And just because I’m on an angry roll today over the deplorable position of women in the film industry…
Last week, Indiewire blog Women and Hollywood ran this headline:
Universal Chief Donna Langley: There is No “Magic Bullet” to Improve Number of Women Directors Working on Studio Films
It refers to a DGA Quarterly magazine interview with Langley, in which she says this:
There’s no reason whatsoever why [women] can’t direct [tentpole and male-oriented action films]. In my own experience, when we have an open directing assignment of any kind, not just the big films, I would say it is the exception, not the rule, that there is a woman in the group of directors that we are interviewing.
Translation: “Sure, women are capable of directing the sorts of movies my studio makes. It’s just that I never think to ask any women if they’d like to do so.”
Langley appears not to realize how full of shit she is when she says, “I don’t think there is a magic bullet answer” to the lack of women directors. Because it’s pretty goddamn clear that the “magic bullet” is this: Hire more women.
This applies to all the studios, not just Universal. Like, maybe, the next time a studio is thinking about giving a $150 million tentpole film to a man with no directing experience — as Paramount has done with Star Trek 3, which will be directed by Roberto Orci, who has never directed a film before, a fact that Variety didn’t even deem worthy of mention in its announcement of this news — give it to a woman with directing experience.
Magic. Fucking. Bullet.
“A” woman.
Probably “a” black guy, too.
Unless they can double up and get a black woman to do the pointless interview.
See, we’re progressive!
Listen, I know I’m the boss and it’s my job to oversee all the hiring of directors for all our movies. But you have to understand… female directors? Ewww, am I right? Boys don’t want to watch movies with girls involved in them. Unless the girls are mostly nude.
But, hey, just because we’re all for diversity doesn’t necessarily mean we’re for — you know — diversity.
Who do you think we are? The New York Times?
Maybe we need magic bullets to kill the cooties Hollywood is so afraid of?
If you want to defend Orci, go ahead, but if you think that MaryAnn hasn’t criticized the lack of opportunities for women, or the vicious circle that creates, you haven’t been reading very carefully. Specifically, you haven’t read the comment you’re responding to, or the other article (linked above) she wrote on the same topic, on the same day. She also chose to target Orci, who was hired over women with much more substantial directing experience. That may be worth arguing about, but I’m not sure it’s effective to argue with MaryAnn by repeating the exact points she already made.
On the basis of what, exactly? This?
Any number of the production staff likely fit that description (even assuming Orci actually has significant on-set experience).
Robert Orci and Alex Kurtzman are “successful” insofar as they’ve sold a lot of scripts for movies that went on to make a lot of money. But if you look at the analyses of those films, they all succeeded in spite of their scripts, not because of them. The hallmarks of a Kurtzman/Orci script are lazy plotting, rampant logical inconsistencies, and plenty of room for flash-bang spectacle from the director.
Orci’s “talent”, such as it is, appears to be in knowing the right people. He’s just not a strong artistic nor financial choice (well, I guess he probably comes cheap compared to Abrams) to helm a major franchise film as his directorial debut.
As for his inclusion in MaryAnn’s analysis of the struggles faced by (would-be) female directors: in light of his general lack of qualifications, it’s clear Orci was hired because he’s part of “the club”, and it is exceedingly difficult for women to likewise become part of the club, in order to potentially be offered that kind of job. So, Orci probably didn’t get the job because he’s a man, but it sure as hell didn’t hurt.
On the basis of what exactly? On the basis of his being a long-time collaborator of current franchise producer J.J. Abrams for over a decade, having written numerous financially successful films (which is the type of things most of the executives will look at, particularly if it’s not someone with much of any directing experience), co-writing as well as serving as a producer on the previous two entries, etc. These are the types of things that, when somebody with any power says, “Hey, who should we hire?”…others are likely to point out alongside the, “Orci apparently wants the job.”-thing.
As for their succeeding in spite of their scripts, as I stated…I will not defend his creative choices. That doesn’t mean that those in charge of the production monetarily wouldn’t likely approve of the financial figures – and those already involved (such as Abrams) didn’t likely already approve conceptually of those creative choices in many instances. So, within all of this, it still makes perfect sense that he was hired. Despite the fan outcry. And most people I would consider both sane and considerate shouting, “No, no, no, no, no!” during all of the rumors prior to the announcement.
As for your final paragraph, I agree to a large extent. However, I still think that makes his inclusion as the primary example quite questionable. One would think there are far better examples rather than, “This person who’s put in a ton of work already in related fields and is directly responsible, to a large extent, for the recent output in this specific franchise which has made a great deal of money and met with fairly good reviews from critics…is being selected to direct his first film as a blockbuster release!” for how ridiculous the hiring practices are and how much female directors are overlooked. A better example of that might be something like what I alluded to elsewhere here regarding Thor: The Dark World and how “creative differences” sprang up there…or any number of other films which “surprisingly” had a female director in the mix only for it to go to random male director #3.
