How Hollywood squeezed out women directors; plus, what's with the rich jerks on TV?

It's Been a Minute

NPR

News Commentary, Society & Culture, News, Spirituality, Religion & Spirituality

4.6 • 8.8K Ratings

🗓️ 10 March 2023

⏱️ 32 minutes

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Summary

In nearly 100 years, the Oscar award for Best Director has only gone to three women. The film industry as a whole has been heavily dominated by men, but it wasn't always this way. Ahead of Academy Awards, Brittany chops it up with Maya Montañez Smukler, author of Liberating Hollywood: Women Directors and the Feminist Reform of 1970s American Cinema, to discuss the state of women directors and how the industry systematically shifted them out of the spotlight.

Then, we ask Chicago Tribune TV and film critic Nina Metz about the oversaturation of fictional, churlish billionaires on screen - and why there should be more depictions of the workers they exploit.

You can follow us on Twitter @ItsBeenAMin or email us at [email protected].

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey there, you're listening to It's Been A Minute From NPR.
0:06.2	I'm Brittany Loose.
0:07.8	Famously, the Oscars are this weekend.
0:10.8	And the Oscar goes to.
0:12.7	And famously, the Oscars are really, really bad at awarding women directors.
0:18.4	In nearly 100 years, the Academy has only given the award for Best Director to three women.
0:24.5	Jane Campiang, Glouis O.
0:26.8	Catherine Bigelow.
0:29.8	How would you characterize the landscape for women directors in Hollywood now?
0:35.8	Well, you mean this?
0:37.8	Wow, you're really starting with the biggest existential question.
0:42.8	I thought maybe we would sort of lead up to that.
0:46.8	That's Maya Montanyas Smuggler.
0:48.8	She's a film historian in archivist who traced the rise, fall, and re-emergence of women directors
0:55.8	in our book, Liberating Hollywood.
0:57.8	The state of women directors in Hollywood today.
1:01.8	Well, and I don't mean to say this to be wishy-washy, but it's complicated as Nancy Myers,
1:08.8	a director.
1:09.8	I would say in her movie, it's complicated.
1:13.8	It's complicated because women directors are finally starting to get their due in the
1:19.0	upper echelons of Hollywood.
1:21.2	In the past decade, we've seen Catherine Bigelow, Chloe Zhao, and Jane Campiang,
	...

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