Innholdsfortegnelse for Women in Ent. Special 40A 2018 i The Hollywood Reporter

This year has been incredible for women in Hollywood. There has been unprecedented dialogue about issues like wage equality and systemic bias and, most notably, sexual assault and harassment. We have spoken and we have spoken loudly, and our voices, once muffled under layers of crinoline and repressed rage, have been heard. Heroines have emerged. We are cracking open windows and beating down doors. The air is circulating and the light is pouring in. There are magazine covers and TV specials and parties and instas celebrating the very real, very important and long overdue progress that has been made. But with that progress, there have been mistakes, there has been pain. There has been a deep and gut-wrenching reckoning. And not just for men. This year has been incredible for…

Cindy Ballard Chief human resources officer, ICM Partners Chika Chukudebelu VP programming and diversity, NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment Group Melissa Beth Hirschenson Senior talent agent, Innovative Artists Agency Melissa Kates Partner, Viewpoint Public Relations Lauri Metrose Senior vp Comms., CBS Television Studios Donna Rosenstein Head of casting, Amazon Studios Nicole Sexton President & CEO, Entertainment Industry Foundation Melissa Blake Writer/producer; co-executive producer, October Faction Kathy Connell Executive producer, SAG Awards & national programming, SAG-AFTRA Stacey Hoppe VP corporate responsibility, Warner Bros. Entertainment Jessica Lacy Partner, Head of international & independent film, ICM Partners Dee Dee Myers Executive vp worldwide corporate comms. and public affairs, Warner Bros. Entertainment Jessica Rovins Executive vp corporate comms., Paramount Television Cristen Carr Strubbe VP physical production, Universal Pictures Spring Aspers Head of music, creative affairs worldwide,…

Entertainment execs who are qualified for corporate boards Non-entertainment execs who are qualified for Hollywood boards Sarah Barnett President, AMC Entertainment Networks WHY SHE DESERVES A SEAT A November promotion gives the former BBC America head a higher profile and more operational experience, key for a programming-focused executive. PERFECT FOR Creative-minded companies Kelly Campbell CMO, Hulu WHY SHE DESERVES A SEAT The Google Cloud alum has received several board offers since she joined Hulu’s C-suite in 2017, but she is holding out for the right fit. Past investment-banking jobs signal coveted financial experience. PERFECT FOR A legacy firm moving to a direct-to-consumer business Channing Dungey Former president, ABC Entertainment WHY SHE DESERVES A SEAT A Disney policy prohibiting execs from outside corporate board seats kept this 15-year TV veteran from…

Billy Eichner, my co-star on the late, great Difficult People, of which I created three beautiful, inclusive seasons for Hulu, was recently a guest on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast. When my name came up in conversation, Marc said to Billy: “I always think [Julie] doesn’t like me. Does she do that to a lot of people, or am I the only one?” Billy’s answer warmed my heart. “Julie’s picky,” he said. “But she has good taste.” I am picky. I don’t like most people, I’m sorry! The batting average of the human race is so unimpressive, I am using sports metaphors like “batting average” to decry it. This makes dating very challenging for me. Currently, I am fortunate to have been in a secure and joy-causing relationship with somebody with…

A wards season has kicked off, and many who will go before the kliegs and flashes will want what they consider optimal presentation. Yes, it’s too late for a little nip and tuck, says Beverly Hills plastic surgeon Garth Fisher (Kim Kardashian and Kate Hudson are patients): “With high-def cameras, you need six weeks for anything surgical or an ablative laser and four weeks for most other lasers to be safe; you can’t afford scars or blotching.” What you can do is improve skin quality and tone (drink collagen!), restore gleam to hair (try CBD oil) and make your body look like you’ve been in the hands of a trainer for months with new combinations of machines and injectables. Here’s what still can be accomplished in time for the Golden…