To me, that’s the type of stuff which actually holds up and proves the ultimate point regarding the severe lack (some might even say “drought”) of women directing big budget blockbusters – that women are rarely given these types of opportunities to begin with…or “it just doesn’t work out.” But the isolated instances wherein someone is “promoted from within due to an intricate knowledge of the goings-ons, expectations, concerns, motivations, etc.” being a good example of how a group of people was patently excluded from consideration? That doesn’t hold up anywhere near as well.
While obviously nowhere near the budget (and on and on)…it’s kind of like wondering why David Duchovny or Gillian Anderson directed an episode of the X-Files at the seeming exclusion of other potential “professional directors.” It’s pretty obvious, isn’t it? Or (aside from contractual finagling) why Nimoy directed Star Trek III? Or Perkins (another novice) directed Psycho III? Or…whatever else…
With Orci, I imagine most of the “studio” people ultimately don’t view it as being all that different from Shane Black directing Iron Man 3. And the decision makes perfect sense within that realm, regardless of what I or others might indicate regarding our preferences (including,”NO, ANYONE BUT ROBERTO ORCI!” being along the lines of my personal sentiment)…
Re: Orci’s past associations with “Star Trek”, you’re describing a lot of people, many of whom will never sit in a director’s chair, whether they want to or not. For instance, Alex Kurtzman actually has a director credit. But those others clearly don’t have Orci’s talent for schmoozing.
Re: his success rate, you may be over estimating that. Looking at boxofficemojo, he has 10 feature film writing credits. Only 4 definitely cleared their production budgets domestically (the “Star Trek” and “Transformers” films), one might have (“Amazing Spiderman 2”) and one made money only thanks to overseas boxoffice (“MI:III”). Besides that he has 3 unequivocal failures on his resume (“Cowboys and Aliens”, “Legend of Zorro”, and “The Island”). So, his success comes from major franchise films by high-profile directors. I know it may seem differently sometimes, but studio executives are not actually stupid. They’re betting the franchise will outdo him. That or he’s talking his clearly legendary game.
Re: “The X-Files”, there’s a lot less money, and therefore a lot less risk, in television. The situations aren’t particularly analogous. Also, Gillian Anderson. But it brings up a good point: Orci is a producer/writer on a number of television shows, 4 of which are currently in production. Why has he seemingly never expressed interest in directing any of those? Why did Paramount not ask him to get his feet wet before diving in, so to speak?
Re: Shane Black, his only apparent connection to “Iron Man” was through Robert Downey, Jr., from “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” 8 years prior. Which he did direct. Not really an analogous situation, either.
Re: fan outcry, it’s more than just dislike of his scripts. Orci’s social media meltdown over fan criticism was infamous and legendary. I can’t understand why that didn’t disqualify him. If he’s given anything close to the opportunity to do that again with “Star Trek 3” (i.e. if his social media interactions aren’t heavily monitored and managed), he is living a charmed life, indeed.
I appreciate that there’s a certain “proof in the pudding” aspect to this, insofar as Abrams and Paramount did hire him. However, there are enough items pointing toward his being a poor candidate that it was mentioned in much of the film business press that his hiring was an unusual and unexpected choice. Clearly we don’t agree, but I – and I’m not alone in this – think the preponderance of evidence is that he was hired against conventional wisdom.
As to the relevance to this discussion, again, being a man in Hollywood makes it orders of magnitude easier to be that kind of unorthodox choice. (Actually hiring a woman would be its own kind of unorthodox choice, which is itself ridiculous.) What I’m wondering now is this: even if the Orci/Star Trek situation isn’t the “best” example, it’s still part and parcel with the overall problem. So, why are you concern trolling that choice of example? There’s a lot of daylight between not presenting the best evidence, and presenting contradictory evidence.
I am aware that, for Orci, who he knows is seemingly far more vital than what he knows. It couldn’t be any more apparent given the generally-perceived quality – outside of “Hollywood circles” and some members of “general audiences” – of his output. That doesn’t change that, given his ties to the production, related experience and his desire, it makes perfect sense from the perspective of those with power to give him the position. I imagine they had him direct a short film or the like first (which may never be spoken of nor see the light of day) in order to show them he could direct on some level – as this is fairly common when someone who hasn’t directed before is hired to direct a major franchise entry.
