ALL POSTS
Weekly Update March 22: Women-Centric, Directed, Written Movies Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening This Weekend Admission – Written by Karen Croner Comedies today seem to always go for the broadest, raunchiest laughs. The audience is not trusted to get the...
Guest Post: Screenplay Design with Diane Drake
Diane Drake is a professional screenwriter, creative consultant, and screenwriting instructor with the UCLA Extension Writer’s Program. Her produced original screenplays include Only You,...
Interview with Katrin Benedikt – Co-Writer of Olympus Has Fallen
Hollywood is such a crazy place that this year there are two films that focus on the White House being taken over. The first one out of the gate is Olympus Has Fallen starring the terrific...
Cross Post: “Oz the Great and Powerful” Rekindles the Notion That Women Are Wicked
Dorothy Gale–the girl who went to Oz–has been called the first true feminist hero in American children’s literature. Indeed, she was condemned by many readers, including...
Interview with Jennifer Fox, Director, Producer and Subject of Flying: Confessions of a Free Women
Originally published on May 12, 2008. Fox’s series Confessions of a Free Woman follows Fox’s personal journey around the globe to discover what it means to be a woman today. While...
Veronica Mars Movie Reaches $2 Million Kickstarter Goal
The message today is: never underestimate the power of fandom. After series creator, Rob Thomas, launched the Veronica Mars Kickstarter movie fund on March 13th with a $2 million goal and an...
Want to Help Women and Hollywood Grow? Outreach and Editing Gigs Available
Here’s some great news. Women and Hollywood has received a grant to help grow our work. For all of you who read the site regularly, you know that the goal of the work of Women and...
Can Women in Hollywood Lean In?
Unless you’ve been under a rock over the last week you have read an article about, heard a talk show about, and seen a panel discussion about Sheryl Sandberg’s new book Lean In. I...
Tribeca Film Festival Announces Lineup Pt. 2: Women Writers
We previously focused on women-directed films in the Tribeca Film Festival lineup. There are also a huge number of women-written or co-written scripts at the festival, so we wanted to highlight their...
Weekly Update March 8: Women-Centric, Directed, Written Movies Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening This Weekend Electrick Children – Written and Directed by Rebecca Thomas Rachel is a rambunctious teenager from a fundamentalist Mormon family in Utah. On...
Interview With Ramona S. Diaz Director of Don’t Stop Believin
Don’t Stop Believin‘ is a terrific crowd pleasing documentary of the rags to riches story of Arnel Pineda who took over as the lead singer of the rock band Journey after he was spotted on...
Ashley Judd Speaks About Women’s Rights in D.C.
As we reported last year, rumors have been swirling about Ashley Judd running for senate against Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. While Judd still won’t confirm rumors, she spoke at George...
The Happy Girl vs. The Cool Girl: Why People Don’t Like Anne Hathaway
People, especially women, really don’t like Anne Hathaway. This isn’t something that just started since Hathaway won her Oscar for Les Miserables last week–it’s been long...
Interview with Dyllan McGee – Executive Producer of MAKERS: Women Who Make America
Women and Hollywood: What made you come up with the idea for this massive undertaking? Dyllan McGee: As a filmmaker who had covered many historical events and figures (The Kennedys, Lincoln,...
How the Case of Zero Dark Thirty Reflects on Hollywood’s Treatment of Women
I was a happy person a couple of months ago. I walked out of seeing Zero Dark Thirty very much liking the film, but also sighing a bit in relief that Kathryn Bigelow had hit another one out of...
Trailer Watch: Nine for IX
This totally made my day. As a big women's sports fan here are NINE short films about women's sports directed by women. Executive producer Robin Roberts (who returned to Good Morning America...
Watch This: Nina Simone Singing “To Be Free”
Legacy Records, the catalog division of Sony Music Entertainment, is celebrating Nina Simone as their February 2013 Artist of the Month in honor of Black History Month and Simone's 80th...
