ALL POSTS
LAFF 2015 Women Directors: Meet Delila Vallot — ‘Can You Dig This’
Delila Vallot isan actress, dancer and director, born and raised in Hollywood, California. Inher career, she has worked with some of the most well-known choreographersto date, including Vince...
Trailer Watch: Meryl Streep Stops Running Away from Family Drama in New Spot for ‘Ricki & the Flash’
“I came out here because I wanted to help you,” Ricki (Meryl Streep) tells her recently divorced daughter Julie (Mamie Gummer). The new trailer for “Ricki and the Flash” emphasizes Ricki’s...
Katherine Heigl’s Lesbian Dramedy ‘Jenny’s Wedding’ Sold to IFC
Rom com queen Katherine Heigl stars in a variation on her theme in “Jenny’s Wedding,” which has been sold to IFC. Heigl stars as Jenny in writer-director Mary Agnes Donoghue’s gay dramedy....
Nicole Perlman to Adapt Hugh Howey’s Sci-Fi Bestseller ‘Wool’
Nicole Perlman, co-writer of “Guardians of the Galaxy,” has lined up her next project. Perlman will adapt Hugh Howey’s self-published runaway bestseller “Wool,” in which a few rebellious...
LAFF 2015 Women Directors: Meet Maggie Kiley — ‘Caught’
Filmmaker and actress Maggie Kiley was one of eight directors selected for the American Film Institute’s Directing Workshop for Women and one of twenty accomplished filmmakers chosen for the...
Amy Sherman-Palladino Discusses Casting Melissa McCarthy, How to Achieve Equality in Hollywood
Amy Sherman-Palladino, best known for creating the WB mother-daughter hit “Gilmore Girls,” shared great insights about women in TV during a panel at the ATX Television Festival in Austin....
New $25,000 Screenplay Prize to Promote “Strong and Complex Female Lead Characters”
Got a great screenplay with a compelling female protagonist and happen to be an Independent Filmmaker Project (IFP) member? If so, good news: You’ve got a chance at a $25,000 unrestricted grant....
Gini Reticker Chronicles Muslim Women’s Fights for Social Justice in ‘The Trials of Spring’
The brave efforts of nine women activists striving for a better world in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Syria, Bahrain and Yemen are documented in Gini Reticker’s “The Trials of Spring.” Billed as a...
‘Fun Home’ Makes Feminist History at Tony Awards
The women responsible for bringing “Fun Home” to the stage made history at the 69th annual Tony Awards last night. Jeanine Tesori and Lisa Kron became the first all-female writing team to win a...
Melissa McCarthy’s ‘Spy’ Opens at #1 in US, Worldwide $86.5 Million
Melissa McCarthy, enthusiastic reviews, and a feminist twist/deconstruction of the secret-agent genre propelled “Spy” to the top of the box office this weekend. The R-rated comedy made $30...
Country Music and Cannes: Blaming Women for Sexism
At first glance,country music and the Cannes Film Festival couldn’t appear more culturallydifferent. And yet, recent events reveal that some high-profile individualsassociated with these...
June 2015’s New & Noteworthy Women-Created VOD & Webseries: Inclusive Gaming and Online Dating
This week’s female-centric VOD releases and noteworthy webseries are not to be missed. On the VOD front, we have two documentaries that have garnered some well-deserved buzz over the last few...
Weekly Update for June 5: Women Centric, Directed and Written Films Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening This Week Spy — Pick of the Week Melissa McCarthy finally gets the star vehicle worthy of her in “Spy,” a jet-setting caper that hilariously deconstructs the...
Helen Estabrook to Produce Film Adaptation of Eliza Kennedy’s Cold-Feet Comedy ‘I Take You’
Helen Estabrook (“Whiplash”) will team up with Tobey Maguire to adapt Eliza Kennedy’s debut novel, “I Take You,” for the big screen. Published on May 5, the book centers on an successful...
Watch: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Tells Girls and Women to “Forget About Likability”
Nigerian novelist and outspoken feminist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has an intensely devoted following, which famously includes Beyonce. The “Americanah” author’s critical acclaim and public...
Ali Smith’s ‘How to Be Both’ Wins Baileys Prize for Best English-Language Novel by a Woman
Ali Smith’s “How to Be Both,” an experimental novel about two characters living centuries apart, has been crowned the winner of the 2015 Baileys Prize. The twin tales of an Italian...
Trailer Watch: Viola Davis and Jennifer Lopez Take Back the Neighborhood in ‘Lila and Eve’
A grieving mother attempts to get revenge on the dealer who killed her son in a drive-by shooting in the female-led vigilante thriller “Lila and Eve.” Starring Viola Davis as a woman who sees...
‘The Babadook’ Director Jennifer Kent to Helm True-Life Lesbian Murder Drama ‘Alice + Freda Forever’
Jennifer Kent has announced her follow-up to “The Babadook”: the story of a broken engagement between two 19th-century teenage girls that leads to the murder of one by the other. Based on...
New Research from Women’s Media Center Concludes “Media On All Platforms Are Failing Women”
The Women’s Media Center has released their annual report tracking the status of women in both entertainment and the news. We’re feeling more optimistic about the future of women in Hollywood...
Gender and Identity in the Wachowskis’ “Sense8” on Netflix
Ever since “The Matrix,” I’ve been hoping the Wachowskis (formerly the Wachowski brothers) would do something else really worthwhile. I’m not sure if the directing duo’s “Sense8” (on...
