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Girls slam Hollywood
27/02/2003 12:22 - (SA)
Los Angeles - As Hollywood revs up for next month's Academy Awards, a group of feminists on Wednesday launched a campaign to protest the white male domination of the Oscars and the US movie industry.
The women, the Guerrilla Girls, will unveil a billboard in Los Angeles on Saturday comparing the number of women in the US Senate to the far lower percentage of women making movies in Tinseltown.
"Even the US Senate is more progressive than Hollywood," the billboard proclaims, comparing the 14 female senators in the 100-member house to four percent of Hollywood film directors who are women.
Next to the figures stands an Oscar statuette, the head of which resembles disgraced conservative US Senator Trent Lott which the Guerrilla Girls have named the "Trent L'Ottscar".
"The stodgy Senate and hip Hollywood have something in common: they both lag behind the rest of US society in numbers of women and people of colour in top positions," the Guerrilla Girls said in a statement.
Stressing that the Senate beat Hollywood in its inclusion of women and non-whites, the group said that the cradle of cinema was even lagging behind what was until recently one of the most repressive countries on earth.
"Even the interim government of Afghanistan is more progressive than Hollywood. Six percent of the interim cabinet members are women!," the organisation said.
Open up the boys' club
Only one of the top 100 grossing movies of last year was made by a female cinematographer, the group said, adding that just eight were written by women and only 12 were cut by female editors.
In addition, the group cited a study that said no "people of colour" employed by movie studios had the power to approve movie projects, while the industry unions were 80-90 percent white.
"We maintain that in the 21st century, low, low, low numbers like this have to be the result of discrimination, unconscious, conscious or both," the group said.
"And there's an easy way to change things: open up that boys' club and hire more women and people of colour. It worked in medicine, business and law. It worked in the art world. Now it's Hollywood's turn."
Guerrilla Girls have staged an annual protest against alleged inequalities in Hollywood since 1999, launching their billboard campaign a few weeks ahead of the Oscars ceremony which will take place in Hollywood on March 23.
- AFP
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South Africa