Zoe Bell has been strapped to the hood of a speeding Dodge Charger and thrown off a building. But the 40-year-old stuntwoman never truly felt fear until she was hired by Quentin Tarantino as the first solo female stunt coordinator on a major feature (the now-shooting Once Upon a Time in Hollywood). “As a performer, the more I scare the stunt coordinator, the better,” she explains. “But now I’m the stunt coordinator, and I’m the one getting scared.” The New Zealand native discovered stunt performing when her father, an ER doctor, met an injured stuntman. “He came home with a phone number,” Bell says, laughing. “My dad looked at this guy with a concussion and thought, ‘My daughter should do that!’” Six months later, she was on the set of…

Brené Brown, a research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, interviewed the Oscar-winning Viola Davis for the cover story, exploring the emotional work required of an artist and of an authentic leader (page 76). “She’s a truth-teller,” Brown says of Davis. A best-selling author, Brown released her latest book, Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts., on Oct. 9. Claudia Lucia photographed THR’s largest-ever group shot — 62 members of Black Women Who Brunch (page 38). Photo and video director Jennifer Martin Laski has brought THR’s photographer roster from 21 percent to 45 percent female in two years, while other magazines still average 28 percent. And all of this issue’s illustrators, hired by creative director Shanti Marlar and her team, are female. The…

AISHA HAUSER works at Warner Bros. Technology. Her mentor was Suzanne Kolb, then president of E! Entertainment. Her two WIE lessons: “Alone, we are tiny drops in a huge ocean, but together we can create powerful waves,” she says. “And even the most powerful women make mistakes.” PAOLA FRANCO, whose mentor was Jennifer Salke, now Amazon Studios head, is a creative assistant at Netflix. “I consider it a life obligation to provide the same kind of support to the next generation,” she says of her WIE experience, “whom I advise to say yes to every opportunity.” RAVYNNE STAINE is a producer assistant on syndicated talk show The Real; her mentor was producer Hilary Estey McLoughlin, now senior exec producer on ABC’s The View. Her advice for current and future mentees:…

Since joining the USC faculty in 2003, Annenberg Inclusion Initiative founder Stacy Smith has published annual reports on the state of race and gender representation in Hollywood. Year after year, the shouts into the void had gone unheard. “For 15 years I was floundering,” Smith tells THR. “Then I found my people.” Enter Brie Larson, 29, and Tessa Thompson, 35. The trio first met at an early Time’s Up meeting in 2017 at Larson’s house, where Smith broke out her trusty PowerPoint presentation. “When everything you’ve studied is finally delivered to the audience that it’s intended for, they’re able to take flight with the information in a whole new way,” says Smith. She and a group of actresses presented her statistics and strategy suggestions to leaders at UTA, which represents…

I met with a [white male] showrunner and we got along well and riffed off of each other. Toward the end, he looked at me almost in disbelief and said, “You’re really smart.” Erika L. Johnson, co-executive producer, The Village (NBC) I was in a writers room and Oprah’s Legends Ball had aired on TV. It inspired me and my mother. The next day, these white writers were like, “What the fuck was that?” I wanted to punch them. Just because something wasn’t about you doesn’t mean it’s not relevant. Lena Waithe, creator/EP, The Chi (Showtime) When people use their one black friend to explain why your point of view is wrong. Angela Nissel, co-EP, The Last O.G. (TBS) Being told I’m too sensitive when I point out classic gags…

AROUND THE ONE-YEAR anniversary of the Women in Film sexual harassment helpline Dec. 1, WIF president Amy Baer noticed that less than half of production deals in TV and film are with female creators. “You can’t achieve parity if there isn’t equal opportunity to access resources,” says Baer, former CEO of CBS films, noting that creators with deals don’t have to worry “about paying rent or salaries — and the studio’s lawyers are negotiating” for them. 15% of film studios’ production deals are with women or companies led by women 32% of TV networks’ production deals are with women or companies led by women…

