LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - An actress fired from TV's "Melrose Place" after getting pregnant testified Friday that she rejected a subsequent offer by the show's producers because it contained a pay cut. Hunter Tylo said Spelling Entertainment Group offered her a new contract after she threatened to sue them, but for less money. She said the new contract would have paid her $15,000 per episode, instead of the $18,000 per show she had been promised earlier, and wouldn't take effect until the following season -- leaving her with no income or health benefits for one year. Tylo, star of the daytime soap opera "The Bold and The Beautiful," is suing Spelling Entertainment Group and Spelling Television Inc. -- run by Hollywood mogul Aaron Spelling -- for pregnancy discrimination, breach of contract and wrongful termination. Defense lawyers say Spelling had a right to fire Tylo because a pregnant actress could not have played the character of Taylor McBride, described as a "vixen" and "seductress" who would steal star Heather Locklear's on-screen husband. After Tylo was fired, the role was filled by actress Lisa Rinna, who still appears on the show. Tylo had testified earlier in the trial that, after Spelling learned of her pregnancy and fired her, she had tried to contact "Melrose Place" producers and got no response. On Friday, under cross-examination by defense lawyer Linda Edwards, she conceded that Spelling had made her the new offer after she threatened to sue. But she stood by her previous testimony. "If you want to define that as a response, it's a response of a sort," Tylo said. "But in my mind, that was not a valid response. I preferred to be talked to by (executive producer) Frank South." She said that in reading the new proposed deal, she saw that she would have to abide by the terms of her original contact, which she considered unacceptable. "I knew that I could be fired again if I became pregnant," she said. "I'd already been fired once for that."
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