Romano Says Disney Paid Her Half of LaBeouf's 'Even Stevens' Salary

Christy Carlson Romano says Disney Channel paid her $6,000 per episode on "Even Stevens" — exactly half of co-star Shia LaBeouf's $12,000 — despite what she calls equal billing and equal screen time.

Romano makes the claim in her new memoir, "Once Upon a Trainwreck: The Fall and Rise of a Child Star," out now. The show ran from 2000 to 2003 and followed the clashes between a brother and sister with opposite personalities.

"I was a kid and the female lead on 'Even Stevens.' I was paid half of what Shia was paid; we were co-leads and had the same screen time," Romano wrote in an Instagram post promoting the book.

What does the paper trail show?

While writing the memoir, Romano found a handwritten letter her mother sent to her agent in 2000. She included a photo of it in the post.

The letter reads: "Shia receives $12,000 per episode and Christy $6,000. With 30% going into trust, we can't make it here financially. This show also holds her up from other work that pays more. Christy wants what Shia is getting."

That 30% refers to Coogan accounts — the legally mandated trusts that set aside a portion of a child performer's earnings.

"By then, my paycheck was keeping us afloat," Romano continued. "My mom was fighting for me, and she was also fighting for a household that depended on a teenage girl. 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."

Is this an attack on LaBeouf?

Romano says no. "Shia earned every dollar, and this book is not about him or any other famous name you might recognize," she wrote. Instead, she frames the memoir as being about "a girl who grew up too fast, and a business that decided she was worth half."

Representatives for Disney and LaBeouf did not immediately respond to Variety's request for comment.

Two child actors, two different childhoods

Romano has spoken before about her off-screen friction with LaBeouf. On the "Not Skinny but Not Fat" podcast last month, she described the two as "like oil and water."

"I was being raised and brought up to be this type A, I mean exactly like Ren Stevens," she said, referring to her character. "Like, you know your lines, you hit your marks, you don't mess up."

She described a regimented upbringing: "You're a New York kid, like that comes with a certain echelon… I was trying to go to pre-college Juilliard… everything we were doing, my mom called it cross-training, came with a certain dollar amount of training."

LaBeouf's childhood looked different. He has spoken about living with his recovering-addict father, an experience that inspired his 2019 film "Honey Boy."

"He was a Venice Beach kind of bum kid," Romano said. "It's like that kind of vagrant fun, but also very chaotic and very scary lifestyle, and he was very young to be having that."

What does this change?

The claim lands in an industry still digesting pay-gap disclosures from other franchises, and it comes with something most anecdotes lack: a dated, written document. Whether Disney responds or not, the memoir puts a specific number on a familiar pattern — and gives parents of young performers a concrete reason to check the paperwork.