ALL POSTS
Gary Sanchez Producer Jessica Elbaum Launches New Label for Women’s Comedies
Studio comedies have long exemplified some of Hollywood’s worst bro-ish excesses. The last decade has seen the fall of the romantic comedy and the rise of the bromance, which wouldn’t...
Catherine Hardwicke and Marti Noxon Get Series Orders
Cable just keeps getting better. Catherine Hardwicke and Marti Noxon have announced separate TV projects, both rather intriguing. Hardwicke, who’s built her career on young-adult fare like...
Berlinale Women Directors: Meet Anna Kazejak
The difficult transition to adulthood is a topic Polish writer-director Anna Kazejak has addressed repeatedly in her work. Kazejak made her feature debut in Ode to Joy, a triptych film co-directed...
Berlin Women Directors: Meet Sudabeh Mortezai
German-born Sudabeh Mortezai grew up in Tehran and Vienna. Her film debut was the documentary Children of the Prophet, a look at Iranian mourning rituals for Imam Hossein, the Prophet Mohammad’s...
Berlinale Women Directors: Meet Celina Murga
Argentine director Celina Murga was thrust into the international film scene when she was chosen by Martin Scorsese to participate in the Rolex Mentor and Protege Arts Initiative several years ago....
Oprah Headed for Broadway
Oprah Winfrey always wanted to be an actress. At a THR roundtable last year, Winfrey revealed that she was discouraged from pursuing acting during her teen years by her father, who declared, “No...
TV: Greta Gerwig to Write, Produce, and Star in CBS’s “How I Met Your Dad”
After co-writing and starring in the indie sensation Frances Ha, Greta Gerwig has signed up for the lead role in CBS’s How I Met Your Dad, a spin-off of the long-running sitcom How I Met...
2014 Athena List of Best Unproduced Screenplays with Strong Female Protagonists Announced
We need more female protagonists. According to a study by the Center for the Study of Women in TV and Film, only 11% of the top 100 grossing films in 2011 featured girls and women as main...
Berlinale Dispatch 1: Off the Plane and Into the Competition
I didn’t get to attend the beginning of the Berlin International Film Festival because the Athena Film Festival overlapped with the first weekend of the Berlinale. But I hopped on a plane the day...
Of Animal Crackers and Mr. Bojangles: When I Got to Talk to My Idol, Shirley Temple
Shirley Temple, one of the biggest — and littlest — stars that Hollywood ever produced, and who raised the spirits of a nation through the Great Depression and mine throughout childhood,...
Berlinale Women Directors: Meet Rebecca Chaiklin
The Occupy Wall Street movement receives a loving eulogy in the documentary Another World, directed by Rebecca Chaiklin and Fisher Stevens. Chaiklin is also the co-director of two other politically...
Berlinale Women Directors: Meet Sophie Fillieres
Paris-born Sophie Fillieres is the director of five films and the screenwriter of several other features. Her latest work, If You Don’t, I Will, follows a long-time couple, played by Emmanuelle...
Athena FF: Lexi Alexander Proposes a Solution to Hollywood’s Woman Director Problem
Lexi Alexander wants to be an optimist. “Let’s assume the men [in Hollywood] are not just selfish pricks,” she declared at the Athena Film Festival this past weekend, where she headlined a...
Athena FF: Callie Khouri on the Difference between Women Characters in Film vs. TV
Thelma and Louise screenwriter and Nashville creator Callie Khouri set out to be an actress, but soon realized that wasn’t for her. Staring out at the crowd from under a blinding spotlight, she...
Athena FF: Tales from the Trenches
No one group of women has cornered the market on terrifying tales fromthe trenches, but women working in TV and film definitely have a few riveting stories totell. Documenting and archiving those...
Athena FF: Amma Asante’s Belle Revisits Jane Austen Through Black POV
“This is the story of a woman who is loved.” Those are the words black British director Amma Asante used to describe her marvelous sophomore feature Belle at the Athena Film Festival this past...
Weekly Update for February 7: Women Centric, Directed and Written Films Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening The Pretty One — Written and Directed by Jenee LaMarque Zoe Kazan (Ruby Sparks) stars as a pair of identical twins in this pleasantly quirky dramedy. As much a...
