Women Who Run the Show How a Brilliant and Creative New Generation of Women Stormed Hollywood

by Gregory, Mollie

• ISBN13: 9780312301828
• ISBN10: 0312301820
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-08-24
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Summary

In the 1970s, you could count the women who produced film or television on one hand. By the 1990s, there were hundreds. What happened? That's the dramatic, firsthand story inWomen Who Run the Show.Based on more than 125 interviews with women in virtually every segment of the entertainment business-from feature films to television, from corporate offices and new media to the back lot-Women Who Run the Showis the unfiltered account of women's lives in the Hollywood workplace from the 1970s ("No one wanted us there") to 2000. How did they make it in one of the toughest industries around. The women include: -Gale Ann Hurd, Producer ofThe TerminatorandAliens -Mimi Leder, director ofERandThe Peacemaker -Kathleen Nolan, the first female president of the Screen Actors Guild -Jane Alexander, actress, producer, and head of the National Endowment for the Arts -Polly Plat, producer ofBroadcast News -Martha Coolidge, director ofIntroducing Dorothy Dandridgeand the first female president of the Directors Guild -Sherry Lansing, chairman of the Motion Picture Group, Paramount Pictures The women came from rich families and poor, from all over the U.S. and from other countries. They talk about a wide range of subjects, including the cost of success, sexual harassment, the "boy's club," their three roles-wife, mother, worker,-or of the children they did not have ("I woke up one day and I was fifty"), mentors, how their parents influenced them, the joys of work, and learning on the job. They reveal the truths they've learned about careers, life, and women's increasingly influential place in the business of entertainment. Women Who Run the Showis a lively, tough, and joyous-but, above all, candid-conversation with the women of Hollywood.

Author Biography

Mollie Gregory has been a writer and producer of documentary films and has written a variety of novels and nonfiction books, including Making Films Your Business. She is a member of the Writers Guild of America and a past president of both P.E.N. Center USA West and Women in Film. She lives in Los Angeles.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Beachhead - The 1970s	p. 1
I Don't Want to Watch, I Want to Play	p. 5
We Don't Want Anything Itsy-Poo	p. 24
She's Young, She's Pretty, and - She's a Producer!	p. 40
The Start of a Wonderful Heyday for Women	p. 57
Get Me a Woman!	p. 80
You Don't Meet Boring People in This Business	p. 99
I Don't Know Any Women - Getting Organized	p. 112
I Was Supposed to Be Hedda Hopper	p. 126
Securing the Perimeter - The 1980s	p. 151
Yes, Sir, Giving Way to Yes, Ma'am	p. 155
Chutes and Ladders - Executive Games in the 1980s	p. 170
More Ladders Than Chutes - The Newcomers	p. 190
Women Make Good Producers - Movies	p. 209
Getting on the Yellow Brick Road - Producing for Television	p. 224
A Different Take on the Set	p. 242
Breakthrough - The 1990s	p. 271
The Suit with Legs	p. 275
Don't Ever Take It Personally	p. 291
Hiring a Woman (Writer) Is the Hip Thing to Do	p. 309
This Is What Men Do	p. 327
Making the Whole Frame in the '90s	p. 342
Epilogue: How Far is Far?	p. 361
Author's Note	p. 379
Endnotes	p. 381
List of Women Interviewed	p. 423
Bibliography	p. 433
Index	p. 437
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