Women and Hollywood

Melissa Silverstein is the founder and editor of Women and Hollywood, one of the most respected sites for issues related to women and film as well as other areas of pop culture. Women and Hollywood educates, advocates, and agitates for gender parity across the entertainment industry.

She is also the co-founder and Artistic Director of The Athena Film Festival. The 4th annual festival will take place from February 6-9, 2014 at Barnard College in NYC.

Melissa recently published the first book from Women and Hollywood, In Her Voice: Women Directors Talk Directing, which is a compilation of over 40 interviews that have appeared on the site.

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Blog Roll

Where'd You Go Bernadette Gets Writers and Producers

News

One of the best books I read over the holidays and last year is Maria Semple's Where'd You Go Bernadette? It is an original, funny, touching, moving story of a 50 year old woman, Bernadette, who winds up in Seattle and becomes something of a hermit after a series of professional and personal setbacks. The thing about the book is that is all about creativity and how when people who are uniquely talented need to create or they lose touch with themselves and as one character says "become a menace to themselves and society."

By Melissa Silverstein
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January 9, 2013 1:30 PM
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0 Comments

Blogs

There are not many times where people have enough juice to make change in a lumbering system that is so resistant to it. But the gig of directing Catching Fire, the second film in The Hunger Games trilogy was one of those golden opportunities and now it is gone.

By Melissa Silverstein
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May 4, 2012 11:59 AM
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7 Comments

Blogs

According to reports in EW, the Playlist and the Hollywood Reporter, the search for a director for Catching Fire is down to two dudes -- Bennett Miller and Francis Lawrence. Now I think that Miller is a great director. I loved Moneyball and Capote. But to pick him to direct Catching Fire when he has NO experience with something of this magnitude is ridiculous. And Lawrence who has experience with CGI and action films is a name not on the tip of anyone's tongue and also doesn't seem right having directed I am Legend and Like Water for Elephants.

By Melissa Silverstein
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April 19, 2012 11:00 AM
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6 Comments

Blogs

Nina Jacobson is poised to have a really great weekend. She's about to open The Hunger Games which if tracking and advance sales hold will be one of the best opening weekends ever. She answered some questions by phone as the film gets ready to roll out

By Melissa Silverstein
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March 22, 2012 11:37 AM
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5 Comments

Video

Nina Jacobson has been around Hollywood for a while. She's one of a handful of women to run a studio having run Buena Vista Studios at Disney until 2006.

By Melissa Silverstein
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March 14, 2012 10:30 AM
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0 Comments

Blogs

The news is that this week when The Hunger Games came onto the pre release tracking (which is what the studios use to gauge awareness and desire to see a film) it was huge - so huge that experts are saying it could open between $70 and $100 million.

By Melissa Silverstein
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March 2, 2012 12:03 PM
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2 Comments

Interview With Lone Scherfig - Director of One Day

One Day directed by Lone Scherfig tells the story of Emma and Dex played by Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess. Two people who become friends and who stick it out even though there are times when they cannot stand each other. Emma is the grounded one. She's a poor would be writer who takes a long time to find her passion. Dex is a spoiled brat, who doesn't figure out how to get his act together until he realizes that he loves Emma. They become partners and extremely happy later in their relationship which is played out on a single day -- July 15th -- over 20 years. It is a story of friendship and love told through Anne Hathaway's different hairstyles.

By Melissa Silverstein
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August 19, 2011 3:00 AM
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0 Comments

Three Vie for Next Female Franchise

Variety reported yesterday that three Oscar nominated young actresses Hailee Steinfeld, Abigail Breslin and Jennifer Lawrence are all in the race to play the lead in The Hunger Games based on the best-selling novel by Suzanne Collins.

By Melissa Silverstein
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March 3, 2011 4:21 AM
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13 Comments