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Ahsoka: Claudia Black Elaborates More on Season 2 Exit, Pay Issues

Shortly after her interview with us, Ahsoka star Claudia Black offered new insights into the systemic issues that led to her Season 2 exit.

Clauda Black has been involved in the entertainment industry for over 33 years, and it's always a golden opportunity to participate in a tentpole franchise like Star Wars, as was the case during her run as Nightsister Klothow in the Disney+ live-action series Ahsoka. While promoting her upcoming series Spartacus: House of Ashur, the actress revealed to Bleeding Cool that she wasn't returning to the Dave Filoni-created series for the second season due to logistics and pay, "Disney, which is structuring things differently these days, could not pay me what I needed to be paid as a single mother to keep all my responsibilities going at home in Los Angeles, because they were filming in London. It was not something that they could make happen, and therefore, I had to bow out for season two." The Hollywood Reporter followed up with Black to elaborate on what she sees as more of an industry trend than isolated to Disney.

Ahsoka Star Clauda Black on Assumptions on Pay and the Greater Truth Behind Pay Disparity

"When I did the first season, people assumed that I'm making hundreds of thousands of dollars. It could not be further from the truth on a role like this," the Farscape star told THR. "[My pay was] closer to what I was earning when I was 19 or in my early 20s. I have heard people who work in corporations, not necessarily Disney, but all these bigger corporations, they have spoken in rooms about how lucky the actors should be to be part of a successful franchise, and that they will take it for the screen credit and they will take it for a bit of money, and then hopefully that will bring them further work, but that they should be lucky. The issue I have is when that comes to women, other people who were able to say yes to this job didn't have the same responsibilities, and that thinking is not designed around how much invisible work women do in a household."

Black is cognizant of the uphill battle she has along with her peers; "I have a great community, I have an amazing life," she adds. "It's just something needs to change and this needs to be discussed, and I knew the risks and I think there's more power in me stepping back, because I'm not desperate and there's more power in me talking about it even though there's so little job security and there's so little psychological safety in these spaces when women do speak up."

Upon the reception she's received since our interview, "It's a difficult situation, and the industry is fragile because if you push too hard, nothing gets made," she said. "It's a delicate balance to strike, and I completely understand the decision that Disney made. The people who were negotiating, whether it was the legal department or whoever they were, might not even know my screen credits, might not even know who I am, and so this was absolutely not personal. But I've been in the business for over 30 years, and it's wild how much of an outpouring there was in response in the last 24, 36 hours, whatever it's been. People from all over the industry, directors, actors, skilled technicians on the crew, just reaching out and acknowledging me, so positively, thanking me because I don't know anyone in this business who has job security."

Black remains grateful for her time in the Star Wars sphere, "It's really important to me, having this conversation as it continues in some respects from #MeToo, just starting to open up discussions around disparity and the way things are run, and the way women are treated. I'm not saying I've been treated poorly in this instance with Ahsoka, not at all. It's just that we're not thought about, we're not factored in, because there's so much invisible work that women do in a household, even when they're married. And it's far from invisible to themselves when they're an unpartnered mother, such as myself, and I think people assume that I've got a whole team of people picking up after me."

For more on Black discussing her email with Filoni, the burnout, and her decision to leave not being personal, you can check out the whole interview. Lucasfilm declined to comment to THR. Set to return for 2026, you can catch season one of Ahsoka, which also stars Rosario Dawson, Natasha Liu Bordizzo, Ray Stevenson, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Ivanna Sakhno, Diana Lee Inosanto, and featuring the voice of David Tennant, on Disney+. Spartacus: House of Ashur premieres December 5th with its first two episodes on Starz.

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