A few years ago, Lindsey Beer and Geneva Robertson-Dworet were up for the same studio writing job. “We found out it was down to the two of us, so we said, ‘Why don’t we just write it together?’” says Robertson-Dworet. The studio went for it. It’s with this collaborative spirit that Beer, Robertson-Dworet and fellow writer Nicole Perlman — whose combined credits include such titles as Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel and Chaos Walking — established their new production company, Known Universe, focusing on sci-fi, superhero and fantasy features from a female perspective. “We thought, ‘It is crazy that there are no genrespecific production companies led entirely by women,’” says Perlman. As producers, they’ll have the power to circumvent the “clus terfuck” process, as Robertson-Dworet puts it, of too…

Maybe it is you, after all. Los Angeles’ dating scene makes it the fifth best city in the U.S. for singles behind Atlanta, Denver, San Francisco and Portland (New York ranks 28th), according to a November study by personal finance website WalletHub. Perhaps because L.A. ranked No. 1 for attractions and coffee shops, it also scored the top spot for having the most active Tinder users (out of 182 cities), so there are plenty of willing fish in the sea. But if you suspect your dates who work in entertainment are ghosting more often, you may be right: Industry users on The League app are 17 percent pickier than the average L.A. user and 12 percent more flaky.…

Viola Davis and Brené Brown first spoke in May 2017. Davis had recently won her Oscar for Fences, and Brown, the author of multiple best-sellers on courage and vulnerability, was developing her 2017 book, Braving the Wilderness. A research professor at the University of Houston, Brown’s work as a leadership consultant has earned her fans in S ilicon Valley (Melinda Gates: “Brené taught me that leadership requires admitting what you don’t know instead of pretending to know everything”), Hollywood (her A-list acolytes include Reese Witherspoon, Amy Adams, Laverne Cox and Oprah Winfrey, who calls her a “soul mate”) and well beyond (her two TED Talks have close to 50 million views between them). Brown was eager to interview Davis because “she’s such an incredible example of what it means to…

ICM Partners’ Joanne Wiles was at the Sundance Film Festival when she received the news about producer Allison Shearmur, a friend she first met at summer camp when they were teenagers — and the reason she pursued a career in Hollywood. “One of my colleagues texted me, ‘Did you know Alli Shearmur died?’” she recalls. “I literally got so upset and angry with him. I was like, ‘That cannot be true.’” Like many friends and colleagues, Wiles had no idea that Shearmur had been battling lung cancer for the past two and a half years and was terminally ill. On Jan. 19, the successful producer whose credits included the Hunger Games films, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and Disney’s liveaction Cinderella had succumbed to the disease at the age…

Tiffany Haddish Actor For Haddish, “She Ready” is part tagline, part rallying cry — though it’s clear Hollywood is paying attention already. The thrice-homeless comic’s meteoric rise kicked off in earnest during the summer of 2017 with her breakout success as supercharged sidekick Dina in the smash hit Girls Trip (which scored $140 million at the worldwide box office). Overnight, Haddish became Hollywood’s latest It girl, the industry showering her with offers and praise. Before long, she was tapped to host Saturday Night Live, a gig that earned her her first Emmy, and grace the cover of Time magazine’s Most Influential People issue. The 39-year-old followed Girls Trip with a Showtime stand-up special (another for Netflix is on the way), an HBO deal, a TBS comedy (opposite Tracy Morgan), a…

“They are all God’s sweet babies and I imagine them crying out for love and hugs. Also, I pretend to take an important call.”LENA DUNHAM “My secret is to remind myself that I fit into this category. Other than Tom Hanks and Sherry Lansing, I can’t think of someone who isn’t eventually called difficult.”TERRY PRESS “Straight-up honesty. When you call someone out, it usually gets their attention.”AMY ENTELIS “TO NOT WORK WITH THEM. I BELIEVE I’VE ADOPTED SHONDA RHIMES’ ‘NO ASSHOLES’ POLICY.”OPRAH WINFREY “I worked in day care in college. The same rules apply: Snack, nap, hug and an occasional time-out.”ANDREA MILORO “I JUST PRETEND THEY’RE A CHARACTER IN A JANE AUSTEN NOVEL.”AMY PASCAL “Do your homework, understand who you’re working with — and avoid the ones that literally everyone…

