Reese Witherspoon
Actor Reese Witherspoon got so annoyed with the way women were being portrayed in Hollywood, that she set up her own media company.
In a talk at Lions Live (the online version of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity), Witherspoon stated how the media company has since looked to tackle not only issues about gender equality but also about racial discrimination, LGBTQ and differently-abled people.
Explaining how the journey began, Witherspoon said, “It was around 2011 when I realised that scripts were greatly deteriorating. I was reading 12 scripts a year that I would consider starring in. It then became six, then four and was down to two. I remember, in particular, that there was this one script that I read that was just so dismal. It had a terrible female lead that was completely in service of the male lead. There were a bunch of boob jokes; I thought it was misogynistic and not funny. I called my agent and told her I’m not going to be doing this. She said every actress in Hollywood wants this part. I thought that if this is what is coming out in Hollywood, I got to do something about it.”