Hollywood and Female Directors

I don’t think it’s a plot and these guys sat around and said let’s keep these women out,” Foster said. “I think it’s like race psychology. When a producer hires a director, you’re hiring away your control completely. You’re bringing on somebody that will change everything. When you give that amount of power up, you want them to look like you and talk like you and think like you and it’s scary when they don’t, because what’s gonna happen? I’m gonna hand over $60 million to somebody I don’t know. I hope they look like me.”

When it was mentioned that many studio executives do, in fact, look like her — a 48-year-old white female veteran of the industry, Foster nodded. “And name the lists that come out of the female studio executives: guy, guy, guy, guy,” she said. “Their job is to be as risk-averse as possible. They see female directors as a risk.

—Jodie Foster, on the causal roots behind women sitting in only 7% of Hollywood’s director’s chairs.

(via Movieline.)