Misogyny’s Permanent Place in the Film Industry

Art by Kaitlyn Tan

Awards season is a highly anticipated time for fans of Hollywood. The difficult task of hosting an award show is burdened with the pressure to perform, most notably in front of peers of the arts rather than the average American. The pressure to produce a watchable show filled with jokes and intriguing monologues can lead the host to make cheap shots at the crowd or topics known to gather controversy in an effort to alleviate stress. 

Jo Koy’s attempt to host the Golden Globes is the perfect example of failing to perform. While giving his monologues, the comedian failed to captivate the room due to his highly insensitive jokes made about the films nominated and jabs at celebrities not present. He attempts to compare the theatrical buildup between Barbie and Oppenheimer’s summer releases while lifting up Oppenheimer and brings down Barbie’s insightful take on womanhood. Koy states that “based on a 721-page Pulitzer Prize-winning book about the Manhattan Project, and Barbie is on a plastic doll with big boobies.” Erasing Barbie’s deeper meaning in order to comment on star Margot Robbie’s body, his ‘jokes’ at the expense of female empowerment in films is what he and his writing team expected to be considered funny. Making a joke about one of the biggest films of the year, in this case Barbie, is expected. However, depending on the film, the joke itself must be written and said with sensitivity. He poked fun at Barbie with that lack of sensitivity required. He believed performing a misogynistic joke making fun of a movie centered around making women feel strong would land a positive reaction. Behavior like this is not new or foreign. Koy believed he would be welcome and later when faced with backlash, he never took responsibility but rather blamed his team. He chose to blame their lack of time to prepare, instead of owning up to his mistakes. 

The film sphere is not known for the abundance of female-led projects. This is to no fault of their own, but rather from the system itself. The Golden Globes held their first show in 1944, but it didn’t have a female winner for Best Director until Barbra Streisands’s win for Yentl in 1984. Streisand was criticized at the time because it was almost unimaginable that an actress could simultaneously direct a motion picture. The next female directorial win would come shockingly over 37 years later. This year’s Golden Globes nominated two female directors out of six for Best Director. Neither of the two won. There was only one win amongst female nominated directors and it was in the category of Best Motion Picture-Non-English. The film industry has made great strides to rectify its past mistakes but is far from perfect. Female directors do not get the same credit as men and if they do, this credit is rarely translated into any wins or awards. Films with female leads are not at the forefront of the industry and if they are, the women often lack depth or are written under the male gaze. MasterClass describes the male gaze as “plac[ing] women in the context of male desire, essentially portraying the female body as eye candy for the heterosexual man.” Female directors are not winning simply because male-dominated spheres do not view their films in their purest form due to most female directors having their craft reflect the female gaze, where masculinity and femininity are depicted non traditionally and allow for these characters to be shown as more than their looks.

Aside from female directorial nominations and wins, wins amongst women of color across all categories are scarce. 2024 Oscar nominations included Lily Gladstone for her part in Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon. Her nomination has made her the first Native American person to be considered for an Academy Award and the second Indigenous woman. She was also the first Native American person to win a Golden Globe.She accepted the award by speaking a few lines of Blackfeet, the native language of the Blackfeet reservation in Montana. Her speech speaks to inspire future generations of indigenous children who strive for the arts as she said, “This is for every little rez kid, every little urban kid, every little Native kid who has a dream, who is seeing themselves represented and our stories told by ourselves in our own words with tremendous allies and tremendous trust with and from each other.” While Gladstone is the first Native American woman to be nominated and win, she is not the first Indigenous person to be nominated. Roma actress Yalitza Aparcio, who is from Mexico, is the first Indigenous woman to win an Oscar. Aside from this she was the second Mexican woman to be nominated in her category of Lead Actress. Her nomination is a huge step that I hope will only lead to more recognition for Indigenous actors and those involved in other aspects of film.

In the context of Gladstone’s historic nomination, it is also important to bring to light the nomination of America Ferrera for her performance in the summer blockbuster, Barbie. She is of Honduran descent and is a shining light for young Latin American women everywhere. However, her phenomenal performance and nomination are overshadowed by the nomination snubs of her film’s counterparts, Margot Robbie and director, Greta Gerwig, by the general public. The glossing over of Ferrara’s nomination is further proof of how little the artistic world credits women of color. She is one of the few women of color to be nominated for an Oscar. Ferrara has been in many iconic films, including Real Women Have Curves, which highlights the struggles of being a young Latin woman. Ferrara herself mentions that due to the lack of films portraying Latin women as valuable, substantial characters when she started to act, she felt as if it would be impossible for a Latin character to be depicted as layered and complex. Her role in Barbie was refreshing, and to see her performance go unrecognized by the public is disheartening. 

Similarly, there was surprisingly only one nomination for a POC-led film, The Color Purple. Danielle Brooks was the only person to see a nomination for the film and she is up for Best Supporting Actress. The Color Purple is centered around an African American teen’s life in the rural South in the early half of the nineteenth century. It is a story of adversity and strength, yet the general public and seemingly the Oscars voters appear to have been more concerned about moderately highlighting Barbie. Tying together the lack of recognition for women of color and their nominations in film awards season, it is easy to see that along with misogyny, there is a permanent place for racial prejudice in show business. Only two Black women were nominated for an Oscar, and it is extremely disappointing to see so many women of color give amazing performances only to go unrecognized for them.
The Oscars and other award shows are not kind to women in any role when it comes to the film industry. However, lack of recognition comes in larger forms for women of color. Nominees like America Ferrera and Danielle Brooks are just a small number of recognized women of color. A film centered around Black strength could not garner large nomination numbers. The film industry is changing and evolving, but the current state of the market and system is nowhere near complete inclusion and peak awareness of its problems. This is highly reflected in Jo Koy’s Golden Globes monologue where he dismisses the overall message of Barbie. In that case, self-reflection for the academies involved is one of the best ways to be able to reach a point of complete incorporation of female talents amongst all spectrums.