As for the television thing, I pointed out that difference regarding budget and similar – but the point remained that these people were known to the production and, while inexperienced, aware to a large degree of what was necessary for the position. And, regarding the Shane Black thing, I said the studio ultimately wouldn’t see it as being very different (plus, Black did work on the Iron Man films previously – as far as I’m aware, uncredited). You are apparently assuming I’m saying I don’t see it as different. But I never put forward that it was truly analogous in my view. But it appears it does make sense to be viewed as similar, from a studio perspective, within their view. They have a tendency to see the formula and the connections but rarely the substance…(hence, why we have a lot of relative “newcomer” directors – to the world of big budget filmmaking, at least – helming blockbusters recently…such as in the case of Godzilla or Fantastic Four…yet those evident examples of men randomly getting a blockbuster filmmaking opportunity out of the blue due to maybe making a somewhat similar film conceptually…go ignored in this instance while someone being “promoted from within” is cited despite the numerous disparate elements which directly led to that…)…
Regarding Orci’s presence on social media, my understanding was that he was essentially done with it.
Within the notion that he was hired against conventional wisdom, I completely disagree (while uncommon in a lot of ways, it does not contrast with “conventional wisdom” given the recent “early-on” directors I’ve cited – they’re all the rage now – as well as various past instances wherein people were hired from within production teams or due to intricate knowledge of the material/process/etc…). That’s trade paper drama (they’re well-aware of the hatred many have for him), not the backstage politics that Orci clearly deals in and which lead to a lot of the deals in Hollywood. Do you think after two successful films that they’re going to jettison the guy who wrote all of these blockbusters when the main producers and others behind the scenes all know him personally and know he knows the work and he’s offering to direct (probably for a whole lot cheaper than most any others because, well, he hasn’t done it before)? That just doesn’t make sense. No matter how much, “Wait, he’s controversial, a lot of major fans don’t like some of the stuff he did…he doesn’t have immediate past experience and…well, this would be weird!” stuff some people bandy about.
What’s with the use of the term “concern trolling”? I am legitimately trying to point out that I don’t feel an example is a very good one because I think it weakens an argument that is otherwise completely valid. As you pointed out, his being a man probably helped him in many of these regards but – as I keep stressing, there is a notably large difference between when someone is promoted from within versus when someone is selected from the field in general.
That’s a little weaselly, don’t you think? Just own your opinions.
Heh. And if you think, with an ego like he displayed, that he’s doing so of his own volition, I got a bridge to sell you.
Are you further trying to argue that that difference somehow levels the gender playing field? Because, if so, bullshit. Or at least, I’m gonna have to ask for more than your repeated (and wordy-to-the-point-of-unreadability) assertions to that effect.
The oh-so reasonable defense you keep posting for Orci being handed a *huge* job he doesn’t even have *tiny* experience doing is a gorgeous explanation of what “old boys club” means.
Of course you’re arguing. And that’s fine. But you’re not entitled to automatic agreement. You can point out whatever you want. And others can still respond that they think you are wrong about that.
While I think, technically, one is arguing to dispute a claim or question its legitimacy in some form, many in the comments here become immediately defensive beyond the merits (or lack thereof) of the “differing” stance portrayed itself. So contextualizing it in that manner when – outside of a contentious viewpoint (while technically remaining “an argument”) – it’s a note or a concern or similar begins causing people to “take sides” rather than take things into consideration. Which is the type of thing that occurs on sites that might stress a very specific mindset (often, the most readily-recognized example of this to many is a website with a heavy political bias or similar but that’s far from the only sort – even various fandoms can do this on completely random subjects) wherein those whose views don’t immediately/easily suit the typical views are treated as though they’re just pointing anything out in order to cause problems. They’re “trying to argue.” So this becomes a means of dismissing anyone’s concerns as relevant and a slippery slope toward accusing anyone with dissimilar views of “trolling” or on and on.
I’ve read reviews here, off-and-on, for years and have seen this type of thing occur on more than a few occasions (and it has happened to me as well). Someone says something which isn’t immediately in agreement in the comments, then soon people are rallying to defend the review or similar (sometimes while ignoring much of the substance of what was said) and then it devolves into most people basically saying, “Go away because you don’t agree with us.” rather than – following, perhaps, a reply a two – addressing anything the other party put forward in a meaningful manner. It isn’t expressly the same (as it isn’t always/often on the same subjects) but it’s notably similar to what happens on websites with various political ideologies heavily promoted whenever someone comments in a manner not immediately within that ideology.
