast members with a new set of Barden Bellas led by Hailee Steinfeld.

According to People, the Bridesmaids star claimed she and her co-stars were deemed too “old” to lead another outing.

“None of us original Bellas were happy about this,” she wrote.

Steinfeld’s character was introduced in Pitch Perfect 2, which surpassed the success of the original and became the highest-grossing musical comedy film of all time.

Thanks to its box office success and market research showing the popularity of Fat Amy, the main cast members returned for the third film and Wilson negotiated herself a $10 million (£8 million) salary.

“Cue the big bucks,” she jokingly wrote. “Girl power!”

Speaking about her salary in an interview with The New York Times, the actress revealed she used her character’s popularity as leverage to add another $1 million (£790,000) onto her pay cheque.

“Universal Studios are incredible, but did they make a ton of money from the Pitch Perfect movies? Yes. So despite me absolutely loving all those folks at Universal, did I use that leverage to my advantage? Yes,” she stated. “And in the 11th hour, I go, ‘You know, that’s a lovely offer of $9 million. But I need one more to make it 10.’

“That’s a big milestone when you’re an actor. To receive an eight-figure offer, for a woman, is huge. Sometimes women don’t like to talk about that. Whereas I don’t think the guys have any issues saying they get $20 million a movie.”

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