Amy Schumer Calls Bullsh*t on Things That Give Women Low Self-Esteem in Awards Speech
Drew Barrymore and Toni Collette Comedy ‘Miss You Already’ Sells to Lionsgate, Roadside
Catherine Hardwicke’s “Miss You Already,” starring Drew Barrymore and Toni Collette, is set to be acquired by Lionsgate and Roadside. Described as a rom com, Morwenna Banks’ script finds...
Trailer Watch: Greta Gerwig is the Queen of Uncomfortable Comedy in ‘Mistress America’
Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach’s eagerly anticipated follow-up to 2013’s “Frances Ha” finally has a trailer. “There’s no cheating when you’re 18. You should all be touching each other...
‘Sister Act’ Remake On the Way
It’s been over two decades since the last “Sister Act” movie, “Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit,” was released, but Disney is apparently confident that singing and dancing nuns never go out...
How The Lilly Awards Help Make Women’s Stories Matter
The recipients of this year’s Lilly Awards gathered onthe stage of Off-Broadway’s Playwrights Horizons Monday afternoon and remained thereas all the awards were presented, chatting, laughing,...
Zoe Kravitz to Star as Gunslinging Vigilante in Shana Betz’s Western ‘Black Belle’
Zoe Kravitz has booked a new gig, and it sounds awesome. The actress will star as a hitwoman in “Black Belle,” a Western set shortly after the Civil War. Deadline reports that the film will...
Watch: Caitlyn Jenner’s Sexist Treatment Exposed on “Daily Show,” Promo for Her New Reality Series
“You start learning the kind of the pressure women are under all the time about their appearance,” Caitlyn Jenner says in the first trailer for her reality series “I Am Cait.” (Watch the...
Quote of the Day: Simon Pegg Complains “Men Tend to Write Women as Their Fantasy”
Simon Pegg recently confessed something he said is likely to get him into trouble. “I think women write men better than men write women,” the actor contended. “Men tend to write women as...
Shonda Rhimes’ First Book, ‘Year of Yes,’ to Arrive in November
Thank Shonda Rhimes for taking care of this year’s Christmas list. TV’s most powerful writer has penned her first book, titled “Year of Yes,” about the 12 months when she accepted...
You Know Things Are Bad for Women When We’re Cheering a Studio for Making a Writing Group Only 78% Male
Two women have been added to the brain trust for the planned expansion of the “Transformers” franchise. Christina Hodson and Lindsey Beer are the first female writers to join the group....
New Study Charts the “Post-Festival Chasm” for Women Directors
After becoming the first black woman filmmaker to win the Best Director prize at the Sundance Film Festival (for her second narrative feature “Middle of Nowhere”), Ava DuVernay waited for people...
Study: Books About Women Are Shut Out of Major Awards
Of the eight films nominated for Best Picture at this year’s Oscars, none were about women. Lest you think that was some freak coincidence, novelist Nicola Griffith has come out with an informal...
First Trailer for Suffragette: “We Will Win”
The first trailer for ‘Suffragette’ has rolled out along with the announcement that it will open the London Film Festival on Wednesday October 7th. This incredibly powerful trailer shows the...
28% of 50th Karlovy Vary Film Fest’s Competition Films Helmed by Women Directors
Female filmmakers will make up 28% of the competition lineup at the 2015 Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. The Czech-based event, one of Europe’s premier film festivals, holds four...
‘Hannibal’ Showrunner Bryan Fuller Explains Why He Banned Rape on His Show
NBC’s “Hannibal” often makes perverse art out of mutilated bodies, stretching the limits of what can be shown on television. But “Hannibal” showrunner Bryan Fuller has, until now, barred...
Update!: 115 Films By and About Women of Color, and What We Can Learn From Them
The response was overwhelming after we posted the original list of 84Films By and About Women of Color, which came from a recent Twitterconversation led by director Ava DuVernay. Not only was the...
Help Improve ‘Women and Hollywood’: Take Our Survey
Women and Hollywood has been in existence for almost 8 years now. I cannot tell you how much the site and the work has grown since that day in 2007 when I pushed the “publish” button on Blogger...
Congresswoman Tells Federal Government to Investigate Social-Media Abuse
Back in March of this year, feminist blogger and critic Anita Sarkeesian stated, “I’m angry that I’m expected to accept online harassment as the price of being a woman with an opinion.” The...
Study: How Much Older Are Male Leads in Romantic Films than Their Female Co-Stars?
Last week, Oscar-nominated actress Maggie Gyllenhaal revealed that, by Hollywood standards, she was “too old” to play the on-screen love interest of a 55-year-old man. She’s 37. Following...
Catherine Hardwicke in Talks to Adapt Ava Dellaira’s YA Novel ‘Love Letters to the Dead’
Director Catherine Hardwicke (“Thirteen,” “Twilight,” the upcoming “Miss You Already”) is in talks to channel teen angst once more with an adaptation of the YA novel “Love Letters to...
June 2015 Film Preview
Summer brings more great news for those of us who long to see women-centric films in theaters.Many of the biggest and most anticipated films of the season are aboutwomen — and a fair portion...
Reese Witherspoon and Bruna Papandrea Discuss “Making Movies with Women at the Center of the Story”
Reese Witherspoon and her Pacific Standard co-founder Bruna Papandrea aren’t like most producing teams. One half of the shingle is an Oscar-winning actress, of course, but more importantly, the...
2016 Athena Film Festival Now Accepting Submissions
Interested in submitting your film to the 2016 Athena Film Festival? The festival is now accepting submissions! Please read our criteria and fill out the form below to submit your application. What...