#Reproductive Rights
Trailer Watch: “Battleground” Goes Inside the Anti-Abortion Movement
Described by director Cynthia Lowen as an “urgently timely window into the intersection of abortion and politics in America,” “Battleground” follows three women who lead...
Showrunner Coalition Now in Talks with Studios Re: Abortion Demands, Aiming to Launch Hotline
The coalition of over 400 women and nonbinary showrunners — and the approximately 1,000 directors and male showrunners who are standing with them in solidarity — is continuing its quest...
Quote of the Day: Jennifer Lawrence Reflects on Pregnancy & Motherhood in the Wake of Roe Reversal
“The morning after I gave birth, I felt like my whole life had started over. Like, Now is day one of my life,” Jennifer Lawrence recalls in a new feature for Vogue. “I just stared. I...
Cynthia Lowen’s Abortion Rights Doc “Battleground” to Be Released by Abramorama & ROCO Films
Most Americans support the legal right to abortion, and people from all backgrounds have abortions — so why is it such a polarizing issue? Why do anti-choicers have so much influence and...
Showrunner Coalition Sends Second Letter Issuing Abortion Safety Demands, Requires Studio Response by Labor Day
The coalition of women TV showrunners and creators demanding abortion safety plans from studios is not backing down. Following the non-response/fuck-you companies including Disney, Netflix, AppleTV+,...
Nothing but Empty Words from Studios Re: Female Showrunners’ Abortion Protection Demands
“I shouldn’t be surprised, I am, but I know I shouldn’t be.” This is what a signatory of the July 28 letter from 411 women TV showrunners and creators — in which the collective...
WGA Health Plan Adds Amendment Covering Travel & Accommodations for Participants Seeking Abortions
The Writers Guild of America East and West’s health plan has a new amendment that will reimburse travel and accommodation expenses for participants and dependents seeking to cross state lines...
400+ TV Creatives Send Letter Calling on Companies to Protect Pregnant Employees in Anti-Abortion States
Shonda Rhimes, Mindy Kaling, Issa Rae, Ava DuVernay, Natasha Lyonne, and many, many more TV showrunners and creators are demanding media companies take a stand in anti-abortion states. Over 400 TV...
Quote of the Day: “P-Valley” Creator Katori Hall Calls for More Stories About Abortion
On this past Sunday’s episode of “P-Valley,” Katori Hall’s Starz drama about a Mississippi strip club’s performers and patrons, a couple characters decided to travel to...
Metrograph Hosting “It Happens to Us” Film Series About Abortion in America Through May 21
As the constitutional right to abortion in the U.S. lies on the chopping block, New York’s Metrograph is hosting a film series exploring the topic and its role in American life. (Spoiler alert:...
Watch: rePRO Film Presents Conversation with Audrey Diwan, Director of Abortion Drama “Happening”
As the news this week has made abundantly clear, abortion and reproductive justice are under siege in the United States. Irony of ironies, that means “Happening” — the award-winning...
Trailer Watch: A Student Seeks an Abortion in 1963 France in Venice Winner “Happening”
“I’d like a child one day, but not instead of a life,” says Anamaria Vartolomei in a new trailer for “Happening.” From writer-director Audrey Diwan, the award-winning...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes – “The Janes”
Tia Lessin was nominated for an Academy Award for her work as a director and producer of the Hurricane Katrina survival story “Trouble the Water,” winner of the 2008 Sundance Grand Jury Prize and...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Audrey Diwan – “Happening”
Audrey Diwan is a filmmaker, author, and screenwriter who has collaborated with Valérie Donzelli, Cédric Jimenez, and Gilles Lellouche among others. She made her feature film directing debut with...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Phyllis Nagy – “Call Jane”
Phyllis Nagy earned Oscar and BAFTA nominations and won the NY Film Critics Circle award for “Carol,” her adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s classic novel “The Price of...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Abby Epstein – “The Business of Birth Control”
Abby Epstein started her career as a theater director having her own Chicago-based production company, Roadworks Productions, which was founded in 1992. After directing a few productions in Chicago,...
rePRO Film Festival 2021 Women Directors: Meet Marion Lipschutz and Rose Rosenblatt – “Bei Bei”
Rose Rosenblatt and Marion Lipschutz are partners in Incite Pictures/Cine Qua Non. Their prior titles include “Young Lakota,” “The Education of Shelby Knox,” “Live Free...
rePRO Film Fest Lineup Includes “On the Divide,” “Fly So Far,” & Other Titles Exploring Reproductive Justice
rePRO Film Fest has announced its 2021 lineup. Now in its second edition, rePRO is the only festival in the world dedicated to reproductive justice and advocates for “women’s (cis, trans,...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Maya Cueva and Leah Galant – “On the Divide”
Maya Cueva is a Latina award-winning director and producer with a background in radio and podcast producing. Her short documentary “The Provider” premiered at SXSW and was nominated for...
