Here's How to Beat the Gender Gap in TV and Film

100 years after Mary Pickford co-founded United Artists, where do women stand in the film/tv/media industry and what are we doing to close the gender gap? #IWD2017 #BeBoldForChange

Pickford might have approved of this year’s Oscars, with a focus on women’s accomplishments in STEM in “Hidden Figures” and the Best Picture Oscar going to “Moonlight,” a film edited by Joi McMillon, the first black woman ever nominated for an editing Oscar. But she would have said we still have a long way to go.

So where do we stand on the gender gap today? According to the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University, 9% of all narrative film directors are women. And directors get to choose their team. So cast and crew often mirror who’s in that top job—aka, white men. In fact, if you pool all women directors, writers, producers, executive producers, editors and cinematographers working on the top 250 grossing films (i.e., those most likely to pay decent wages), the result is only 19% women. In my own world of documentary, the number is slightly improved at 36%. But wages are also lower in this genre. Looking at popular genres like action (9%) and horror (11%), women are hard to find.

Photo: DP Megan Donnelly

There’s some good news for women, people of color and LGBTQ when we look at the new streaming content providers like Netflix and Amazon (who notably took home Oscars this year). Women and minorities had more speaking roles and regularly appearing characters in their shows versus traditional film and network television. (Sources: Annenberg/USC Media, Diversity and Social Change Initiative Report 2016; GLAAD Report on Queer Representation 2016). And women are less of a rarity on set. Netflix’s Marvel superhero show Jessica Jones will have women directing all 13 episodes this year.

Still, women only directed 17% of episodic television in 2015-16 (women of color 3%) so there is more work to do.

So what works to change gender diversity?

1.     HIRE MORE WOMEN ON SET AND IN POST

According to gender activist Kylee Pe?a, Workflow Supervisor for Bling Digital, “The one bold action an industry that has a 50-50 gender split in graduates and only a 20% employment rate for women? Hire women. It's as simple as that.” She adds “There are more layers to this problem beyond getting women in the door, including hostile work environments and too many assumptions made about what women really want out of their career. But the problem begins to solve itself when you have more women in the room at all.” 

Cinematographer Autumn Eakin explains that getting that job on set is often a challenge because “There’s an assumption of incapability when it comes to women, as opposed to the assumption of capability when it comes to men.” Eakin is a founding member Cinematographers XX, a resource for high quality cinematographers specializing in narrative, documentary, commercial and music video genres. She currently has narrative films competing at SXSW ("The Light of the Moon") and Tribeca Film Festival (Additional Photography for “No Man's Land”).

For gender parity on set, look to QUEEN SUGAR and Ms. DuVernay's insistence on women and minority directors. Ryan Murphy's production company also set a bar for parity on set that they exceeded in their first year just by paying attention to the issue. And gender-balanced crews can work just as well, if not better, than traditional all-guy crews. Says producer Adryenn Ashley of 21st Century Pictures Group, who hires gender-balanced teams: "I'm known for having the best looking crews in the business... not because I hire mostly women on my crew, but because of the camaraderie and fluid way we all work together breeds smiles and laughter through long hard days of production." 

WHAT YOU CAN DO: For starters, take names off resumes when you are reviewing them for positions, which helps all of us push back against our own gender and ethnic biases. If you’re a producer, use organizations like Cinematographers XX the next time you hire a DP. If you are a DP, hire a woman AC. If you are an editor, hire a woman assistant editor. If you are a gaffer, hire a woman grip. These are the trainee” positions in our industry and lead to the next level in careers.

2.     PROVIDE STRUCTURED MENTORING

Companies taking the initiative and measuring success are, not surprisingly, making some headway for women. The CBS Diversity Writers Program has nurtured hundreds of writers and future show runners (the network term for producers) for the past 12 years. According to founder Carole Kirschner, the program has launched more than 30 television careers. 

Photo: Participants in The Writer's Lab

Another success story is Meryl Streep’s founding of The Writer’s Lab, a partnership with NY Women in Film and Television. Streep saw a dearth of women over 40 writing stories, who often design more roles and more interesting roles for older women. By pairing selected writers with mentors through an intensive workshop process that also touches on getting scripts sold and produced, the organization hopes to inject more gender balance behind-the-screen and on-screen. 

