The good news: there are more women nominated in non-acting categories at the Oscars this year (56, or 30 percent of all non-acting nominees) than in 2019 (51, 25 percent). The bad news: 30 percent is still far from actual parity.
According to the Women’s Media Center’s (WMC) annual analysis, 130 of the total 186 non-acting 2020 Oscar nominees are dudes, amounting to a whopping 70 percent. As we all know, this exclusion of women nominees comes on the heels of a particularly incredible year for women in film. Movies about and made by women — such as Lulu Wang’s “The Farewell,” Greta Gerwig’s “Little Women,” Alma Har’el’s “Honey Boy,” Céline Sciamma’s “Portrait of a Lady on Fire,” and Lorene Scafaria’s “Hustlers” — earned rave reviews. It’s infuriating that the Academy Award nominations don’t reflect this.
“The number of nominations of women went up in the categories of Best Picture (producing), Film Editing, Animated Feature, Makeup and Hairstyling, Original Score, and Documentary Short,” per a press release for the report. “They stayed the same or dropped in the other 13 categories, including Best Director, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, and Cinematography.”
Women were completely shut out of the Best Director and Cinematography races. Just one woman each is up for Film Editing (“The Irishman’s” Thelma Schoonmaker, marking her eighth nomination in this section); Original Screenplay (Krysty Wilson-Cairns, “1917”); and Adapted Screenplay (Gerwig, “Little Women”).
On the brighter side, two women scored double nods. Cynthia Erivo is being recognized in the Best Actress race for her portrayal of Harriet Tubman in “Harriet,” as well as in the Original Song section for co-writing the biopic’s anthem, “Stand Up.” Producer Emma Tillinger Koskoff is nominated twice for Best Picture, for both “The Irishman” and “Joker.”
Eight of the nine Best Picture nominees feature at least one woman producer. “That’s up from last year, when only four out of eight did,” the press release notes. Women comprise nine nominees, or 39 percent, of those recognized. They include Koskoff’s double nod; Jenno Topping (“Ford v Ferrari”); Kwak Sin-ae (“Parasite”); Jane Rosenthal (“The Irishman”); Chelsea Winstanley (“Jojo Rabbit”); Amy Pascal (“Little Women”); Pippa Harris and Jayne-Ann Tenggren (“1917”); and Shannon McIntosh (“Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood”).
“Congratulations to Kwak Sin-ae for her nomination as producer for ‘Parasite,’ said Helen Zia, WMC co-chair emerita. “She is making history as one of the first Koreans to be nominated for Best Picture and one of the very few Asian women from anywhere to be nominated for an Oscar.”
The Documentary section boasts some of the 2020 Oscar nods’ most encouraging numbers. Seven nominees, or 47 percent, are women: Julia Reichert (“American Factory”); Kirstine Barfod and Sigrid Dyekjær (“The Cave”); Petra Costa and Joanna Natasegara (“The Edge of Democracy”); Waad Al-Kateab (“For Sama”); and Tamara Kotevska (“Honeyland”).
Women actually dominate the Documentary Short Subject race; they represent six, or 60 percent, of those nominees. They are Carol Dysinger and Elena Andreicheva (“Learning To Skateboard in a Warzone (If You’re a Girl)”), Kristine Samuelson (“Life Overtakes Me”), Laura Nix and Colette Sandstedt (“Walk Run Cha-Cha”), and Smriti Mundhra (“St. Louis Superman”).
“Unless the voting members of the Academy include a critical mass of women and people of color in all non-acting categories, it is hard to imagine equality of representation in Academy Award nominations,” said Julie Burton, president and CEO of WMC. “The Women’s Media Center urges all branches of the Academy Awards to kick up their representative numbers to reflect the real world and not just an exclusive boys’ club.”
The Oscars will take place this Sunday, February 9. Head over to WMC’s website to read the full report. The highlights are in an infographic below, courtesy of the org.
