{"id":94905,"date":"2020-02-18T13:55:00","date_gmt":"2020-02-18T17:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa\/?post_type=bu-article&p=94905"},"modified":"2022-10-31T09:33:56","modified_gmt":"2022-10-31T13:33:56","slug":"geena-davis-leading-the-fight-for-gender-parity-in-hollywood","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa\/news\/articles\/2020\/geena-davis-leading-the-fight-for-gender-parity-in-hollywood\/","title":{"rendered":"Geena Davis: Leading the Fight for Gender Parity in Hollywood"},"content":{"rendered":"\t
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Geena Davis (CFA\u201979, Hon.\u201999) speaks at the Share Her Journey Rally for Women in Film during the Toronto International Film Festival, in 2018. In 2004, Davis set out to collect data about the portrayal of girls in media. When she learned that information didn\u2019t exist, she created the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media to begin her own in-depth research.\u00a0Photo by CHRIS PIZZELLO\/INVISION\/AP<\/em><\/p>\n\t\t\t\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGeena Davis: Leading the Fight for Gender Parity in Hollywood<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Long before the #MeToo movement, the Oscar winner, BU alum, and recent\u00a0GLOW<\/em>\u00a0star founded the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media<\/h4>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\n\t<\/div>\n\n\t\n
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February 18, 2020<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
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This article was originally published in Bostonia<\/a> in February 2020. By Megan Woolhouse.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Excerpt<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Sitting in a Pacific Palisades caf\u00e9, eating an Italian grinder on a recent afternoon, Geena Davis recalls when she began talking publicly about Hollywood\u2019s gender problem. It was a delicate proposition for a veteran actor, one with an Academy Award no less, who was hungry to keep landing major roles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the early 2000s, Davis had noticed that her daughter, then a toddler, watched TV shows that featured few, if any, female characters. Dismayed, the star renowned for her strong lead roles in films like Thelma & Louise<\/em> and A League of Their Own<\/em> used her industry connections with studio executives, directors, and the Screen Actors Guild to launch a conversation about why women and girls were so underrepresented on-screen, or were often represented in highly sexualized ways, and how to fix it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Davis was honored in October 2019 by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for her work to end gender inequality in film and television. <\/em><\/strong>Photo by KATHY HUTCHINS<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

And who better to address gender bias than a celebrated actor and mother, one with a Mensa<\/a> membership and the respect of her Hollywood peers? If only it were that simple. Davis (CFA\u201979, Hon.\u201999) says that in dozens of private meetings she had with Hollywood stakeholders, men and women, no one was swayed by her observation about women and girls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNobody believed<\/em> what I was saying,\u201d Davis says, drawing out the word \u201cbelieved.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coming on the heels of the scandals involving Hollywood executives and producers like Harvey Weinstein that have roiled the industry, those words resonate more deeply than ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But long before the #MeToo and Time\u2019s Up movements took hold, Davis was hatching a plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2004, she decided to collect data about the portrayal of girls in media and to build a body of fact-based research that would prove her theory. When she learned that such information did not exist, she created the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media<\/a> to begin her own in-depth research. The institute has used new technology to continuously monitor industry progress toward gender parity. Davis has spent the last 15 years delivering the results to the skeptics, disbelievers, and elite power players who would have been content to let men rule Hollywood. Forever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edgy, delicate work<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Those results were as bad as, or worse than, Davis thought. In media targeting children age 11 and under, girls were appearing on screen less, and when they did appear they were hypersexualized or they spoke little. One of the institute\u2019s earliest studies found that of the more than 4,000 characters across 400 G-rated, PG, PG-13, and R-rated movies surveyed, women were more than five times as likely as males to be shown in sexually revealing clothing (25 percent for women, versus 8 percent for men). It examined more than 1,000 shows from 12 network, public broadcast, and cable outlets\u2014a total of 534 hours of programming in 2005\u2014finding that male characters appeared at twice the rate of female characters in children\u2019s TV. This was edgy and delicate work, especially in an era when women actors were subjected to one-on-one hotel room interviews.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now Davis is getting some hard-earned recognition for her efforts to discuss unconscious bias and ingrained stereotypes a decade before they were mainstream concepts. The New York Times<\/a><\/em> has noted that her institute \u201cset the stage\u201d for the Time\u2019s Up<\/a> movement. And last October, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presented Davis<\/a> with the prestigious Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award for her efforts to help change the entertainment industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Geena pioneered the field of research on gender in media. Period.<\/div>