On Friday, Aline Brosh McKenna—the co-creator, showrunner, and head writer of “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend”—started the #FemaleFilmmakerFriday hashtag to shine a light on all the female directors who work behind the scenes on television and movie sets. Only 4.3 percent of directors behind the top 1,100 films from 2007 to 2017 were women, according to the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative—and in the 75 years since the Golden Globes began, only one woman has won the award for Best Director.
McKenna said she got the idea for the hashtag when she saw director Tamra Davis post a photo of herself working on set.
“We were planning this for 2/2 but people were excited, so let’s go for it!,” McKenna tweeted alongside a photo of her behind the camera. “My friend Tamra Davis recently posted a photo of herself directing and it inspired me, so I invited some women to do the same. It’s hard to become what you do not see. #femalefilmmakerfriday”
Other female directors, including Ava DuVernay, who directed the upcoming film “A Wrinkle in Time,”, followed McKenna’s lead and posted their own photos and messages on Twitter.
“Happy #FemaleFilmmakerFriday. I love seeing all the images of women helmers doing their work. We are a small, but mighty tribe. A few pix with my boys on #WrinkleinTime,” DuVernay tweeted.
Throughout the day, women like Amber Tamblyn, America Ferrera, Gina Rodriguez, Elizabeth Banks, Kerry Washington, and Shonda Rhimes shared their work on social media, celebrating themselves and each other.
https://twitter.com/ElizabethBanks/status/957089524701478913
https://twitter.com/AmericaFerrera/status/957011120673374208
https://twitter.com/kerrywashington/status/957079053391089664
This kind of visibility is powerful, because the more women writing shows, creating new series, and directing, the more representative and reflective of women’s experiences Hollywood will (hopefully) become. To that end, McKenna wants to make this a weekly thing—so be sure check back next week for another installment.
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