Record number of big Hollywood films had female directors in 2020

Women directed 16% of top 100 grossing movies, but ‘stunning imbalance’ off-camera remains.

A record number of female directors took charge of major Hollywood films over the last 12 months, according to an annual gender study which found a “stunning imbalance” when it comes to other off-camera roles.

The yearly Celluloid Ceiling report by San Diego State University found that women accounted for 16% of directors working on the 100 highest-grossing films in 2020, up from 12% in 2019 and only 4% in 2018.

Dr Martha Lauzen, the founder of San Diego State University’s Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film, which conducts the survey, said the increase in female directors helming major projects for two years in a row could show gender balance was finally improving.

“Even without the release of some of this year’s most anticipated big-budget films by women – including Chloé Zhao’s Eternals and Cate Shortland’s Black Widow – the percentage of women working as directors inched upward in 2020,” Lauzen said.

“The good news is that we’ve now seen two consecutive years of growth for women who direct. This breaks a recent historical pattern in which the numbers trend up one year and down the next. The bad news is that fully 80% of top films still do not have a woman at the helm.”

Despite the improvement when it comes to directors, the study found that other off-camera roles were still dominated by men.

Lauzen added the “imbalance in behind-the-scenes roles remains stunning”, with almost 70% of films employing fewer than five women in the key positions of director, writer, executive producer, producer, editor or cinematographer.

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