Today is my birthday. It’s my
birthday and I’m posting. I’m doing this because in all of last year, I directed
nothing. From a 10 episode, webby and IAWTV award nominated webseries, and a
handful of music videos, to a full year of not a thing. You know how motivating
that is? I originally typed depressing, but I’m going for the positive
motivational stuff and none of that downer BS. Downer BS hasn’t worked yet!
Lately I’ve
been noticing the commentary in the world right now about the statistics of
women in the industry. I’ve just always thought that I had as much chance as
every other human in doing this, I just thought I was going about it wrong. Why
was it that my guy friends were getting interviews and asked to speak on panels
and asked to write and direct things when I was doing to same thing and of the
same caliber, sometimes better, as them? What was I doing wrong? Get that? What was I doing wrong.
It’s been a
hot topic in the media as of late. In the article, The World Is Round, People:
Cannes’ Poor Inclusion Of Female Directors (found here) on Raindance.org from
Rebecca Lantham writes,
“The shared winner of
the 1993 Palme d’Or, Jane Campion, is in the headlines this week as a positive
figurehead for women in film as the Jury President at this year’s Cannes Film
Festival. At a news conference on the Croisette last week, Campion stressed the
necessity for female inclusion within the ‘inherently sexist industry.’ She
joked that, ‘the guys are eating all the cake.’”
And this sad fact,
“Why then is the industry so rigid in its belief that women are incapable
directing big-budget features? Perhaps, film studios would rather invest in
established male directors to helm their epic money makers. Interestingly, as
Brown comments, Gareth Edwards is the director of the recent “Godzilla” epic
having previously been in command of the modestly budgeted “Monsters”, ‘for
which he acted as writer, director, cinematographer and visual effects artist
using just off-the-shelf equipment.’ So it would seem that Hollywood is taking
risks, just not on females.”
Not that Mr. Edwards is some kind of
sh*tty director, it’s just that women aren’t even given the chance. We want the
chance - hell, I want the chance.
There’s
also another good article about this subject in Ms Magazine by Maria Giese (Here). It
starts off getting my blood in a bubble,
“…a
woman director who we’ll call Jane met with a well-known television producer.
They had a great meeting and he liked her sample reel, but he told her that he
couldn’t hire her to direct his show. “I already hired a woman director this
season,” he said with a straight face.”
This
is 2014 NOT 1950. This is astounding.
I’ve
seen in other data roaming on the ‘nets that women with the highest GPA is
getting the same opportunities and pay as a man who averaged a 2.5 GPA. I can’t
find the link, so I can’t state that as fact, and to be totally honest I’m
really hoping that’s just rumor. I mean, this sounds silly, but it's just too mean spirited to be true..... It's just too stupid to be true.
I
think the bottom line is, yes this sucks. As a woman, I’ve been in situations
of being degraded in the work place by male co-workers, I can also honestly say
this hasn’t happened in years. I feel like I’m not given the same
opportunities just being talented and driven, yet nice. Knowing that I have to work harder to achieve what I want kind of pisses me off, but Godamnit I want it, real
f*cking bad.
*Rolls up sleeves…
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