Seed & Spark: Writing Women

So, where does that leave us? There are the dismal numbers, all laid out, Hollywood’s claims that it can’t take risks, that women are a financial liability (though they buy the majority of movie tickets), or that the few female execs that climb to the top can’t or won’t pull other women up with them. But on the micro-level, this is about individual decisions each woman makes when she allows a story she wrote to be usurped as it transfers to the screen, or takes a part, no matter how fantastic, that is written and directed by a man.

Five-Fingered Lucy, from seedandspark.com, © Jack Lawrence Mayer
Five-Fingered Lucy, from seedandspark.com, © Jack Lawrence Mayer

 

This is a guest post by Martine Moore. 

This month, I’ll shoot a short film called Five-Fingered Lucy, in which I play the lead. It’s a dark, girl-meets-patriarchy story about a young shoplifter, written and directed by Jack Lawrence Mayer. The script tackles sexuality, abuse, and solitude. Jack is a long time friend and collaborator, and yet, my decision to be in his film is a conscience call. He is telling a story about male culture from a female point of view. Should I let Jack tell my story for me, or broadly speaking, should women let men tell our stories for us?

This is a question that can be asked at every level of the industry. Let’s take a look at the big awards circuit films this year, as presented by the Golden Globes list of nominees for 2015. Of the Best Picture nominees, only one centers on a woman’s experience, and that’s The Theory of Everything, which, arguably, is a story popularized by the famous male figure it depicts. The film is based on Jane Hawking’s memoir of her marriage to Stephen Hawking. The screenplay is written by a man, Anthony McCarten, and directed by a man, James Marsh.

The Best Actress category is a better place to search for films with female driven content, and here the pattern holds: Cake, Still Alice (an adaptation of Lisa Genova’s novel), Wild (an adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s memoir) and Big Eyes are all written or adapted and directed by men. Annie has a single woman on the writing staff, Aline Brosh McKenna, but is otherwise written and directed by men. The notable exception is Gone Girl, directed by David Fincher but adapted by Gillian Flynn from her own best-selling novel.*

Cheryl Strayed, from her website, cherylstrayed.com, photo by Jobi Kabana
Cheryl Strayed, from her website, cherylstrayed.com, photo by Jobi Kabana

 

Much has been made of Gone Girl’s feminist or anti-feminist content and its psychopathic anti-heroine, Amy Dunne. I’m not sure this movie qualifies as female-driven content, as half of the narrative is a male POV, but I saw the movie and will say this: I don’t think it’s up to Flynn, simply by virtue of being a female writer, to create characters that advance the feminist cause, though her reliance on stereotypes that seem to re-reinforce misogynistic views—namely that women lie about rape—is unfortunate. Still, these stereotypes have more to do with Flynn’s capacities as a writer and her chosen genre than they do with her stance on feminism. I side with Zoë Heller, who wrote in the New York Review of Books that both the novel and film are too plainly pieces of pop entertainment to be taken as serious examinations of gender.

Yet, Flynn carried her story into this second, male-dominated medium on her own, which is no small feat. How come the female authors of best-selling books like Genova and Strayed didn’t adapt their own work for the screen?

Strayed, in an interview with Indiewire, is asked the question, and responds, “Well I wasn’t offered the job! And I think I agree why. Reese and Bruna both felt that with a memoir the writer isn’t the best person to make that adaptation because he or she is too close to the material and to that life.” Apparently the best person for the job is Nick Hornby, a popular male British writer who has written numerous novels and screenplays. He received Strayed’s blessing before adapting Wild.

Can men tell authentic stories from the female perspective? For any artist, the world should be his or her fictional oyster. Men can write women, and women can write men; imagination and empathy do not have a gender. Male filmmakers who are captivated by women’s stories and want to tell them can be allies. Actresses are still lucky to get a role in which they are fully developed (and fully clothed), with nuance and an inner life, and many words to speak. Still, the overwhelming likelihood is that those words will be written by a man, and spoken under the direction of another, despite the source material.

Women’s media center logo, from their website, womensmediacenter.com
Women’s Media Center logo, from their website, womensmediacenter.com

 

It’s not enough to simply say to women, “Make your own work.” They are attempting to do so. Look at enrollment numbers in film schools, as one indication. Women make up 46 percent of USC’s School of Cinematic Studies, according to their admissions site. On the indie film circuit, women’s participation is greater as well, making up 26.4 percent of writers at Sundance in 2013, and 50 percent of its narrative directors. But when women hit the larger market and the culture at large, these numbers slide drastically. Women either can’t get hired or secure funding. The Center for the Study of Women in Television & Film at San Diego State has found that women’s participation behind the camera is at 16 percent for the top 250 domestically made films in 2013, down one point from 1998. The Center’s Director, Dr. Martha Lauzen, is quoted as saying “there is no evidence to suggest that women’s employment has improved in key behind-the-scenes roles over the last 16 years,” debunking anyone’s notion of gradual but linear progress.

So, where does that leave us? There are the dismal numbers, all laid out, Hollywood’s claims that it can’t take risks, that women are a financial liability (though they buy the majority of movie tickets), or that the few female execs that climb to the top can’t or won’t pull other women up with them. But on the micro-level, this is about individual decisions each woman makes when she allows a story she wrote to be usurped as it transfers to the screen, or takes a part, no matter how fantastic, that is written and directed by a man. It’s a decision that comes with internal conflict. We’ve come a ways in acknowledging that women’s stories on screen hold universal, non-gendered appeal. We need to take the next step in giving women more opportunity to tell them themselves.

*While this is a separate though related discussion, I would be remiss not to point out that all these stories, with the exception of a re-imagined Annie, are about white women.

 


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Martine Moore is an actress and writer living in Los Angeles. She is a co-creator of the web series Ingenue and will appear in the upcoming shorts Dry and Five-Fingered Lucy and the feature, Americana. martineaverymoore.com

 

 

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week–and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

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The Women’s Media Center: The Status of Women in the U.S. Media 2014 at Women’s Media Center

Charts: Hollywood’s White Dude Problem by Nina Liss-Schultz at Mother Jones

TV: Lisa Edelstein, Janeane Garofalo to Star in Marti Noxon’s New Bravo Series by Inkoo Kang at Women and Hollywood

Meet Saudi Arabia’s first female editor-in-chief of a national newspaper by Maya at Feministing

 

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

 

The Women’s Media Center Announces Social Media Award Nominees

  
From the Women’s Media Center website:

As part of this year’s Women’s Media Awards, the Women’s Media Center is opening voting for its Social Media Award to the public. Cast your vote today for one of nineteen incredible bloggers, social media gurus, activists, and new media makers for gender justice! The winner will be honored at the Women’s Media Awards on November 13, 2012 in New York City. 

You can vote by clicking here. GO VOTE!
And here’s a special shout out to two of the nominees–Jessica Luther and Tami Winfrey Harris–who’ve both published pieces at Bitch Flicks!
Congratulations to all the nominees!