hey hollywood where are the girls?
It's happening again. And wow, it just makes me tired.
I saw the Jan/Feb 2000 issue of "Creative Screenwriting." "The Best Writing
of 1999." Nice title, huh? And nine men on the cover. Nine. And not one
woman. Hmmm. Nice way to start the new century. . . .
This reminds me of the last day I bought a copy of "Vanity Fair." (And
I do mean last, those "Vanity Fair" boys will never get another dollar
out of me.) It was the April '95 issue. A "Hollywood" issue. It featured
all the studio heads. The guys were all in power suits. The lone woman
on that list? Sherry Lansing? Head of Paramount Pictures? I don't know
how hard they had to hunt for it, but they dug up an old photograph of
her in a bathing suit and ran that. Nice, huh? All those guys in power
suits and one woman half naked by the pool. The mind boggles.
And it got worse.
The photo titled "The Writers"? Guess who "The Writers" were? Eighteen
middle-aged paunchy guys drinking scotch and smoking cigars. No offense
to middle-aged paunchy guys who like scotch and cigars, but excuse me?
There are some pretty fabulous woman writers out there. Off the top of
my head, Calli Khouri (Thelma and Louise), Nora Ephron (When Harry Met
Sally), Carrie Fisher (Postcards From the Edge), Fannie Flagg (Fried Green
Tomatoes), Caroline Thompson (Edward Scissorhands, Nightmare Before Christmas),
Jane Campion (The Piano), Elaine May (Heaven Can Wait, The Birdcage).
That's off the top of my head. And it's 2 a.m. More are out there that
aren't even leaping into my brain at 2 a.m. But there was "Vanity Fair."
Showing us "The Writers." And they were all guys.
And here we are again. It's January 2000, five years and a brand new century
later. And there is "Creative Screenwriting." Showing us "The Best of
1999." And it's all guys. Wow.
Here are the best flicks of '99 according to "Creative Screenwriting"
and the people credited with writing the scripts:
American Beauty: Alan Ball. Guy.
Snow Falling on Cedars: Ron Bass and Scott Hicks. Guys.
Man on the Moon: Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski. Guys.
Magnolia: Paul Thomas Anderson. Guy.
Three Kings: David O. Russell. Guy.
The Talented Mr. Ripley: Anthony Minghella. Guy.
Green Mile: Frank Darabont. Guy.
Cradle Will Rock: Tim Robbins. Guy.
Those aren't bad movies. And in the interests of being fair, since I'm
about to roast "Creative Screenwriting" here, I thought maybe I'd better
hunt up a few movies written by women. Being lazy, I reach for the paper.
It's January 19th, 2000. All the movies except two listed in theaters
right now are '99 flicks. I think, off the top, let's see what we've got?
Here's what's playing at my local theater that isn't on the "Creative
Screenwriting" list:
Sleepy Hollow: Kevin Yagher. Guy.
The End of the Affair: Neil Jordan. Guy.
Dogma: Kevin Smith. Guy.
Any Given Sunday: John Logan and Oliver Stone. Guys.
Stuart Little: M. Night Shyamalan and Greg Brooker. Guys.
The Cider House Rules: John Irving. Guy.
Girl Interrupted: James Mangold and Lisa Loomer and Anna Hamilton Phelan.
Holy cats, we've got girls in there. And a -- Guy.
Bicentennial Man: Nicholas Kazan. Guy.
Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo: Harris Goldberg & Rob Schneider. Guys.
Anna and the King: Steve Meerson & Peter Krikes. Guys.
The Hurricane: Armyan Bernstein and Dan Gordon. Guys.
The World is not Enough: Neal Purvis & Robert Wade and Bruce Feirstein.
Guys.
Galaxy Quest: David Howard and Robert Gordon. Guys.
Toy Story 2: Peter Docter. Guy.
Liberty Heights: Barry Levinson. Guy.
Being John Malkovich: Charlie Kaufman. Guy.
There are a couple new releases for 2000 in theaters. "Supernova" and
"Next Friday." Guess who wrote the scripts? David Campbell Wilson. Guy.
Ice Cube. Guy.
Guy. Guy. Guy. Guy. Guy.
What the? Okay, look, I've been underground writing for a bit. But maybe
I should have been paying attention. Because apparently, while I was writing,
Hollywood stopped hiring woman writers?
I started here with the intention of roasting "Creative Screenwriting"
for picturing only men on their cover. But I'm staring at these films
in the paper thinking, What damn choice did "Creative Screenwriting" have?
They were being lazy, sure. Six of the eight films they listed happened
to be in theaters right now, so they didn't hunt far for their "Best of
1999" list. And they didn't even mention "Sixth Sense," which according
to everyone I know, came in right up there at the top of the list. (Also
written by, cough cough cough, um, a Guy.) But the question is, What damn
choice did "Creative Screenwriting" have?
Out of twenty-four films showing at local theaters, twenty-three were
scripted by guys.
Women worked on one.
With a guy.
So who am I supposed to roast here? "Creative Screenwriting"? Whose editors
couldn't even find films in theaters written by women? Or a system that
hires only men to write films. Or, if it hires women? Only shoves scripts
written by men through the door? Except --
It's not "The System": some amorphous entity responsible for all evil
perpetrated on Planet Earth. Let's be grown up here for a second and stop
pretending "The System" is some all powerful evil "entity" and acknowledge
-- "The System" is people. People in charge of who gets hired. People
in charge of who gets fired. And people in charge of what gets made. So
who's in charge? Well, there's a lot of musical chairs in Hollywood, so
people shift around a bit, but according to my sources today, let's see.
. .
¥Castle Rock Entertainment: Martin Shafer.
¥Columbia Tristar Motion Picture Group: Amy Pascal.
¥Dreamworks: David Geffen, Jeffrey Katzenberg, Steven Spielberg.
¥MGM/United Artists: Alex Yemenidjian, Chris McGurk.
¥Paramount Pictures-Motion Picture Group: Sherry Lansing.
¥Twentieth Century Fox: William Mechanic.
¥Universal Pictures: Stacey Snider.
¥Walt Disney Pictures/Touchstone Pictures: Peter Schneider.
¥Warner Brothers Pictures: Alan Horn.
Anyone see their name on that list? If you do, I have one big question
for you. Where are the girl writers? Sure as hell not in my theater. And
till I see them there? It's to the dungeon with you, my cherubs. And take
the "Vanity Fair" editors with you. You ought to get along. You appear
to have a lot in common.
Love and Kisses,
Max Adams
*Special thanks to Denise & Jessica at the WGA, who worked late helping
me correct mispellings and "screenplay by" credits. Any and all mispellings
and/or errant ampersands and "ands" are the result of the author's attrocious
handwriting.
*originally published in ScreenTalk
