It is nuts! 'Harry Potter' star Daniel Radcliffe on Hollywood gender inequality

Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe says he is glad Hollywood is talking about gender inequality more than ever now.

The debate surrounding differing pay for actors and actresses hit headlines following the leak of Sony emails back in 2014 which revealed the female stars of American Hustle were on a 7% pay deal, while their male co-stars were on a 9% deal.

Jennifer Lawrence, who appeared in the film, and pal Lena Dunham have since spoken out about the lack of equality in Hollywood, but Radcliffe admits he had been unaware of the issue until the email leak, reported Daily Telegraph.

"It is nuts to me. I'm incredibly glad it (gender equality) has come up because I had just naively thought this was not an issue anymore because how can this still be happening? It's crazy. It is definitely the time for our industry to step up. Especially if we want to pride ourselves on being a liberal, progressive industry then you can't be doing that."

Radcliffe, 26, added he finds it baffling that American Hustle bosses had made a decision to pay the film's stars unequally.

"What I found shocking about the whole American Hustle thing, and please correct me if I'm' wrong - but if I have this right, they had all the boys on one deal and all the girls on another deal," he said.

"That, to me, is shocking... stuff like that is crazy and the thing I can't help but think is 'Who? Who's doing that? What guy is sitting in a studio somewhere thinking let's keep the girls out of some money'?"

The actor said there are amazing actresses in the world right now and the film industry needs to write better roles for them and pay them well too.