And, therefore, it’s damaging to meaningful discourse. Just as viewing someone disputing an element of someone else’s portrayed perspective (even though they agree with the vast majority of it) as “being argumentative” or similar can be damaging (and cause unnecessary divide where, otherwise, there would be allies). It often leads to things no longer being about what is said but about “winning the argument” or “taking sides in the argument” or on and on. Whereas, if people were open to consideration of various takes from the start (by not thinking it’s “an argument” wherein they should take sides or that someone is “trying to argue”), there would easily be a means of reconciling differing views through earnest communication. That is to say that, when people disagree, they talk it out meaningfully and come to a place of understanding regardless of whether anyone ultimately changes their mind or not. Personally, that’s typically what I pursue – understanding rather than validation.
So I was never suggesting I should get any sort of “automatic agreement.” Just that I shouldn’t have my views written off as I have seen occur on this site previously – particularly when I’m putting forward something which is roughly a helpful note about how an example of an overwhelming issue might not be as suitable as intended due to numerous exceptional factors in the individual case.
I see. You’re being perfectly reasonable, and helpful. Of course you are.
I am going to presume that you have no damn idea at all how often a woman is told that a man is simply being “reasonable” and just wants to “help” when he is being condescending and dismissing her position. If only she would heed *his* helpful and reasonable position, she would be doing so much better.
I stand by my example. I don’t care if you don’t like it.
So, whether literally or metaphorically, the presumption here is that I’m a man. And that you hold no responsibility for your own dismissiveness while others do because, in instances such as this, they must be men (and therefore worthy of having their views dismissed as “mansplaining” immediately) if they even begin to dispute something you’re saying (possibly specifically regarding notions of gender).
So ignore if someone is being reasonable or trying to help you because they must be a man being condescending. I don’t think you realize how off-base what you’re saying is (and how it’s apparently just a means for you to continue being misguidedly self-righteous and ignore considering differing views – which is an issue I put forward as one some who comment on this site have). But, of course, I can’t actually point that out now because “I’m a man” and must have no clue what it’s like to be constantly belittled by others on an erroneous basis (such as assumptions about my gender…or level of knowledge…or sanity…or personal experiences…or where any of those might be thought to overlap…or on and on).
Obviously, it makes sense that you might conclude that you will stand by your example. But, as with other cases where you might have misapplied some notion, it doesn’t automatically mean your conclusions are well founded.
I apologize for making assumptions about your gender. The photo of Ted Danson threw me off. I’m going to suggest, however, that you wait a few weeks, reread your original comment, and think about how it might come across to a reader who doesn’t know you or your intentions. Does it sound like a calm, reasonable statement, or does it sound like an aggressive attack?
Wall of text much?
We told you why we didn’t think your views were valid. And then you kept pushing them by repeating them. That’s when your behavior and attitude became an issue.
You might want to avoid that because it is damned condescending.
I don’t need your “help.”
Mansplaining!
MaryAnn wrote paragraphs and paragraphs about the discriminatory hiring practices in Hollywood. She also made a brief, though not unimportant, comment about Orci. When you suggest that, instead of talking about him, she should discuss discriminatory hiring practices (which seems to be the implication of “…but I’d select a more ‘open field’ to begin with as the target of my ire rather than the suggestion that someone with significant on-set experience and close ties to the production was selected to direct. In fact, that notion for the “Hollywood” world at large would be much better to critique…”), three possibilities come to mind:
(1.) You skipped over almost all of what she wrote.
(2.) You think you can explain her points better than she can, which is “mansplaining.”
(3.) You’re trying to make a reasonable point, but you’re expressing yourself really, really badly, in a way that impedes communication.
I really hope we’re dealing with option 3.
1. I read it all. But in the case of her example, her focus is skewed away from those things influenced directly by what she’s describing. Hence, there are exceedingly better, far more relevant examples of the systemic issue.
2. I don’t think I can explain those points better except to say that I think Orci was likely a bad example. The reason for my saying this is that there was no “open field” of directing candidates in that instance (which is what I was referring to with that term). Orci was “promoted from within.” Using his being director as though it exemplifies the broader issue would be like suggesting that a major secondary character on a show being promoted to lead indicates that they passed over numerous others they might have auditioned. That’s not “mainsplaining” – that’s careful consideration of the individual instance. Which is utterly dissimilar to, say, the more “work-for-hire” approach to things such as is often the case in the MCU – like Patty Jenkins being brought on to direct Thor: The Dark World prior to Alan Taylor arbitrarily getting the job…
3. This is entirely possible. But it’s also possible that at least some people here are prone to misinterpreting things when they don’t immediately align with the forum’s accepted view. It’s possibly likely that it’s some combination of those two. Although it could presumably be something else…
what a moron