ALL POSTS
Debra Messing Making Broadway Debut in Outside Mullingar
Early next year, Debra Messing will make her Broadway debut in Outside Mullingar. Messing will co-star with Brian F. O’Byrne in the production. Written by John Patrick Shanley (Doubt) the...
Comic-Con: The New Trailer for The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
A new trailer debuted at Comic-Con for The Hunger Games: Catching Fire during the panel for the film. Per usual, the new trailer is intense and compelling. Based on the second novel in the series,...
Rita Moreno to Receive Lifetime Achievement Award at 2014 SAG Awards
Rita Moreno’s amazing nearly 70-year-career will be honored at the 2014 SAG awards with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Moreno, 81, is one of the only 11 artists and only Hispanic...
Must-Read Blog: Hollywood Boys Club
Check out this new blog, Hollywood Boys Club, that compiles examples of “men only” in Hollywood. Current examples include the all male writing staffs of television shows like Real...
Sticking Together
Having recently completed my first feature film, Arcadia, I’m occasionally asked in q&a’s what my experience has been directing a feature as a woman. In truth, I don’t often...
Alyssa Rosenberg Joins Women and Hollywood
I have some great news to report. Alyssa Rosenberg, the amazing, talented writer is joining Women and Hollywood as a weekly columnist. When I was thinking about bringing in someone to...
Comic-Con: Veronica Mars Trailer
Out of Comic-Con is the first footage from the anticipated Veronica Mars movie. In March, creator Rob Thomas launched a Kickstarter fund requesting $2 million to make a film version of the critically...
Sony Pictures Classics Only Counting on Women for Austenland
Sony Pictures Classics (SPC) has made a calculated decision that the audience for the upcoming Jerusha Hess (who co-wrote Napoleon Dynamite) directed film will be predominantly women. They are...
Celebrate the 18th Anniversary of Amy Heckerling’s Clueless
I remember watching Clueless for the first time when I was in 5th grade. It was immediately my favorite movie because I wanted all of Cher’s clothes, her electronic wardrobe and thought Paul...
Outfest Review Roundup: Road Trips, True Love and Iconic Queer Memoirs
This year’s Outfest Los Angeles has yet again proven why they are one of the best LGBT film festivals in the country. They’ve had a spectacular line up of LGBT films including a few we...
Weekly Update July 19th: Women Centric, Written and Directed Films Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening This Weekend Girl Most Likely – Directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini, written by Michelle Morgan Kristen Wiig could have made another...
2013 Emmy Nominated Women React to Nominations
As we reported yesterday, the caliber, talent and diversity of women nominated for the 2013 Emmy Awards is incredible. We have writers and directors like Lena Dunham and Allison Anders earning...
Guest Post: There She Is: From Festival Rejections To Online Success
In film school you learn that there is an established process once you’re done with your film. After hours slaving away in an edit room, you start applying to festivals and hope for the...
Quote of the Day: Fay Kanin on Being President of the Academy
Earlier this week, the WGA and Academy paid tribute to the late, great Fay Kanin. Kanin passed away in March at the age of 95. Kanin was a woman of many achievements–writing for television and...
Cross Post: In Praise of Difficult Women
Fuck off, Don Draper, Walter White, Tony Soprano, et al. The age of the male antihero is over. Sure, you’ve had a good run. And, fuck, look at all those shiny, shiny Emmys. But I’m...
Reese Witherspoon to Star in Adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s Wild
Fox Searchlight just acquired the worldwide rights to Cheryl Strayed’s critically acclaimed and bestselling memoir Wild. Reese Witherspoon is set to star and produce. The film is about Strayed...
Looking at the 2013 Emmy Nominated Women
Looking at this year’s Emmy Awards a couple of things are clear. TV, like films has changed. Cable had been infiltrating the Emmy’s for years but now there is Netflix, maybe soon...
One Man Trailer Perfectly Illustrates What is Wrong With Hollywood
Why is a man always saving everyone? {"title":""One Man" Movie Trailer Voice Supercut","author_name":"Solid Wooden...
Women Directed Films at the 2013 Locarno Film Festival
The line up for the Locarno Film Festival was unveiled today, the first under new artistic director Carlo Chatrian. The festival runs from August 7-17th and has a diverse slate of films ranging from...
Pussy Riot are Back with New Video
The ladies of Pussy Riot are back with a new video “Like a Red Prison.” The video is the first in over a year, since their anti-Putin protest which led to three of the members being...
The Women’s Guide to Comic-Con
Comic-Con has long been a boys club — I mean, it is called “fanboy” culture for a reason. However, in recent years there’s been more and more female-skewing programming,...
Guest Post: The Evolution of Women in Comedy: From Mary Tyler Moore to Amy and Mindy
Treva Silverman had spent most of her 30 years wanting to be funny and female — and allowed to do so in public, maybe even collect a buck or two for her trouble. Growing up in the 1950s in...
Jane Campion on Television, Women and Being ‘Untameable’
In a new interview with The Telegraph, Jane Campion talks at length about Top of the Lake–her excellent miniseries which just premiered in the UK starring Elisabeth Moss as a detective looking...
Trailer Watch: Billie Jean King
For the first time, PBS’ American Masters series is profiling a sports figure and we are glad that they chose Billie Jean King. The documentary focuses on King’s career as a tennis...
Claire Danes Almost Quit Acting Due to Lack of Good Female Roles
In the August issue of Vogue, Claire Danes talks at length about her family, playing Carrie Mathison on Homeland and her preparation for that role. The big news is that after receiving critical...
Nine for IX: Let Them Wear Towels Directed by Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern Premieres Tonight on ESPN
The latest film (the third) in the series Nine for IX is a historical look at the women who broke the barriers for women to cover sports. It is directed by Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern and...
