It is well known that gender diversity needs significant improvement in Hollywood. But every now and then there are advances, and each time, women get closer to equality in the world of writing, directing and acting in film.
The New York City based Athena Film Festival announced today that they are partnering with The Black List to present the inaugural Athena Film Festival Black List Mini-Lab. This unique Mini-Lab, offered as part of the 2016 program, is open to female writers with scripts focusing on women's leadership. The Athena Film Festival, an annual celebration of women and leadership, will return for its sixth year February 18–21, 2016 at Barnard College.
This Mini-Lab is only open to women writers. Ten screenwriters will be picked, based on the strength of their scripts, as evaluated by The Black List screenplay evaluation service and invited to submit a one page personal statement. Four writers will be selected to participate in the Mini-Lab.
Athena Film Festival Co-Founder and Artistic Director Melissa Silverstein told me this morning, "As we know there is a dearth of films with women in leadership positions AND there is a dearth of female screenwriters. With this partnership between the Athena Film Festival and the Blacklist we hope to address both these issues. Our goal give women writers the tools they need create a great screenplay that will ultimately become a fantastic movie that help expose the world to much needed stories of women leaders."
Founder and CEO of The Black List, Franklin Leonard, strongly believes in the positive power of a partnership such as this, "The deplorable state of gender diversity in Hollywood's screenwriting ranks is both a moral and an economic outrage. We've long admired what the Athena Film Festival, and co-founder Melissa Silverstein in particular, have done to raise the profile of this issue and address it head on. It was only natural for us to partner in an endeavor like this, and we're very excited to do so."
