The Furor Continues over Hollywood's Lack of Support for Women Filmmakers

Emmy? Oscar? Nope a  “Gutsy Gal Award” -- That’s right, we’ve created a Gutsy Gal FILM Award!  Tired of watching women including myself having to fund, write, direct and then market their films to audiences single-handedly, I decided to give women recognition and attention by creating the Gutsy Gal FILM Award.

In 2014 my company, Gutsy Gals Inspire Me®, called on women filmmakers to submit their films for the award. If Hollywood wouldn’t let us in or acknowledge our work then let it be my mission to honor and be inspired by these “gutsy” filmmakers. If we at Gutsy Gals can support women filmmakers, and make enough noise to help them, then let’s do it.

We are 52% of the film watching audience.

I had not even considered that I was “on a mission” until I met Geena Davis in 2008 at her first conference on Gender Equity in Film (both on set and in films). I was beginning the journey of making my first film and she was explaining how the odds were against us. She was confronting the studios with her own mission to get more women on sets and in films.  Little did I know that today, seven years later, the nearly impossible odds women writers and directors of films face in Hollywood would finally be at the forefront of media awareness (see NYT Article on Women Fighting for Better Opportunity in Hollywood.  It is gratifying to know that Geena Davis’s determination (along with that of her business partner Madeline Di Nonno) grows stronger and stronger everyday.

On March 21st 2015 Gutsy Gals Inspire Me® will be honoring women writers and directors of films in the creative community of Great Barrington, MA. Working in partnership with the Berkshire Festival of Women Writers, we’ll hold our first Gutsy Gals Inspire Me FILM award ceremony.  And while Angelina Jolie and Ava DuVernay may currently be household names, one day a Gutsy Gal Film Award Winner like grand prize winner Cathryn Michon of Muffin Top, Heather Taylor of Breaking Through the Clouds, or Naomi McDougall Jones of Imagine I’m Beautiful may get a shot at an Oscar!!!

-- Deborah Hutchison, President, Gutsy Gals Inspire Me