Tribeca 2021 Preview: Sisters Racing Their Way into History, Nigerians Fighting for LGBTQ+ Rights, & More
Slated to run from June 9-20 with a mix of online screenings and live in-person events at outdoor venues, Tribeca Film Festival is celebrating its 20th edition with a feature lineup that is 60...
Pick of the Day: “Plan B”
Given its subject matter and raunchy sense of humor, Natalie Morales’ teen comedy “Plan B” will probably draw comparisons to “Booksmart” and “Unpregnant.”...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Celina Escher – “Fly So Far”
Celina Escher is a Swiss-Salvadorean filmmaker telling stories about women as well their pursuits of empowerment, artistic processes, and their sociopolitical contexts. Her film “Verde Olivo” was...
Trailer Watch: Activists Work to Destigmatize Periods in “Pandora’s Box”
“When I started my period, I was very young and nobody had told me about it,” an interviewee reveals in the trailer for “Pandora’s Box,” a documentary about the stigma...
“Novitiate” Director Maggie Betts Lines Up Two New Films
Maggie Betts is set to portray a reproductive rights activist and a bankrupt funeral home owner with her next directing gigs. The “Novitiate” director is set to helm a dramatic thriller...
Trailer Watch: “Belly of the Beast” Investigates Modern-Day Eugenics in California Prisons
“Belly of the Beast” tells the story of Kelli Dillon, one of many women who has been involuntarily sterilized while in prison. A new trailer for Erika Cohn’s documentary sees Dillon...
Martha Plimpton to Receive Inaugural ChangemakeHER Award at rePRO Film Festival
Martha Plimpton’s longtime championing of reproductive rights will be celebrated at the first rePRO Film Festival, a fest focused on women’s reproductive healthcare, awareness, and...
rePRO Film Festival Announces Inaugural Lineup
rePRO Film Festival has unveiled its inaugural lineup. Dedicated to exploring “women’s reproductive healthcare, awareness, advocacy, and bodily integrity in America,” the five-day...
The Director & Stars of “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” Consider the Film a Classical Hero’s Journey
For her third feature, Eliza Hittman took on the painful, infuriating realities of seeking a legal abortion in the United States. “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” tells the story of Autumn, a...
Eliza Hittman On Why Abortion Drama “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” Is Both Personal and Political
Writer-director Eliza Hittman’s latest film, “Never Rarely Sometimes Always,” is an unflinching story about reproductive rights in the United States. Facing an unplanned pregnancy...
“AKA Jane Roe” Marks FX’s First Feature Doc Acquisition, Premiere Date Set
“AKA Jane Roe,” the story of Roe v. Wade plaintiff and pro-choice turned anti-choice activist Norma McCorvey, is FX Networks’ first feature-length documentary acquisition. Deadline...
Exclusive: A Woman and Her Partner Discuss an Unplanned Pregnancy in This “Saint Frances” Clip
When Bridget (Kelly O’Sullivan) finds out she’s pregnant in “Saint Frances,” she doesn’t spend much time wondering how she will handle the situation. She takes the test,...
Elizabeth Banks Is the Head of Center for Reproductive Rights’ New Creative Council
You can catch Elizabeth Banks fighting for human rights around the globe as Bosley in the “Charlie’s Angels” reboot in theaters next month. Offscreen, the multi-hyphenate is...
Watch: Busy Philipps and ACLU Fight Back Against Abortion Bans with #YouKnowMe Campaign
Busy Philipps and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) are putting a human face on an issue that is being unjustly politicized — one that, unsurprisingly, affects women, women of color,...
Reed Morano and Kristen Wiig Pull Projects from Georgia in Protest of Abortion Ban
Reed Morano and Kristen Wiig are standing up for every woman’s right to choose. Both women have pulled productions from Georgia to resist the state’s draconian, misogynist...
