Hollywood Commission Launches Second Entertainment Survey To Identify Progress & Adds Focus On Employees Working In Game Sector

The Hollywood Commission is launching its second Entertainment Survey with the goal of giving voice to entertainment industry workers.

Chaired by Anita Hill and founded by board members Kathleen Kennedy and Nina Shaw, the Hollywood Commission was formed in 2017 to bring together entertainment executives, independent experts, and advisors to take the necessary collective steps toward tackling the culture of abuse and power disparity in the industry.

The survey is a temperature check to identify the progress that has been made up until now and where work still needs to be done. There’s a goal of 20,000 responses and the survey is now live through November 27 at hollywoodentertainmentsurvey.org

“As we seek to determine what systemic progress we have made over the past several years, the second Hollywood Commission Entertainment Survey is more important and in many ways consequential than our first,” said Hill.

“With this new edition, we hope to double the participation of the first survey, which will help provide us with the insight we need as we continue to focus our efforts on our next phase of work. The key to that will be participation – we need to hear directly from all workers about their experiences. We look forward to working with our partners to encourage everyone in the industry to respond and participate, safely and anonymously.”

The new survey will open up to include a wider representation across all communities with an added focus on employees working in the game sector. New questions will zero in and measure whether, and in what ways, people experience colorism. Other questions will also focus on survivor support and the resources needed for victims of retaliation to get back into the industry. 

The survey is open to entertainment workers in television and film, commercials, live theater, music, broadcast news, talent representation, public relations, corporate settings, and the gaming sector, from countries including the US, Canada, Mexico, the UK, and countries throughout Asia, Oceania, and the South Pacific. 

Published in 2020, the first survey received responses from 9,630 entertainment workers, resulting in eye-opening responses, including: 

• 65% of respondents didn’t believe that a powerful individual, such as a producer or director, would be held accountable for harassing someone with less power

• Only 28% of respondents who had experienced an incident of gender harassment, unwanted sexual attention, or sexual coercion reported it to employers – because they think they won’t be believed, nothing will happen, or they’ll be retaliated against.

• While men and women reported gender harassment (demeaning jokes or comments based on gender; sexually crude terms and insults) at similar rates (62% of men, 67% of women), females experience unwanted sexual attention (42%), sexual coercion (20%) and sexual assault (5%) approximately twice as often as males (22%, 9% and 2%, respectively).

The results of the new Hollywood Commission survey are expected to be completed and released in early 2023.