Kate Beckinsale is a highly accomplished actress, but that doesn't mean she hasn't been subjected to Hollywood sexism throughout her career. While appearing on The Graham Norton show, the actress recalled how director Michael Bay seemed to be more focused on his distaste for Beckinsale's looks than on her acting ability while working together on the 2001 film Pearl Harbor. She said, "I don't think I fitted the type of actress Michael Bay the director had met before," "I think he was baffled by me because my boobs weren't bigger than my head and I wasn't blonde." She also said he was sexist in his promotion of the film, "he'd say, 'Kate wasn't so attractive that she would alienate the female audience.' He kept saying it everywhere we went, and we went to a lot of places."