A few months ago, I started working on a project about women in the film and television industry. A project about women in Film and Television quickly turned into a project about diversity in Film and Television because the idea of more representation on set and on screen does not just mean ‘more women’.
The project is meant to give a voice to the feedback that the Film and Television industry so desperately needs.
Janal Bechthold, Composer
The diversity problem that is so deeply embedded in the film and television industry cannot be solved simply by adding more women.
I could talk endlessly about what I learned and continue to learn through this project but that would defeat the purpose of it because my hope is that you will continue on to read what these incredible women have written about encouraging diversity in the film and television industry.
There is only one thing I’ll share here – feedback is a gift. Knowing where you need improvement means that you’re one step closer to it and the Film and Television needs feedback badly.
Diversity is an intricate issue which of which I am incapable of addressing on my own because I can only attack it from one very narrow perspective.
Farah Merani, Actor | Advocate | Filmmaker
There are two parts to feedback and the first part is the easiest but seems to be chronically forgotten: listening. Just listen.
Then act. This is where either growth happens, or things start to unravel. You can’t just act to make the other person think you’ve listened to them, you have to listen and understand why you’re making a change, why are you being asked to do things differently? Unless you yourself believe in the change you’re making it’s not a real step forward its only surface level and surface level changes are never permanent.
Being treated like a checkmark is something that came up constantly in my conversations. This is why we’re not as far as we think because so much of the changes we’ve seen are only surface level, they are there to make it look like something has become different but the moment you start to pick it apart you realize that in fact things don’t look so different after all.
Change takes effort, a lot of it. But this was never going to be easy and if its easy then you push yourself until its hard, until you’re uncomfortable.
Christina Ienna, Director of Photography | Director