Geena Davis’ Endless Gender Fight

Hollywood has serious issues with gender inequality, both in front of and behind the cameras. The business of filmmaking has made repeated headlines in recent years for its lack of diversity and wage gap between genders.

What makes the issue worse is the constant preaching of left-leaning celebrities to the rest of the world about such inequality in other areas of life and business.

All of it is unfortunately just further proof of Hollywood’s general hypocrisy in advocating for something while also ignoring to do anything about it.

One actress, however, is calling out her own trade. Academy Award-winning actress Geena Davis recently announced she will be producing a documentary later this month about gender inequality in Hollywood — and it won’t be a film with a light touch.

“I’ve been encouraged by my peers speaking out on gender disparity in recent years, but we still are not seeing the actual number change. There’s been no real improvement in the number of female roles since 1946, and there’s still a dearth of female directors,” Davis said, according to Variety, about the upcoming documentary, directed by Tom Donahue.

The film will include research from Davis’ Geena Davis Institute on Gender and Media and firsthand testimonials. “This documentary will allow us to share what has worked, and to highlight our successes and impact on the industry,” said Davis.

Sexism and gender inequality have long been problems that have plagued the Hollywood trenches. What makes the issue worse is the constant preaching of left-leaning celebrities to the rest of the world about such inequality in other walks of life and business.

“At one point, in my late 40s, I said to my agent, ‘Hey I want to take out an ad in Variety that says: not for nothing but I haven’t retired — he was like ‘no, just don’t,” she recently told MSNBC.

Actress Carey Mulligan called the film industry “massively sexist” while promoting last year’s “Suffregette;” director/actress Elizabeth Banks labeled the gender issues in Hollywood as “systematic problems;” and actress Emma Thompson claimed the same year, “some forms of sexism and unpleasantness to women have become more entrenched and indeed more prevalent.”

Despite much attention and preaching and existing in a supposedly socially responsible town, little has been done to remedy Hollywood’s sexism issues.

Testimonials, the same kind Davis’ film promises to use, have shown that sexism and gender inequality is an unattractive side to Hollywood that is more intentional than anything.

Actress Gillian Anderson, while promoting the recent revival of “The X Files,” revealed her mistreatment while making the original incarnation of the series.

Anderson revealed in an interview with The Daily Beast that she was encouraged by producers to walk behind her male co-star, David Duchovny, while in frame despite the two being co-leads on the show.

[lz_infobox]According to research out of USC Annenberg by Dr. Stacy Smith, only 30.2% of named roles in the top 100 grossing films released between 2007 and 2014 were female. And only 1.9% of those films were directed by women.[/lz_infobox]

It also took her three years to close the gap in their wages. When being asked to come back for the revival of the series, she was offered only half of what her co-star Duchovny was — despite both stars being essential to the series’ return in many fans’ eyes.

“Even in interviews in the last few years, people have said to me, ‘I can’t believe that happened, how did you feel about it, that is insane.’ And my response always was, ‘That was then, this is now.’ And then it happened again! I don’t even know what to say about it … It is sad,” Anderson said in the interview.

Despite the obvious issues Hollywood has with gender inequality and sexism, its mostly liberal stars still manage to criticize other Americans and businesses while ignoring the plights of artists like Anderson.

“Thelma & Louise” star Geena Davis seems to hope her film does something to shine a light back on Hollywood and its issues.

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The actress has mostly kept things quiet on the acting front for the last 15 years or so, and launched her institute in 2007. The Institute’s site claims to have “influenced change in major feature films, including Pixar’s ‘Monster’s University,’ Sony’s ‘Hotel Transylvania,’ and upcoming film “The Little Prince.'” Davis also launched the Bentonville Film Festival last year, which is dedicated to highlighting diversity in front of and behind the camera, particularly for women.

Of course there’s always the upcoming “Ghostbusters” reboot. The lead roles are being filled by women, but filmmakers are unwilling to accept criticism of their trailers and reboot plans, and fans have been unwilling to accept a new “Ghostbusters.” Will that change when the movie opens next month?

The gender inequality and sexism issues in Hollywood seem to be making little progress. Maybe Davis can help change that.