Director Jennifer Warren, who has pushed for gender parity for decades, heads up the Alliance of Women Directors in Hollywood, which offers workshops and mentoring opportunities for women directors. And this year 50 Hollywood influencers and leaders, including studio heads, came together with Women in Film and the Sundance Institute to launch ReFrame, a formal action plan that includes toolkits, mentoring and an accreditation certificate for media companies that are gender inclusive.

WHAT YOUR COMPANY CAN DO: You don’t have to be as big as CBS to have a mentoring program in your media company. You can rotate mentors from different departments each month, put names into a hat, or just pay for a mentor-mentee lunch once a quarter. And remember, mentoring can work two ways—younger staffers have a lot to offer older ones, in terms of social media saavy and understanding of key markets like “millennials.”

3.     FINANCE WOMEN DIRECTORS AND THEIR FILMS

Financing is a big challenge for women filmmakers. Studies have shown that when men and women win at a festival like Sundance, the male directors get tapped for big-budget studio films, while the female directors don’t. To close this gap, several organizations have jumped into the fray, most notably three chapters of Women in Film in LA, New York and Washington, D.C. Other organizations that are helping to fund women-directed and produced projects include Chicken and Egg and Women Make Movies. Getting stories financed that include interesting roles for women is another challenge. New production companies started by well-known actors - Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon, Jessica Chastain, Rose McGowan to name a few—is a good start. 

WHAT YOU CAN DO: Don’t ignore crowdfunding campaigns by up-and-coming female directors and producers, especially women of color. Even well-known directors like Spike Lee have had to turn to Kickstarter to finance film projects ignored by major studios. Seed & Spark has created a crowdfunding platform that it claims is “raising bold, daring, diverse voices in film & TV”—check them out! And if you are in a position to teach film, watch films or finance films, then here’s a list of 100 women directors whose work is worth watching.

4.     HEAR US

One way to break down the barriers in the TV and film industry has been to put more women front and center at industry events, notoriously all male. My colleague Kylee Pe?a has worked diligently to be sure more women in post-production get on panels. She compiles a list each year of women who are experts in their field and willing to be tapped as speakers. Follow her on Twitter @kyl33t for more info.

Photo: #GalsNGear at NAB New York

Last year, I launched a program with my Washington, DC chapter of Women in Film and Video (WIFV) and the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) called #GalsNGear to spotlight women working in the technical fields of our industry. So far this year at NAB events in New York, Las Vegas, and Shanghai, we have showcased dozens of women working as cinematographers, sound engineers, VR producers, camera engineers, editors, UAV (drone) pilots, and finishing artists.

WHAT YOU CAN DO: If you are involved in professional events in our industry, be sure you book as many women for your panels as men. We are out here and ready to speak!

5.     MEASURE PROGRESS

Shining a light on the gender gap on and behind the screen is one way to keep the pressure on the industry. It’s as simple as that. You know the old adage “what gets measured gets done.”

WHAT YOU CAN DO: Support organizations like the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, that actor Geena Davis launched ten years ago to help change the gender dynamics in front of and behind the lens. The institute has spearheaded important research, education, thought leadership and advocacy programs for women and girls.

6.     TELL DIVERSE WOMEN’S STORIES

“Internet distribution hasn't been the panacea that was hoped for in terms of leveling the playing field for stories by and about women,” says WIFV Executive Director Melissa Houghton. In some cases, women are even retreating from blogs and postings given the trolls and threats. But, she explains, there is still plenty of bandwidth for telling and sharing womens’ stories, and ensuring that female characters have a voice.

WHAT YOU CAN DO: Whatever content you produce, whether it’s on your personal Facebook page or you run a communications department of a corporation, be sure you are including women’s stories. Not just traditional stories, but ones that break barriers, and show the diversity of women in all their many roles, ages, colors, backgrounds on this earth. 

“Women are half the world. One bold action is to let half the world tell their stories. Now!” says Gabrielle Kelly, Faculty member of the American Film Institute and author of “Celluloid Ceiling: Women Film Directors Breaking Through.” If Mary Pickford were here, she’d say Amen to that, sister.

Amy DeLouise  is a freelance video director-producer, and author of The Producer’s Playbook: Real People on Camera (Routledge), a frequent speaker at media industry events like #NABSHOW, and author of three #LinkedInLearning courses related to video writing, production and post production.