Kathleen Kennedy said one of the Walt Disney Company and Lucasfilm's biggest priorities was to hire qualified women on and off screen.
- Oct 16, 2015
AceShowbiz - Fair treatment for women in Hollywood is being campaigned for one of the most successful film franchises out there. Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy is hoping that a female director will take over a future "Star Wars" movie.
Six directors that have been announced for the next "Star Wars" movies are all male. "There's nothing we'd like more than to find a female director for 'Star Wars'," she said at Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit this week. "There is an assumption made that the people involved should predominantly be men. There are women who are 'Star Wars' fans. That's what's so insane."
Kennedy said there's actually a big female force behind the project. "Six out of eight of the people in my story group are women and I'm sure there's are a lot of people that would be surprised that we're making 'Star Wars' movies and the majority of the people involved in the development of those stories are women," she said, adding, "It is going to happen. We are going to hire a woman who's going to direct a 'Star Wars' movie. I have no doubt."
But they don't want to thrust the position into someone. "It's not just a token job to look out and try to find a woman that we could put into a position of directing 'Star Wars'," she said. "If we do want to bring a woman in to direct a 'Star Wars' movie, we want to make sure that it's somebody who's passionate and really, really wants to do a 'Star Wars' movie. We don't want to talk somebody into it."
The challenge actually lies in the lack of interest from female directors. "In a weird way, a few years ago there were more," Kennedy noted. "The numbers never climb significantly but more women were running studios than there are today." Emphasizing on the importance of balance, she said, "Having a balance of men and women in the room changes the story. The dialogue, the point of view."
J.J. Abrams, Rian Johnson, Colin Trevorrow, Gareth Edwards, Christopher Miller and Phil Lord are in charge of directing the next three installments of "Star Wars" and its spin-offs. Josh Trank was due to direct an untitled "Star Wars" standalone film before he dropped out in June.
