Levo: Though Kirsten Dunst is only 35 she is a veteran, in every sense of the word, when it comes to working in the film industry. After all, by the time she was a tween she was acting opposite Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise in Interview with the Vampire. As she effortlessly moved from child actor to teen star (Bring It On is a masterpiece no matter what anyone says) to serious adult actress serving as Sophia Coppola's muse and making a beautiful transition into television with Fargo last year, she has clearly gotten to know the ins and outs of this complex industry. She especially has seen its treatment of women when it comes to film roles and her opinion of how Hollywood treats "older" actresses may surprise you.
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The idea of "the young girl who’s just, like, beautiful and things are happening to her” seems like a pretty good summary of far too many women’s roles in movies. I guess it makes sense that roles for older women are on average more interesting. I hadn’t really considered that before, but it is an important observation. However, there are still fewer roles for older women as opposed to younger ones, and once you account for all the ones played by Meryl Streep, there are only so many to go around. I could see this being alright for Kirsten Dunst because she is very well established, but given how many more opportunities (even if they are worse opportunities) there are for younger actresses, it seems inevitable that some portion of women will inevitably age out of the industry even if they were once reasonably successful just because there are fewer roles to go around. Maybe I’m wrong though, I’m basing that entirely off of other articles I’ve read.
This article reminds me of a great project named 'The Counting Actors Project' by Valerie Weak, an actress I worked with in a small theater production. She runs a website named "Works by Women San Francisco: spotlighting theatrical work written, directed, designed, performed, and produced by women in the San Francisco/Bay Area". The website address is as followed: https://worksbywomensf.wordpress.com/. The project began in June 2011, and is still going strong. She uploads statistics every month about how many women are in each play produced in the San Francisco and Bay Area. Most recently in September 2017, there were 10 female and 11 male playwrights, 7 female and 9 male directors, 14 female and 20 male union actors, 31 female and 40 male non-union actors and 45 female and 60 male total actors. Still, more men are hired than women in all categories. But according to an informant, there are more female actors than male actors in the area, and therefore men are always sought after for their gender. The website provides great resources to hard fact that there are more roles for men available.
This article is so frustrating. There is nothing at all surprising about Kirsten Dunst saying that there are not a lot of parts for women who are not the young bubbly ingénue, but not yet mature or old. I would love to see the statistics on ages of actresses vs age of character. The statistics on how many women of each age range are cast in a year would also be interesting.
I like how she has dealt with this dearth of parts- just taking interesting films rather than thinking about the part. This way, she is still working and because she is a well-known name, she can choose what she wants to work on while waiting to age into a demographic that the American Film industry has more of a use for.
Here is a list of actresses in their 30’s
Anne Hathaway.
Kate Hudson
Katherine Heigl.
Drew Barrymore
Rachel McAdams.
Kate Winslet.
Elizabeth Banks.
Angelina Jolie
And Actresses in their 40’s
Halle Berry
Penelope Cruz
Gweneth Paltrow
Amy Adams
Kate Winslet
Charlize Theron
Julia Roberts
Cameron Diaz
Cate Blanchett
I think I have seen more of the women in their 30s in recent movies than the women in their 40’s. Perhaps that is the real lull in their career. I hope Hollywood will move towards seeing women in all stages of life and not just when they are useful plot devices.
If I were an actress, I would probably feel exactly how Kirsten Dunst does. The older female characters in movies are usually very complicated. Mothers, grandmothers, teachers, mentors, all these female characters always have things going on under the surface, whether this is shown in the film or show with their own plot line or not. That would make those roles much more interesting and rewarding to delve into. Being able to show these underlying complexities through a smaller role where not everything is explicitly shown to the audience would be exciting, and would lend the actress more freedom. The main female characters are always confined to such strict standards, as Dunst said, they are beautiful, things happen to them, and they react in, usually, a predictable way. Older side characters are more up for interpretation.
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