Stephany Folsom to Pen Michelle Williams Abortion Drama “This Is Jane”
Another woman has joined “This Is Jane’s” creative team. According to Variety, “Toy Story 4” and Black List writer Stephany Folsom will pen the feature, about a pre-Roe...
Martha Plimpton on How Non-Profit A is For Goes to Bat for Reproductive Rights
Six years ago, Emmy-winning and Tony-nominated actress Martha Plimpton co-founded A is For, a non-profit dedicated to advancing women’s reproductive rights and ending the stigma against abortion...
Emma Watson Pens Letter to Woman Who Died Due to Ireland’s Anti-Abortion Law: “Rest in Power”
In 2012 Savita Halappanavar died in Ireland after suffering a septic miscarriage. The 31-year-old Indian-born dentist was under medical supervision for seven days and could have survived had doctors...
Trailer Watch: The Right to Choose Is On the Line in “Reversing Roe”
“Life is winning again,” Vice President Mike Pence gloats in the trailer for “Reversing Roe” — but women’s rights are not. As Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme...
Trailer Watch: Gilead Is Within Offred in “The Handmaid’s Tale” Season 2
When we last saw Offred (Elisabeth Moss), real name June, in “The Handmaid’s Tale,” she was being carted away to who knows where in a foreboding black van. In the trailer for Season 2 of...
Sandra Bullock to Play Texas State Senator Wendy Davis in “Let Her Speak”
Sandra Bullock will portray a contemporary feminist icon in her next project. The Oscar winner will play former Texas state senator Wendy Davis in the spec “Let Her Speak,” Variety confirms....
Kimberly Peirce Will Direct Underground Abortion Network Drama “This Is Jane”
Amazon’s abortion drama “This Is Jane” has found its director. “Boys Don’t Cry’s” Kimberly Peirce will helm the film about an underground abortion network in Chicago, which went by the...
Elisabeth Moss to Topline Film About Underground Abortion Network
Elisabeth Moss is pivoting from one women’s rights narrative to another. The star of the feminist dystopian drama “The Handmaid’s Tale” has signed on to topline Simon Curtis’ (“My Week...
Rachel Carey’s Film About Chicago’s Underground Abortion Network Goes into Production
Production has begun on a new film based on the true story of the underground abortion network known as The Jane Collective, a press release has announced. “Ask for Jane” is the brainchild of...
Guest Post: Why I Made “Birthright: A War Story,” The Real-Life “Handmaid’s Tale”
Guest Post by Civia Tamarkin As a veteran journalist and documentary filmmaker, much of my focus has been criminal and social justice issues. My investigations led to the releases of a young man...
Trailer Watch: “Birthright” Documents the Real-Life “Handmaid’s Tale”
Civia Tamarkin’s upcoming documentary “Birthright: A War Story” depicts the so-called pro-life campaign for what it really is: an assault on women’s reproductive choices. For many...
Spec Script About Underground Abortion Service Acquired by Amazon
Amazon could be bringing the story of underground abortion providers in Chicago to the cinema. Per Deadline, the studio has obtained “This Is Jane,” a spec screenplay by Dan Loflin...
Shonda Rhimes Accepts Planned Parenthood Award and Says “Women Should Be Running Things”
“Women should be running things.” Amen, Shonda Rhimes. The mogul took the stage last night to accept the Champion of Change Award from Planned Parenthood, which still exists despite the best...
“The Birth of the Pill” TV Adaptation Headed to National Geographic
Soon you’ll be able to watch a scripted series about the creation of the birth control pill alongside documentaries about nature and foreign cultures. According to The Hollywood Reporter, National...
Trailer Watch: Elisabeth Moss Wakes Up in “The Handmaid’s Tale”
“I was asleep before. That’s how we let it happen,” says Offred (Elisabeth Moss) in a powerful — and disturbingly timely — new trailer for “The Handmaid’s Tale.” “When they...
Monumental Pictures Developing Movie About Roe v. Wade
With the demagogue-in-chief doing everything in his power to outlaw legal abortion, the public — and the elderly white men who are able to legislatively control women’s bodies — needs...
Teaser Watch: Elisabeth Moss’ Story Is Our Story in “The Handmaid’s Tale”
Some of the images in the latest “Handmaid’s Tale” teaser are shockingly familiar. Tagged “Her Story is Our Story,” the clip features glimpses of a protest — not unlike the Women’s...