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

Lucy Alibar and Doris Kearns Goodwin Nominated for USC Scripter Award

News

USC announced their 2013 Scripter award nominees this week. The Scripter award celebrates both the screenwriter and the author of the original text that the film was adapted from. This year, due to a tie, there are six nominees instead of the usual five. Two of the nominees are women.

By Kerensa Cadenas
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January 17, 2013 11:00 AM
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0 Comments

Reviews

Beasts of the Southern Wild is the perfect example of how to make a movie in this new post recession world. Take a great script, make it for a price and then let the movie stand on its merits. And yes, the awards and great reviews it has received since the premiere at Sundance earlier this year are all right -- this is one seriously spectacular and special film. Run, don’t walk to the theatre to see it. The film tells the story of 6-year-old Hushpuppy -- played by Quvenzhané Wallis, a girl who had never acted before – and the people who live with her and her dad in the Bathtub, a place below the levees in the Bayou of Louisiana one storm away from destruction. The location is not exactly real but it is also not exactly fictional. You are supposed to be reminded of the Lower Ninth Ward and what happened during Katrina. This is about people who are everywhere in our society who live on the edge, extremely poor, with no resources except their own spit and guts.

By Melissa Silverstein
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June 29, 2012 11:30 AM
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2 Comments

Video

I saw this film last night. I was totally and completely blown away. I can't even articulate my reaction to it right now. One of the most interesting, different and without a doubt one of the best films I have seen in a long, long time. The lead of this film is an amazing 6-year old girl, Quvenzhane Wallis. The film opens on June 22.

By Melissa Silverstein
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June 8, 2012 9:22 AM
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Blogs

It’s hard not to notice sexism when it is everywhere. After dealing with a person named Chris for three years trying to find lodging in Cannes I was stunned to find out that Chris was a woman. I’d assumed she was a man and all of this time I thought I was communicating with a man. I trusted “him” that he wouldn’t rip me off, that he knew what he was doing — and once I discovered “he” was a “she” I had to rethink my expectations. Suddenly I worried whenever the wi-fi went out that “she” wouldn’t know how to fix it.

By Sasha Stone
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May 20, 2012 12:00 PM
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4 Comments