Connie Britton on Hollywood, Nashville and Aging
If you are a regular reader of Women and Hollywood, you know that we are big fans of Connie Britton here. We love her as Rayna James in Callie Khouri’s Nashville and Tami Taylor is one of our...
Cross Post: A Female Tarantino
As a recently decided film major midway through the fall of my sophomore year, I was sitting in the back of 511 Dodge Hall at Columbia University, idly doodling in the minutes before my Script...
Cross Post: My Two Favorite Golden Globe Winners: JLaw & Anne Get it Right on Body Image
As a complete movie nerd, I dragged my reluctant friends and family to my tiny local movie theater quite a few times over this past winter break. There have been just too many great movies to choose...
Guest Post: What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Aging: An Oscar-Nominated Filmmaker’s Conversation-Starter on Women and Aging
Ten years ago, when I began work on the short documentary that would become Kings Point, issues of aging weren’t really a part of the public discussion. In a way, that helped me: because they...
FX Picks Up The Bridge from Meredith Stiehm
FX has picked up creator Meredith Stiehm’s The Bridge for a thirteen episodes. Production is set to begin in April. The detective drama stars Diane Kruger and Demian Bichir. Marco Ruiz...
On the Ground in Berlin
I arrived in Berlin two days ago from NY after the huge success of The Athena Film Festival. Did you hear we had a blizzard and people still came. I missed the opening weekend craziness...
Rachel Feldman to Direct Lilly Ledbetter Biopic
Lilly Ledbetter has chosen Rachel Feldman to direct a biopic based on her life and her fight for equal pay for women. Ledbetter worked for over two decades in an Alabama Goodyear Factory. After...
Interview with Cate Shortland – Director and Co-Writer of Lore
Cate Shortland’s Lore opens on this Friday (2/8) in New York and Los Angeles. Originally published on September 25, 2012. Lore is Cate Shortland's second film after the exciting...
Sundance Interview with Sarah Barnett, General Manager of the Sundance Channel
We got to spend a couple of minutes at Sundance with the woman behind the Sundance Channel, Sarah Barnett. We don't get to talk to executives too often so it was really nice to get her...
Sundance Interview with Lynn Shelton – Director of Touchy Feely
I had never met Lynn Shelton before last month but I already felt like I knew her. She has a way of telling us stories about other people that are really about all of us. Her new film...
Guest Post: A Perfect Ending — Lesbian Film, Art House Film or Both?
So what is it that makes a movie a lesbian movie? Does it require lesbians playing the roles of the characters? Does the director have to be gay? Is there a quota of girl on girl...
Lena Dunham’s Big Week: DGA Win, New Show and Entertainment Weekly Cover Story
Things for Lena Dunham are showing absolutely no signs of slowing down—within the past week, she’s won a DGA, is developing a new show for HBO, is Entertainment Weekly’s cover girl...
Sundance Interview: Concussion – Directed by Stacie Passon, Produced by Rose Troche, Starring Robin Weigert
Concussion was one of my favorite movies at Sundance this year. It was truly a revelation. Robin Weigert who we have seen for so many years as a supporting character in shows like...
Standing Up and For Women
When I first started Women and Hollywood I knew that I wanted to the site to support women and their roles and accomplishments in pop culture but I really did not know exactly what that meant. Now,...
Cross Post: Uppity Women: How Maya and Kathryn Bigelow Continue to Threaten the Status Quo
“A woman is like a tea bag; you never know how strong it is until it’s in hot water.” — Eleanor Roosevelt If you want to win an Oscar for Best Picture now, make an...
The Sun Sets on 30 Rock
As we wrote last week two female written sitcoms were shut down last week, Ben and Kate and Don't Trust the B in Apartment 23. We also said goodbye to Private Practice which did not get...
Cross Post: A Common Problem I See In Plays By Women Playwrights. It’s Not What You Think.
My theatre company is in heavy season planning mode, so I’ve recently read dozens of new plays. I’m always reading new plays, but this time of year, I’m reading a lot of plays, all...
