Here's to Women!

I did a little investigating this morning. I went to the Oscars website and got the numbers for the women ever nominated in the two writing categories. I have to say I was expecting to be angry. To see us so underrepresented. The fact is, at the very first ceremony in 1928 there was a woman nominated. An unofficial nomination as they did in those days but, Josephine Lovett was nominated for "Our Dancing Daughters".

Eighty years, two writing categories, five nominees in each category equals a total of 800 nominees. (Is my math right?) There have been a total of 123 women nominated. Wait a minute, I am angry. That's only 15% of all nominees! How many women are in this country? About 51%? Is that right? When I saw 123 I thought, we came a long way. And I guess we did. But there's a long way to go.
Nominees for the screenwriting categories

Out of the total 160 winners, 20 were women. (Sorry, received the Oscar, I forgot we don't say "the winner is" anymore. It creates too much competition. I just hate our new P.C. world.)

So, here's something else that annoyed me. Straight from the website, here are the women nominated in the Directing category:

Results displayed by award category; sort is chronological
Win indicated by an asterisk (*)


1976 (49th)
DIRECTING

Seven Beauties -- Lina Wertmüller

1993 (66th)
DIRECTING

The Piano -- Jane Campion

2003 (76th)
DIRECTING

Lost in Translation -- Sofia Coppola

Three out of 400 nominees. Zero wins. Does anyone else see a problem here? Why are we being kept away from the director's chair?

Okay, I'll stop now and get back to my own screenplays. But think about this, if the majority of directors and producers are white males how are we ever going to have real diversity in this industry? People focus so much on actors winning the Oscars and their ethnicities, but we should really be worried about the people behind the cameras, choosing who gets to go in front of them...