SAMANTHA BEE Host-producer, Full Frontal With Samantha Bee Full Frontal — the No. 1 late-night show on ad-supported cable, which reaches 4.2 million multiplatform viewers — is much more than a cri de coeur against the mendacities of Trump and his minions. It’s a call to action, including an extensive get-out-the-vote initiative in advance of the midterms. Not only has Bee, 49, pioneered a wry style of journalistic comedy, but she’s made it a priority to raise awareness and money for marginalized groups. My three morning musts “4 a.m.: Wake up in a panic from news alerts on my phone. 4:05 a.m.: Turn off phone, throw phone across the room. 4:10 a.m.: Crawl to phone, apologize to phone, turn phone back on, panic continues.” ELLEN DEGENERES Host, executive producer Not…

LORRIE BARTLETT, TONI HOWARD AND JESSICA LACY ICM Partners Agency indie film head Lacy, 39, went nine for nine at Toronto, including partnering with CAA to sell ICM client Karyn Kusama’s Destroyer to Annapurna. Talent co-head Bartlett, 55, reps Regina King, who claimed her third Emmy in 2018 and could win her first Oscar with If Beale Street Could Talk. Also in the Oscar hunt are BlacKkKlansman helmer Spike Lee and his film’s David Duke, Topher Grace — both clients of Howard, 74. What’s changed with men in Hollywood this year … Barlett: “Attitude.” … and what hasn’t changed at all Bartlett: “Inclusion. The numbers don’t lie. Thank you, Dr. Stacy Smith!” Howard: “Very few women really run things.” What might surprise people about me Lacy: “The movie One Fine…

“Stop telling me to ‘wait my turn’ to develop my own ideas, despite there being interest in doing so, when my white male peers weren’t told that at all. I know. I’ve asked them.” Morenike Balogun Koch, producer, Jupiter’s Legacy (Netflix) “Stop only coming to writers of color to write or develop series with main characters of color. Every show, regardless of the main character’s race, should have writers from all different backgrounds and experiences.” Shalisha Francis, supervising producer, Seven Seconds (Netflix) “Stop asking me about Kwanzaa.” Maisha Closson, co-EP, Claws (TNT) and How to Get Away With Murder (ABC) “Start asking writers of color for recommendations. I make no secret about BWB and the talented women who populate this group, yet I can think of only one time when…

Before there was SoulCycle and quickie Botox, there was Golden Door, the O.G. health spa that helped give rise to today’s $4.2 trillion wellness industry. Just off the 15 freeway (it becomes a zen exercise for guests to tune out the traffic) in the desert hills of San Marcos, the Door, as it’s affectionately known, may not be as plush as some of its newer rivals. But like Hollywood haunt Musso & Frank, it has history and enduring appeal. For 60 years, the unlikely sanctuary of bamboo forests and koi ponds has hosted guests (recently, Oprah Winfrey, Julia Roberts, America Ferrera and Liev Schreiber) for stays that are like summer camp for adults: part pampering, part personal adventuring, with 100 percent of net profits going to philanthropic causes. (All-inclusive weeklong…

CITY OF ANGELS | 2000 Davis met husband Julius Tennon (at the craft services table) when he guest starred on the CBS drama, which marked her first series regular role (Nurse Lynnette Peeler). KING HEDLEY II | 2001 Winning her first Tony Award for featured actress in a play, Davis said, “I’d like to thank God for the joy of my work … for giving me enough humility to know that I’m not the best, I’m just one of the blessed people in this business.” DOUBT | 2008 Hollywood snapped to attention at Davis’ performance opposite Meryl Streep in the John Patrick Shanley drama, which earned her the first of her three Academy Award nominations. Left: She hit the 2009 Oscar red carpet with co-stars Streep and Amy Adams (left).…