Claudia Llosa’s Aloft Bought by Sony Classics
Peruvian director Claudia Llosa’s first English-language film, Aloft, has been purchased by Sony Pictures Classics. Starring Jennifer Connelly, Aloft is one of the four women-directed films to...
Berlinale Women Directors: Meet Gina Kim
South Korea-born director Gina Kim is best known for the critically acclaimed drama Never Forever (2007), starring Vera Farmiga as a woman struggling to conceive a child with her infertile husband....
Berlinale Women Directors: Meet Anja Marquardt
Writer-director Anja Marquardt was born and raised in Berlin when the city was still divided in two. Her personal and national background have strongly shaped her artistic interests. “Having felt...
Athena Film Fest Starts February 6th
Please join the Women and Hollywood team this weekend at the fourth annual Athena Film Festival, a celebration of female leadership in film. Taking place over four days at Barnard College in New...
The Pretty One Director Jenee LaMarque on Her Twin Obsession and Her Inspiration to Make Her Debut Feature
Being a sister is hard, but being the sister of your dead twin is way harder. That’s the sad predicament socially awkward Laurel (Zoe Kazan) finds herself in, but she’s so fed up with being...
The Big O: What’s at Stake for Cate in the Woody Debate?
[Editor’s Note: The opinions in this piece belong solely to the author, a columnist hired to assess the Oscar race from the female perspective. Women and Hollywood also published a piece earlier...
New Fellowship for Women Playwrights Announced
New York City’s Drama League and Broadway director Michael Mayer have announced the creation of the Beatrice Terry Fellowship. The fellowship will support the development of an original work from...
Julie Delpy to Direct a Sixth Feature
Julie Delpy has announced plans to write and direct her sixth film, A Dazzling Display of Splendor. Variety reports that the film is set during “the early days of silent films and the automobile...
Trailer Watch: Divergent Finally Looks Amazing
Divergent, out March 21, doesn’t seem to be garnering as much interest or as excitement as it should. The film adaptation of the first installment of Veronica Roth’s best-selling YA trilogy is...
Vanity Fair’s Diverse 2014 Hollywood Issue: FINALLY
Vanity Fair’s annual Hollywood Issue has always been a reliable barometer of the stardom industry’s fickle moods. In previous years, the magazine has reflected Hollywood’s preoccupations with...
Bryan Singer Blames Women for the Failure of Superman Returns
Bryan Singer is nobody’s favorite director. His last film, the fatally milquetoast Jack the Giant Slayer, was made for $195 million and earned just $65 million at the domestic box office. (Half of...
Nancy Buirski’s Afternoon of a Faun Explores a Dance Legend
Photographer-turned-film festival founder- turned-director Nancy Buirski’s first film was the documentary The Loving Story, a look at the 1967 Supreme Court case that made interracial marriage...
Sundance Sale: Sony Classics Nabs Maya Forbes’ Infinitely Polar Bear
After debuting at Sundance to great reviews, Maya Forbes’ feature debut, Infinitely Polar Bear, has been bought by Sony Picture Classics. Starring Mark Ruffalo and Zoe Saldana, the heart-tugging...
Sarah Polley, Breaking Bad’s Gennifer Hutchison Win Big at WGA Awards
Stories We Tell and Breaking Bad were feted as the 2014 Writers Guild favorites this weekend. After being mysteriously snubbed by the Academy this year, Sarah Polley’s family documentary Stories...
Frozen Wins Best Picture at Annie Awards
For the second time since the Annie Awards’ Best Animated Feature prize was established in 1992, a woman-directed film has received the top honor. The Annie Awards are the Oscars of the animation...
No Women Nominees in Top Categories for France’s Cesar Awards
Best Film. Best Director. Best Foreign (Language) Film. These are the categories where women filmmakers have been completely shut out by Oscar and Cesar this year. France’s answer to the Academy...
Kristin Scott Thomas Quits Film
After racking up nearly 80 credits to her name, Kristin Scott Thomas has declared she’s tired of making movies. “I just suddenly thought, I cannot cope with another film,” she told The...
