Really easy to say for someone else, long after the fact, but put yourself in that position as a young actress. Is it really so hard to see being pressured by someone like that, with all that's come out (you're not blessed with this hindsight, but it should inform this scenario) about him? It's unlikely you're as confident then as you are now, decades later, regardless how "established" you are.
Depends on the situation. Like I said, as a young actress in a hotel room with a movie mogul I could totally see being pressured.
But when you're talking about a scene in a movie, with negotiations and the ability to go away and talk with your friends and agent and others, I think it's different. Perhaps some people would still feel pressured in that situation, but I feel like if you don't have the ability to say no there then you would probably find it hard to turn down a chicken sandwich.
The main difference is that it's not necessarily all on Ms. Hayek to make the call. She can get advice. She can have a negotiator work for her (she was successful enough that I'd be shocked if she didn't have representation at that point). She can talk to other actresses about their thoughts on it. Any number of totally sensible and reasonable things, instead of "this makes me super uncomfortable but I guess that's just the way it is".
I get that it's hard when you're talking to someone who is offering you a job and so is nominally at least in a position of power, but ultimately you're totally able to walk away. A job negotiation is NOT a one way street. If you don't want to walk, then it's at least in your interest to inform yourself and make a little effort to balance the situation instead of simply bending over.
It's a side argument, but holding someone's career hostage in exchange for sex would also be a crime in and of itself, extortion in fact. I believe I read something about California making extorting for sex an specific offense under California law recently.
And I think this is where it largely comes down to the shadiness of how the sexual activities are approached. If a porn producer asks an actress to do a demo scene before signing her onto a part, that's straight up asking to see a demonstration of ability before hiring. If a movie producer wants a sex scene and asks to see an actress naked before hiring, I don't see a problem with that either. As long as it's all out in the open and agreed to, as far as I'm concerned a producer can make it a condition of hiring that an actress also has sex with him. And I would hope that anyone that was uncomfortable with that would tell him to sod off.
The problem comes with people like Weinstein trying to slip stuff under the table, as it were. Stuff that wasn't openly agreed to, and stuff where actresses (or actors) are placed into compromising situations where they have to make immediate decisions without the opportunity for consideration or discussion with their peers. But I feel like Salma Hayek making a movie with nudity is not exactly "under the table". The entire cast and crew can see it happening, but unless Ms. Hayek says something everyone will assume that it was consensual.
It feels awfully like the domestic violence victims who shelter and defend their abusers. Yeah, it's not their fault and they shouldn't be in that situation, but nobody can help if you don't let them know that there's something wrong.
