Women Attain Their Highest Level of Leadership at the Academy

null 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. As of this year there are three board members for each branch. Members must be re-elected when their three year terms expire, and can serve three consecutive terms before they are termed out.

Current Academy president Hawk Koch is termed out so the next fight will be to take over his position. Rob Friedman and Cheryl Boone Isaacs are said to be the leading candidates.

The big news is that this year, Amy Pascal was elected to the executive branch. She is the first WOMAN to represent the branch since one of the Academy’s founders — Mary Pickford — was a member. Mind blowingly ridiculous.

Keep in mind that people can be elected in branches they no longer work in like Nancy Utley, the co-head of Fox Searchlight. She was elected to represent the PR branch which is where she got her initial membership. Because honestly, do you think they would elect two women in the executives branch when they haven’t had a woman for probably 75 years. I guess in some way it is smart that Nancy Utley stood for election in a different branch because that was a way to get elected.

There are now 14 women on a board of 48 which is a shade under 30%. Let’s see what can happen now that women have achieved critical mass. I can only imagine what will happen to the town if they actually elect a woman to be president on top of having Dawn Hudson as the CEO.

The current list of female governors of the Academy include:

Judianna Makovsky, Deborah Nadoolman, Costume Designers Branch;

Jan Pascale, Designers Branch;

Lynzee Klingman, Film Editors;

Amy Pascal, Executives;

Kathryn Blondell, Makeup Artists and Hairstylists

Cheryl Boone Isaacs, Nancy Utley, Public Relations.

Lisa Cholodenko, Kathryn Bigelow, Directors;

Robin Swicord, Writers

Annette Bening, Actors;

Gale Anne Hurd, Kathleen Kennedy, Producers

Film Academy Names 10 New Governors (Variety)