Venice - The Groundbreaking Series

I went to a discussion panel last night called ‘Casting Female Roles: Actresses and the Casting Couch’ hosted by the wonderful group “Women in Film and Television” (WFTV) which is the UK branch of an international organization that is dedicated to helping women in the film and TV industry through information and networking opportunities etc. This does link back to Venice, so bear with me!

The reason for the discussion is due to the sever lack of female roles in the industry. An Equity survey showed that over half the viewing public is female (not hard to believe) but that for every 2 male roles, there is only 1 female role (35.3% female to 63.5% male). And often, depending on the genre, it’s even less than that.

The panel was made up of some significant names in the UK industry:

Nancy Bishop - casting director for films like Wanted, Chronicles of Narnia, The Bourne Identity

Ros Hubbard - casting director for films like Angela’s Ashes, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, and most recently Desert Flower

Pippa Cross – A producer of many films including Vanity Fair and who has recently joined the UK Film Council’s Board of Directors.

Aisling Walsh –writer and director. She directed Fingersmith (helloooo sista!) as well as numerous other projects that have seen her win awards and recently completed a project with Kenneth Branagh.

Sharman Macdonald – Playwright and Screenwriter. She’s won numerous awards for her plays as well as writing “The Edge of Love” which starred her daughter, Keira Knightely and is working on “Gellhorn” which will star Gillian Anderson.

So we’re all sitting as comfortably as one can in the those rickety fold up chairs, a room full of women and two men (both partners to women on the panel) and not surprisingly the room is mostly comprised of actors.

Why is it there are so few women roles, especially when there are more actresses than actors? Well the conclusion was that women tend not to get as high up in the industry, that there aren’t as many female writers, female directors, producers, crew members etc except for a very few selected jobs like casting and script supervising which harks back to a time when secretaries were given these roles by default. You may be nodding your head at me stating the obvious, but the panel was not really there just to talk that because THAT discussion would have been short – it was more a call to arms, an inspiration panel of women who have been successful and who are telling us that hey! The industry IS skewed towards males but that we need to do our own thing and basically elbow our way into industry! They also spoke about getting out there and making our own things – using the current volatility of the industry (the recession has hit the UK film industry hard) and get on the web!

Starting to sound familiar? Naturally throughout this my mind is jumping to Venice and if ever there was answer to last night’s panel it was this series. The three creatives behind Venice are women with Crystal, Kim and Hope. We have a series which will be woman centric by its very nature and glory hallelujah in the Venice banner you will count seven women to three men, plus another now that Nadia Bjorlin has joined the cast. And more than half of those women roles are to be played by over 35's. I can’t think of a single series right now that boasts that (possibly the Imaginary Bitches webseries, but I haven’t watched that yet and I believe it’s a more youth orientated cast…) and the last series I can think of is the L Word – which again was youth centric.

From the incredible buzz surrounding Venice it is already clear that there is an audience for woman orientated entertainment and we are willing to use our considerable buying power to be represented. Just look at our response to the t-shirt the challenge issued to us by the Venice Team only today! (Okay, so we have a very tasty incentive…but let’s not get too technical…). This is also reflected with films like Mama Mia, which pulled in a decidedly older woman centric audience, and the Sex in the City film – perhaps not la crème de la crème of film making, but viable box office hits. This shows the industry that it is commercially viable to make entertainment specifically for women including the over 25 demographic.

Indeed Venice is breaking ground on many levels. It represents lesbians, it represents women and it is boldly forging a way forward for the viability of web series by showing us how it’s done! This series is simply comprised of so much WIN! *does an I love Olivia dance*.

xAnita
http://bidforvenice.webeden.co.uk/