Latest in San Diego State University

A pair of studies released Monday from San Diego State’s annual The Celluloid Ceiling report and USC’s Annenberg Inclusion Initiative showed few gains for women and people of color working in the film industry in 2022. In the SDSU study (read it here), which has tracked women's employment on the 250…

Representation of female protagonists and BIPOC women in 2021’s top-grossing films have ticked up slightly from the previous year, the latest study from San Diego State University’s Dr. Martha Lauzen finds. The study, titled It's a Man's (Celluloid) World, Even in a Pandemic Year: Portrayals of Female Characters in th…

The number of top-grossing films in 2021 directed by women has decreased, according to the latest Celluloid Ceiling study from the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University. Women accounted for 17 percent of directors working on the top 250 films, down from 18 percent the year…

More than half (52.2%) of the major characters on streaming programs shown during the 2020-21 season were played by women – an increase of seven percentage points from a year ago and a "recent historic high," according to the latest “Boxed In” report from Dr. Martha Lauzen, executive director of the Center for the…

The percentage of top-grossing films that featured female protagonists “dropped dramatically” last year, down from 40% in 2019 to just 29% in 2020 – a decline of more than 10%, according to the latest study from Dr. Martha Lauzen, executive director of the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San…

The Celluloid Ceiling, a report that has tracked women's employment in film for the last 23 years, says female directors reached an all-time high in 2020. The report claims to be the longest-running and most comprehensive study of women's behind-the-scenes employment on US films. Since 1998, the study has tracked a…

The percentage of women working in key behind-the-scenes jobs on the 250 top-grossing domestic films "has barely budged" during the past two decades – increasing by only 4 percentage points from 17% in 1998 to 21% last year. That’s according to the latest “Celluloid Ceiling” report from Dr. Martha Lauzen, founder and…

Female independent filmmakers made historic gains in 2019-20, according to a report released today by Dr. Martha Lauzen, executive director of the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University. The report, titled Indie Women, cites more than a dozen categories in which women…

Women made "unprecedented gains" as protagonists in the top-grossing films of 2019, according to the latest installment of “It's a Man's (Celluloid) World,” an annual report out of San Diego State University, which found that women achieved "recent historic highs" as lead characters in last year's biggest hits. The…

A new report is painting a gloomy picture for women in the film industry, with women directors having a particularly bad year in 2018. Even so, the report found a nearly 10% overall increase in the percentage of female directors, writers, producers, executive producers, editors and cinematographers employed on the 500…

The number of female protagonists in the 100 top-grossing domestic films declined year-over-year in 2017, according to a study released today by the Center for the Study of Women in Television & Film at San Diego State University. Women repped 24% of that total, down 5% from 2016. The study, titled “It's a Man's…

Females made up 29% of protagonists and 37% of major characters in the 100 top-grossing movies of 2016 — up 7 and 3 percentage points, respectively, from the previous year to recent historic highs, a new study finds. But the number of female speaking characters dipped to 32%, meaning moviegoers were twice as likely to…