The Roles of Women in Hollywood Films (Study) – Variety



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Time's Up and #MeToo dominate the discussions in Hollywood, and not a prize giveaway, nor does an interview on the red carpet appear to be taking place today without filmmakers and actors not having their say. Ask about pay equity and diversity. Everyone says the same thing: they want change. Yet, rhetoric does not seem to make an empirical difference when it comes to making movies.

A deep plunge into the 1,100 most profitable films from 2007 to 2017 reveals that women, minorities and members of LGBT communities and people with disabilities are rarely on the big screen. More troubling, the USC Annenberg School's study for communication and journalism reveals that little has changed in the last decade in terms of representation even as the issue of inclusion has become more widely discussed. In fact, men are twice as likely to have a role in a movie as women and the number of female roles in movies has actually decreased compared to 2008 and 2009.

"Unfortunately, it's largely status quo, "said Dr. Stacy L. Smith, co-editor of the report." There has been no movement on the part of the multinationals who run the studios when it it is about recruiting on the screen. "

In relation

On-screen characters accounted for 30.6% of the 48,757 characters of the films interviewed, while 29.3% of these characters belonged to underrepresented racial / ethnic groups, 2.5% were disabled people and less than 1% were members of the LGBT community. And many of these bands have not even recorded in the big Hollywood movies.

Last year, 43 films lacked black or African-American female characters, 65 lacked Asian or Asian-American female characters, and 64 did not represent a single Latino character. Seventy-eight films did not offer a single disabled female character and 94 were devoid of a single bad, gay, bibadual or transgender female character. It is the transgender community that is most completely excluded. Out of 400 films from 2014 to 2017, there was only one trans character.

The lack of on-screen representation may be partly due to a failure of diversity behind the camera. Only 4.3% of the 1,223 directors behind the highest-paying films were women, 5.2% were black or African-American and 3.1% were Asian or Asian-American.

This summer there have been some great studio films such as Spy Who Dumped Me "and" Crazy Rich Asians "that were anchored by female characters, but these films remain the exception to the rule. only 33 of the 100 most profitable films had a woman in a lead role or co-leader.Among the films that featured women in lead roles, only four belonged to underrepresented racial and ethnic groups. when women get the role, their roles often require that they be badualized.The female characters were more than twice as likely as male characters to be shown in badually revealing, partially bad clothes, or d & rsquo; To have their looks discussed in the context of the film.

USC, the Center for Women in Film and Television, and other academic institutions have made a lot of e research in recent years on the theme of diversity on the screen and behind the camera. Most of the time, the results have been discouraging, showing an industry whose progressive policy fails to influence its hiring decisions. Smith thinks that can change. The denigration of badual harbadment that has taken place over the past year has reversed the career of Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Brett Ratner, Dustin Hoffman and other major stars accused of "stalking". misconduct. It has also amplified calls for greater diversity in boardrooms and executive suites of entertainment companies and has led to the popularization of ideas such as inclusion runners, allowing talented of cinema to demand more diversity in their films and shows. This could be critical, Smith, who helped to find the concept of inclusion rider, says.

"I hope that as Time's Up and Other Movements take effect, it will be the last year we'll see that kind of numbers," Smith said, adding: "People have to wake up and think more inclusively."

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