I Believe Dylan Farrow
There are a few fundamental beliefs that I hold, and one of them is that I believe women. We live in a world that does everything to protect the powerful, and when the powerless speak up, against...
Study: Female Movie Stars’ Paychecks Decrease Rapidly After Age 34
On the hit show New Girl, Zooey Deschanel’s character Jess is finally embarking on responsible adulthood. In real life, though, the perpetually youthful Deschanel apparently stands at the...
Weekly Update for January 31: Women Centric, Directed and Written Films Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening Somewhere Slow “Overt femininity is sometimes just a wall to keep outsiders from peering in,” I wrote in my Los Angeles Times review. “That’s certainly the case...
SXSW Festival Lineup Features 20 Features from Women Directors
Of the 115 features that will play at the South by Southwest Festival in March 7–15, women filmmakers will be represented in 20, or about 17%, of them. Two of the eight films competing for the...
TV: Why Parenthood Is One of Television’s Best Shows About Marriage
As television’s revival hasreinvigorated the water-cooler discussion, many of the moments viewers have to talk about with someone have come fromcable. Hannah Horvath spends a sexy weekend with a...
The Monuments Men Erases Women from History
On Wednesday, the New York Times published a necessary correction to the upcoming movie The Monuments Men, a goofy historical caper about a team of actual art scholars and curators whose Sisyphean...
Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks Reunite — as Director and Producer
Few actresses are the target of as many comeback rumors as Meg Ryan. After 2003’s In the Cut, the Jane Campion thriller she had hoped would be her reinvention, Ryan disappeared into quickly...
Women and Hollywood February 2014 Film Preview
There’s only a smattering of films directed, written, and about women on offer this upcoming month, but there’s a few gems in the mix, as well as a great deal of variety in quality and...
TV: Tea Leoni Cast as Star of Madam Secretary
Earlier this week, we reported that Homeland writer Barbara Hall was developing a political drama for CBS called Madam Secretary that would center on an “maverick” Secretary of State. The...
TV: Ellen DeGeneres’ Lesbian Sitcom, Nahnatchka Khan’s Asian Am Series, & More Pilot News
Good news continues to trickle in about the networks’ fall pilot season. In addition to new shows from Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, and Casey Wilson and June Raphael, we can now look forward to four...
Trailer Watch: The Fault in Our Stars
Is there a way to tell a romance involving a teenage cancer patient that isn’t cheesy, exploitative, or politically regressive? Author John Green certainly tried to find a way with his...
The Big O: Which of the 3 Best-Picture Frontrunners Is Female-Friendliest?
Hear that “ouch”? It’s the sound of frustrated pundits pulling their hair as they attempt to divine the outcome of the Oscars’ best-picture race this year. Those of us who put our reps on...
Watch the Sundance Spotlight on Women Directors Panel
Indiewire’s Thompson on Hollywood founder, Anne Thompson moderated a women’s director panel at Sundance, and a video of the discussion was released earlier this week by SundanceNOW’s Doc Club....
Stephanie Soechtig’s Sundance Doc Fed Up Sold
Tracy Droz Tragos and Andrew Droz Palermo’s Rich Hill was the nonfiction jury favorite at this year’s Sundance, but the documentary that’s arguably received the most Park City attention is...
Sundance Women Directors: Meet Kate Barker-Froyland
Kate Barker-Froyland is the writer and director of Song One, her first feature film. Her short film “Match” screened at Lincoln Center and the Museum of Modern Art’s New Directors/New...
TV: Margaret Cho Joins Tina Fey’s Women’s College Comedy
Tina Fey’s 30 Rock has only been off the air for a year, but it feels like a lot longer. TV has never been better, and yet nothing’s been able to replace the Lemon-sized hole 30 Rock’s...
Elizabeth Banks to Direct Pitch Perfect 2
Two weeks ago, we applauded Elizabeth Banks, Lead Comedic Actress. Now we celebrate Elizabeth Banks, Feature Filmmaker. The Hollywood Reporter revealed yesterday that Banks will make her...