I was buying a pastel pink pair of stripper shoes on Hollywood Boulevard but was worried the purchase would go to waste. I had a final callback in an hour to meet the director for an intriguing leading role on a new well-written cable show and wanted to feel exactly like the character in her element. She was the “best pole dancer in the United States.” A topless role, which made me initially hesitant, but I decided to go for it, thinking: “Well, I am not going to have these lovely, young breasts forever, I’ll soon have children and breastfeed, so I might as well celebrate and archive ’em onscreen.” I fell in love with the role and all the physical training I would need to take on to prepare…

JACK NICHOLSON An investor, the actor dated then-waitress (and future mother to two of his children) Rebecca Broussard at the club. ANJELICA HUSTON “I have a [special] karma with Anjelica,” says Kallianiotes. “I helped her move in to [Nicholson’s place].” MADONNA “I remember Madonna coming up to me, saying, ‘Helena, how can people dance when you have garlic here?’” says Kallianiotes. SEAN PENN The actor punched someone over Madonna and once ran after a would-be photographer, taking away his film. MARLON BRANDO After Kallianiotes hired his son Christian to do welding work, Brando came in often to hang out and help with construction pre-opening. PRINCE “I would go to Prince’s house on Rexford, and we would play pool and talk about dancing,” recalls Kallianiotes. HARRY DEAN STANTON A charter member,…

SARAH BARNETT President, entertainment networks, AMC Networks The 53-year-old executive has solidified BBC America as a scripted programming destination with 2018 Emmy-nominated breakout Killing Eve, but can she do the same for niche brands IFC and SundanceTV — while keeping perennial prestige outlet AMC in the game? That’s the big question for Barnett, whose AMC Networks ascent now finds her in charge of one of TV’s most enviable portfolios. Getting to steer AMC, with flagship The Walking Dead firmly on the ratings wane, will be a blessing and a burden. What would surprise people about me “I’m a descendant of a bareknuckle Portuguese pugilist.” My entertainment guilty pleasure “No guilt, pure pleasure: Call the Midwife.” FRANCES BERWICK President, Lifestyle Networks, NBCU Cable With Bravo still powered by the Real Housewives…

MARA BROCK AKIL Producer, Akil Productions The fruits of her rich Warner Bros. TV deal (with husband Salim Akil) rolled out in 2018, when Brock Akil, 48, returned to the tube with two new hits: Black Lightning premiered to two-year highs on The CW, and semiautobiographical Love Is_ scored a quick renewal at OWN. Is it better to be an introvert or extrovert in Hollywood? “Don’t limit me. I vote for an extroverted introvert — it’s best to be yourself.” AVA DUVERNAY Producer-director DuVernay, who became the first African-American female director to helm a $100 million studio film with February’s A Wrinkle in Time, is on every studio’s most-wanted list. Currently wrapping up Netflix miniseries Central Park Five, she’s attached to direct Warner Bros.’ DC feature The New Gods. In…

As head for two years of the 160,000-strong actors union, Carteris, 57, this year oversaw major initiatives to address sexual harassment and welcomed i pn Telemundoerformers, who voted to unionize and signed their first contract in July, the first time in 65 years that actors at a major TV network have sought unionization. Berman, 62, and Fisher, 69, were voted presidents of the 8,500-member PGA in June. While each is busy producing — as head of The Jackal Group, Berman has projects at Fox, CBS and Netflix, and an animatedAddams Family movie hitting theaters in October; while Fisher, co-chairman of Red Wagon Productions, is developing a Gladiator sequel with director Ridley Scott — they served on the task force that created the PGA’s Anti-Sexual Harassment Guidelines (which has served as…