CHANGEMAKER

Actress Geena Davis is using her fame and brain to increase representation of women on screen.

Tired of there continuing to be three times more male characters than female ones in movies, the Thelma and Louise star is campaigning for times to change.

She even won an honorary Oscar last year for her activism with the Geena Davis Institute on Gender which not only researches gender depictions on screen but also asks creators to consider before they cast and shoot if any characters in the script can be changed from male to female or have any kind of diversity.

Davis speaks around the world about her work on the topic, always stressing the enormous impact a fictional character can have on changing the world.

She cites the example of Gillian Anderson’s X-Files character Dana Scully who was named as an inspiration by 63 per cent of women working or studying in science and technology.

Geena’s 1992 women in baseball movie A League of Their Own prompted a generation of girls and young women to take up sports. But there have been relatively few female-led sports movies since.

Policy and regulation on the topic would be a help but a change in perception would aid more than anything.

With that goal, Geena and actress friends like Meg Ryan have been holding public script reads of scenes from all-male films like Reservoir Dogs and City Slickers. The aim is to show that projects can be just as entertaining, exciting and funny with women playing all the parts.

Davis has enjoyed a brilliant career with a string of hits but changing the industry could yet be her biggest achievement of all.

—Sandro Monetti