News Archive
Despite progress in big-game ads, representation doesn’t match reality
For much of its existence, the NFL’s big game has been home to ads that featured action, comedy, and plenty of men. When women were featured at all, there was a good chance they’d be sporting a bikini. In short, the ads in what has become the nation’s biggest TV event were made by men, for men. To a certain kind of marketer, it made a certain kind of sense. The assumption was that the game was watched predominantly by men. But that’s no longer the case. According to Nielsen, women have accounted for 46% to 47% of total Super Bowl viewership from 2014 to 2018. But the advertising running during the game hasn’t caught up to the people watching it. Why does this matter? Equal representation isn’t just the right thing to do, it’s good for business. In our ongoing work with The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, we found that marketing content on YouTube featuring female led and gender-balanced content attracted 30% more views than male-dominant videos, despite representing less than half of all the videos we studied. Read More…
Filmmakers Work to Reframe the ‘Male Gaze’
In the opening shot of Sofia Coppola’s “Lost in Translation” (2003), Scarlett Johansson is lying on a bed, back to the camera, shown in partial view, wearing underpants. In Denis Villeneuve’s “Blade Runner 2049” (2017) a banged-up Ryan Gosling stares up at a bone-thin, enormous nude projection of a woman. More recently, Jay Roach’s “Bombshell” (2019) featured Margot Robbie lifting her dress for John Lithgow as the camera takes in her legs. All typical images from Hollywood films, all doing their job: telling story, building character and providing context. These are images that have been used in cinema almost since its beginnings more than 100 years ago. But what if many shots framed and filmed by directors and cinematographers — men, women, nonbinary — actually do something else, too — like undercut every other progressive stride women make on the camera, and in real life? “It’s about asking filmmakers what they’re trying to achieve,” says Madeline Di Nonno, CEO, Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. “What are they trying to say? Is there a way to depict their vision without objectifying the female character?” Read More…
Disney Fights Gender Bias with GD-IQ: Spellcheck for Bias
Disney recently announced they’ll be using GD-IQ: Spellcheck for Bias, artificial intelligence (AI) technology developed by The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media in their scriptwriting process moving forward. The move came in response to years of criticism over the studio’s on-screen history of racism and sexism. The Geena Davis Institute’s AI, GD-IQ: Spellcheck for Bias (Geena Davis Inclusion Quotient), will review completed scripts and report any findings of bias, as well as instances of diversity — like how often female characters are speaking, the number of characters that fall under the LGBTQIA umbrella, and representation of people of color and characters with disabilities — in order to ensure films and shows produced by Disney more closely align with the makeup of the world’s population. Read More…
Geena Davis Reflects on Working With Tom Hanks in ‘A League of Their Own’: “He’s Just That Guy”
According to one of his most famous co-stars, the actor — set to receive the Cecil B. DeMille Award at the Golden Globes — proved his nice-guy reputation on the 1991 set: “I don’t think it ever even occurred to us that he was the only guy on the team.”
One of the great joys of my life is that I got to make A League of Their Own with Tom Hanks. He and Penny Marshall, our director, were friends from doing Big together a few years earlier — but I don’t think I’d met him before we started making the movie. Now, A League of Their Own was rather unusual at the time. Read More…
Deauville Festival du Cinéma Américain
At Deauville, the facts took precedence over the intentions. The 45th edition of the American Film Festival, was undoubtedly feminine. Marked by the presence of many actresses, directors, screenwriters, producers, the festival had chosen this year to award special prices to four actresses: Kristen Stewart (playing Seberg, by Benedict Andrews), Geena Davis (coming to present the documentary This Changes Everything, by Tom Donahue), Sienna Miller (in American Woman, by Jake Scott, screened in Deauville) and Sophie Turner (the heroine of the Game of Thrones series). The festival also had as president of the jury for the films in competition Catherine Deneuve, and for that of the revelation, Anna Mouglalis. Read more…
The 10 best diversity advocates to follow on social media
In our fast-paced world of the 24-hour news cycle and seemingly endless social media scrolling, it can be all too easy to get overwhelmed by an overload of information. Read on to help keep your feeds filled only with the smartest, most informed (and opinionated) people in the game. Our list of the top 10 advocates for diversity to follow on social media includes a wide range of powerhouses, from an indigenous rights attorney to the most powerful showrunner in the world. Read More…
Artios Awards To Honor Geena Davis, Audra McDonald & More
The Casting Society of America said Thursday that Geena Davis will receive the Lynn Stalmaster Award for Career Achievement and Audra McDonald will be honored with the Marion Dougherty New York Apple Award at the 35th annual Artios Awards, set for January 30, 2020. The annual awards honoring casting directors in more than 20 categories across film, TV and theater will be bestowed at ceremonies in Los Angeles, New York City and London. Read More…
Geena Davis just got an honorary Oscar for her work fighting gender inequality
Actor Geena Davis knows gender inequality can’t be fixed overnight — except on screen. Davis was celebrated Sunday with an honorary Oscar for her work fighting gender inequality. Called the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, the honor is given to someone whose humanitarian work has made a difference in the industry. “Here’s my theory of change: nearly every sector of society has a huge gender disparity problem,” Davis said when she accepted the award. “But there’s one category of gross inequality where the under-representation of women can be fixed absolutely overnight: on screen.” Davis has spent years battling gender inequality that can be seen on screen. Her work has stretched off screen and beyond her roles in “Thelma & Louise” and “A League of Their Own,” and her Oscar-winning role in the 1988 movie “The Accidental Tourist.” Read More…
Premiados con los Oscars honoríficos denuncian la desigualdad entre hombres y mujeres en Hollywood
A continuación Tom Hanks contó anécdotas de Geena Davis, a la que se premió por su trabajo por la igualdad entre hombres y mujeres en la industria del cine a través de la organización que fundó en 2004, el Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. “Amo ser parte de esta industria y la actuación es mi pasión. Pero también estoy apasionada por la igualdad de género”, dijo Davis al recoger el premio especial Jean Hersholt. “El film que cambió mi vida fue ‘Thelma y Louise’. Fue la primera vez que me di cuenta de que las mujeres salían del cine inspiradas por los personajes femeninos”, continuó, antes de denunciar que los medios y el cine mandan el mensaje de que “niños y hombres” son más valiosos que “niñas y mujeres”. Read More…
Geena Davis receives honorary Oscar for work against gender bias
Actress Geena Davis urged Hollywood filmmakers to take new steps to address an ongoing gender imbalance in media as she accepted an honorary Oscar on Sunday for her work to promote more women on screen. While equality for women lags throughout U.S. society, it is even worse in film and television, said Davis, the “Thelma and Louise” star who founded a nonprofit research group called the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media in 2004. “However abysmal the numbers are in real life, it’s far worse in fiction – where you make it up!” said Davis as she accepted the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award. “We make it worse.” Read More…