Cross Post: Why Women Should Get The Jobs
In a recent episode of the television series Mad Men, two advertising agencies merge. Each agency has a single woman on their creative team and one woman is told she’s...
Women Attain Their Highest Level of Leadership at the Academy
Each year the Academy votes in members of its Governors Board. The board members represents each of the Academy’s 16 branches which includes the newly created costume designers branch....
On the Importance of Talking About “Lady Quotas”
I saw this blog post on Jezebel from the editor in chief Jessica Coen who doesn’t have a lot of time to write as she spends most of her day keeping everything moving and flowing on the ladyblog...
J.K. Rowling Fooled Everyone With Latest Novel
In April, The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith, was published. The book focused on private investigator, Cormoran Strike, who lost a leg in Afghanistan, his girlfriend left him and he is...
Aubrey Plaza and the Importance of Having Girls Come of Age in Film
Aubrey Plaza has always been a dark comedic force in her role as April Ludgate on Parks and Recreation. She has continued to show her comedic range as a young intern in Safety Not Guaranteed and now...
Why Talking About Women Directors Matters
When I started doing this work six years ago, and when I spoke about the importance of talking about women directors, about the importance of their voices, I was basically talking to the mirror....
Guest Post: Interview with Paula Ortiz
Paula Ortiz’s terrific feature debut Chrysalis aka De tu ventana a la mía is a film of perseverance of spirit. With images that resemble a Braque painting one minute, a Dutch master the next,...
Malala Yousafzai To Be Subject of New Documentary
The extremely brave 16 year old Malala Yousafzai will be the subject of a new documentary by Davis Guggenheim (An Inconvenient Truth.) Last October, Yousafzai was shot in the head by...
Sundance Institute Awards Documentary Grants
The Sundance Institute awarded 29 documentaries grants from their Documentary Film Program and Fund. Combined all the films will receive over $550,000 in grants. Here are the women directed...
xoxosms directed by Nancy Schwartzman to Air on PBS July 15th
Nancy Schwartzman’s short documentary, xoxosms, will be airing on PBS on July 15th. Schwartzman’s doc follows the romance between Gus and Jiyun–seemingly opposites in every...
When Women and Hollywood Came to London
I work in script development in the UK, and am increasingly frustrated, infuriated and worried by the portrayal – or lack thereof – of women in film and TV. Readers of this site are...
Directors Tia Lessin and Carl Deal Use Kickstarter to Replace PBS Funding
Documentarians Tia Lessin and Carl Deal made a big wave with their film, Trouble the Waters about Hurricane Katrina. They got funding through PBS to make their new film that examined the role...
Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken Makes Moves
Angelina Jolie’s second directorial feature Unbroken now has a release date and a star. Written by Joel and Ethan Coen, Jolie’s next feature is based on Laura Hillenbrand’s...
New TV Study Finds Young Female Characters are Sexual Targets
The Parents Television Counsel has released a new television study that looked at teen sexual exploitation on primetime television. They found that the primary target of the sexual exploitation were...
Trailer Watch: Lovelace
Amanda Seyfried stars as Linda Boreman in the story behind the woman who made Deep Throat. Opens in US theatres August 9. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vJADecKL-4
Ava DuVernay To Take on Martin Luther King Jr. Biopic Selma
Ava DuVernay has signed on with Plan B (Brad Pitt’s company) and Pathe UK to helm Selma, a biopic on civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. The film will focus on the voting rights...
Emma Thompson Returns to the Big Screen in Saving Mr. Banks
It feels like it has been a long time since we saw Emma Thompson on the big screen in a meaty role. In Saving Mr. Banks she plays Mary Poppins author P.L. Travers. The film is written by...
Kerry Washington Covers Vanity Fair
Recently, Kerry Washington has been on the cover of some major magazines. In May, she was on the cover of Elle and now she’s on this month’s cover of Vanity Fair. Washington is the first...
Trailer Watch: Austenland – Directed by Jerusha Hess
Jerusha Hess’s feature debut, Austenland, follows the very single Jane (Keri Russell) who has been obsessed with the works of Jane Austen since she was young. However, her status as...
Trailer for Kim Cattrall in Sweet Bird of Youth
I’m kicking myself for not getting a ticket to see Sweet Bird of Youth when I was in London last week especially since Kim Cattrall has been so outspoken on the issue of aging and women and...
Cross Post: Dear Hollywood: Hiring Women Directors Could Rescue the Superhero Movie. Love, Half the Human Race
The superhero picture is suffering from female trouble, and not just because a franchise based on Wonder Woman keeps going in and out of development limbo. Any creature on screen minus a...
Girls Are More Than Just Princesses
As we’ve reported about before, images aimed at young girls in the media don’t have much variety. As The Geena Davis Institute in Media has researched only 28.3% of speaking roles in...
Trailer Watch – The Lifeguard – Directed by Liz W. Garcia
We wrote last week about Liz W. Garcia’s amazing and perfect quote about women working as directors in a recent interview. Garcia’s latest film, The Lifeguard, premiered at Sundance and...
Guest Post: Who Says There Are No Women Onscreen This Summer? Susan Seidelman’s The Hot Flashes Hits Theatres This Weekend
The best surprise of this summer is Susan Seidelman’s new film The Hot Flashes, opening in selected theaters on July 12 and starring Brooke Shields, Daryl Hannah, Virginia Madsen, Wanda...
Joan Didion, Elaine May Amongst Women Awarded the National Medal of Arts and National Humanities Medal
Tomorrow, President Obama will award the 2012 National Medal of Arts and National Humanities Medals. Both honor individuals or groups that have made significant achievements in the arts and...