Sundance Interview: Lana Wilson and Martha Shane – Directors of After Tiller
One of the highlights of Sundance was seeing the documentary After Tiller directed by Martha Shana and Lana Wilson. Here's our conversation right after they won a $5,000 grant from Women in...
Cross Post: Reel Girl’s Gallery of Girls Gone Missing From Children’s Movies in 2013
In 2012, I waited until the last possible minute. It wasn’t until December that I posted Reel Girl’s Gallery of Girls Gone Missing from Children’s Movies in 2012. Even though in the...
Sundance Institute and Women in Film Release Unprecedented Study on Women Directors
This morning, here in Sundance, a new ground breaking study of women directors "Exploring the Barriers and Opportunities for Independent Women Filmmakers" was released. The study is...
Sundance Diary Part One: Mother of George and After Tiller
I arrived in Sundance on Friday morning totally freaked out about the Sundance flu and the cold. But now I'm on day 2 and so far so good. I hear there are people stuck in their hotels...
In Her Voice: Women Directors Talk Directing Volume 1 Available Now!
For the past couple of years I have been working IN HER VOICE: WOMEN DIRECTORS TALK DIRECTING, a book of interviews with women directors from the first couple of years of the site. I am happy...
Anticipating Sundance: Using Sundance to Shift the Narrative on Women Directors
I am heading to Sundance for the first time. I am looking forward to seeing a bunch of women directed movies over the next couple of days. There are also several women's events...
Kathryn Bigelow Speaks Out About Zero Dark Thirty Criticism to Los Angeles Times
Kathryn Bigelow has decided to address the torture criticism surrounding Zero Dark Thirty in a personally written response to her critics in the LA Times. And it’s a must read. Bigelow...
Cross Post: The Brave One
Hard as it may be to believe, I won’t remember the 70th annual Golden Globes Awards for my beloved Tina Fey. Or Amy Poehler. Or Sofia Vergara’s golden globes. I mean, sure, they were all...
Thoughts on the Golden Globes – Girls Literally Ruled
Last night, I ended up watching the Golden Globes in real time (with the commercials too.) The reason why that was possible was because of twitter and because I was having such a good time watching...
Athena Film Festival Announces 2013 Line Up
I am so very proud to be sharing with you the line-up for the 3rd Athena Film Festival, a celebration of women and leadership, which will take place this upcoming February 7-10 on the campus on...
Interview with Meredith Vieira – Executive Producer of The Woman Who Wasn’t There
This eye-opening and disturbing movie is about a woman, Tania Head, who completely fabricated a story of being a 9/11 survivor. She so ingratiated herself into the survivor world that she was...
Cross Post: Heroines of Cinema: An A-Z of Women in Film in 2012
Since this column began in August, it has profiled a wide variety of women – fictional and real, contemporary and historic – whose achievements in film have been considered worthy of...
The Women Directed Movies of 2012
We here at Women and Hollywood want to salute the women who directed films in 2012. We have compiled a list of features and docs (and foreign films) that were released in US theatres in...
Sexism Pushes Its Way Into the Oscar Campaign
In the last week the screws have really been tightening in this bizarre world of Oscar campaigning, and Kathryn Bigelow and her film Zero Dark Thirty are the recipients of what is referred to a...
Interview with Director Amy Berg and Producer Lorri Davis – West of Memphis
West of Memphis is a film that makes you realize that our justice system is not blind. That if you look different or are poor that you can be caught up in a witch hunt of epic proportions and...
Interview with Anne Fletcher – Director of The Guilt Trip
Barbra Streisand has not had the lead in a film since The Mirror Has Two Faces (which she directed) in 1996. She's back onscreen as Joyce Brewster, Seth Rogan's mom in the road comedy...
Cross Post: Breaking Into the Film Business
So, recently I've been gaining a little modest traction in this oh-so-fickle business. And as I try to figure out what the next phase of my career will hold, I've been finding myself...