Women and Hollywood: Of the top 100 grossing leading men in Hollywood, 20 haven't worked on a single film with a woman director, Cosmopolitan has revealed. The magazine compiled a list of the big screen's A-list male stars, then sorted through their credits to see how many films they acted in, including small roles and animated voices, with female and male directors.
5 comments:
When starting my comments this week, I started scrolling through the article titles and as expected a few were about feminism in theater and the entertainment industry. Honestly, I am pretty tired of reading these articles because they all just belabor the same point that we all know, not say any actions that the author will enact to improve the issue. I decided I would read one of the articles and this one really grabbed my attention. It really is astounding that so many of the top notch male actors who have been in so many productions hardly ever had a female director. These kind of statistics are so scary as a female who is going into the production aspect of entertainment. I think that as important as it is to expose these kinds of statistics and using popular actors will get you more attention. There are also some negative vibes it sends out, for some people this is inspiring as a women to try to change the status quo as they go into this business but also it is scary that as hard as this industry is to navigate it is going to be even harder for me just because I am a girl.
There are a hell of a lot of straight white men that make millions of dollars in the entertainment industry. That's what it is right now, it's what it has been since the industries inception, and while I do think prominent Hollywood men need to start demanding that they work with people who aren't just like them, the actors are just a pawn in a much larger problem. The truth is that as much as the media and the news talks about these actors as though they have so much power, they rally don't. They aren't picking the script, or the team, or decided what makes and what doesn't, and the definitely don't have any say in casting they are just the last piece of the puzzle. The issue is that the people who pick the movies and make all the big decisions are also all white men, and maybe they are excluding people out of malice or maybe they pick plays with white men because people are drawn to what they relate to. Either way we will never start to have more diversity on screen until there is diversity off screen. There need to be a whole bunch of types of people working on choosing a film and it's cast, and crew. I agree that this article is staggering, and that there is a problem, but I think the problem is much larger and much broader than we care to admit.
I think this article highlights some very key, very crux points about women directors in the industry, as well as the attitudes surrounding them. Hopefully, with movements like We Do It Together on the rise, some of these highly visible actors will become involved in ways that help to advance women in the industry, leading to a greater percentage of male A-listers working with multiple female directors on a variety of projects.
David Oyelowo provides valuable insight and commentary on these statistics, acting as a contextualizing the numbers and contributing a male perspective. His revelation that he had to very actively hunt for female directors to work with really emphasizes the need to introduce and propel more female directors into the business. So too, his comment about the difference between criticizing and actively pursuing change and reform is something that must be internalized by both men and women in the industry alike.
"We're inclined to agree with "Selma" star David Oyelowo, who told Cosmo, "We can complain about inclusion or diversity or all these words that have now become buzz phrases, but if you have the ability to do anything about it and you don't, you are part of the problem."
I think this is a really good quote that explains the inherent fear or latency of progress - there is an obvious power discrepancy in the world, based on gender, race, sexual orientation, physical ability, etc. There is most times someone or a some people above you in some way, especially if you are a woman. In the past 100 years, this has become so obvious and disputed that people talk about it CONSTANTLY. People nowadays recognize that sexism is bad (in theory) yet the people who benefit off it, who have the power to make effective change, simply do not - not necessarily out of malice or selfishness, but because they have never known anything other than their privileged lifestyle. I am no different, I am a white, middle class woman. I have certain privileges that other women do not have, and I did not realize this until a few years ago. I am still working on changing myself, the viewpoints of others at my level of the social hierarchy, and the world as a whole I guess, but ignorance is a powerful tool. It takes time, it is frustrating, and reading these articles about the systematic power structure formulated to work against me just makes me sad. If you ever asked me to name a bunch of famous directors, I could only tell you men. I am a part of the problem for not seeking out works by female directors - I must work to be better.
This disappoints me almost more than the recent article regarding how few roles are offered to either women or minorities, and I’ll tell you why. Having directors with different perspectives of the story, or a different idea of what is a worthwhile story, that is what will diversify Hollywood. The fact that these actors, all instantly recognizable by name, many with dozens if not over a hundred films under their belts, have not worked with female directors in any proportion even remotely acceptable is appalling to me. And yes, it is a gender thing, and likely also a race thing, but the big reason to me why it makes no sense to me for that to be true is that there are women in the world who will go see movies, and there should be women directors who make movies from a woman’s perspective. In fact, there are women, and men, in the world who would gladly go see a movie made by a woman director. It’s just nonsense.
Post a Comment