Christy Carlson Romano has opened up about the pay gap she faced on Disney Channel’s “Even Stevens.”
Romano, 42, revealed in an Oct. 9 Instagram post promoting her memoir “Once Upon a Trainwreck: The Rise and Fall of a Child Star” that she earned half of what co-lead Shia LaBeouf made during the show’s run from 2000 to 2003. The “Kim Possible” voice actress shared a letter her mother, Sharon, sent to her agent in 2000 documenting the disparity.
“Christy wants what Shia is getting,” Sharon wrote in the letter, which Romano posted alongside a throwback photo of herself, LaBeouf and her mother. The document showed LaBeouf, now 40, was earning $12,000 per episode while Romano made $6,000 despite their equal billing and screen time.
“As much as we love the show, it has to be worth her while,” Sharon added in her push for renegotiation.
Romano said she discovered the letter while writing her memoir and digging through “thousands of old photos and letters.” She explained that her mother wrote it while the family was struggling financially.
“My mom wrote it to my agent in 2000, asking for equal pay and admitting we were deep in debt,” she wrote on Instagram. “By then, my paycheck was keeping us afloat.”
The financial pressure on the teenage actress was substantial. Romano described how her mother’s advocacy came during a period when the household depended on her earnings.
“My mom was fighting for me, and she was also fighting for a household that depended on a teenage girl,” she continued in her post. “It took me years to understand I could love her for advocating for me and still wish I had gotten to just be a kid.”
Romano was careful to note that her memoir is not focused on LaBeouf or other famous names from her past. “They were part of my story. They were never the story,” she added. “The story is a girl who grew up too fast and a business that decided she was worth half.”
She also made clear she harbors no resentment toward LaBeouf personally, writing that he “earned every dollar.” Her broader message was aimed at others who experienced similar childhood pressures.
“If you grew up taking care of the people who were supposed to take care of you, I wrote this book for you,” she shared.
Romano has addressed her complicated feelings about LaBeouf’s post-“Even Stevens” trajectory before. In a 2021 YouTube video, she admitted she was once “a bit salty” about his rise to major Hollywood stardom while she pursued a different path.
“We went from seeing each other every day to not seeing each other for years to him being this huge star,” she said in the video. “For a while, I think the ghost of who Shia was and who he became was really frustrating for me.”
She also expressed “an undercurrent of regret” about choosing to attend college while LaBeouf made what she described as a “big ol’ splash in Hollywood.”
The relationship between the former co-stars appeared to strain further after LaBeouf’s February arrest in New Orleans. Romano posted an Instagram video days later with the caption, “When they ask you about your old co-star, but you’ve stopped ‘inserting’ yourself.”
Romano played Ren Stevens opposite LaBeouf’s Louis Stevens on the Disney Channel series for three seasons. The sibling comedy became a defining show for the network during the early 2000s, launching both young actors into wider recognition. While LaBeouf transitioned to blockbuster films and critical prestige projects, Romano shifted toward voice work and later pursued higher education, though she has described the emotional complexity of watching her former co-star’s meteoric rise while navigating her own career choices.
“Once Upon a Trainwreck: The Rise and Fall of a Child Star” was released Oct. 6.