Women still face steep challenges securing top movie jobs

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Last year, women made up just 13% of directors working on the top 250 films.That level represents a 3-percentage-point decline from 2024, when women led 16% of the top-grossing movies, according to a San Diego State University study released Thursday.

The troubling tabulation comes as Hollywood seeks to turn the page from a gut-punching year that included the Los Angeles wildfires, ongoing declines of local film and television production and the deaths of beloved filmmakers.“Hamnet,” directed by Chloé Zhao; “Freakier Friday,” helmed by Nisha Ganatra; and “I Know What You Did Last Summer,” led by Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, were among the few notable exceptions.The university’s Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film and its founder Martha M.Lauzen have tracked employment of women in behind-the-scenes decision-making jobs for nearly three decades.

Roles included in the study are: directors, writers, executive producers, producers, editors and cinematographers.Data from more than 3,500 credits on top-grossing films were used to compile the report.

Lauzen launched her effort in 1998, assuming that pointing out the imbalance would cause doors to swing open for women in Hollywood.But despite countless calls for action, and a high-profile but short-lived federal investigation, the picture has stayed largely the same.“The numbers are remarkably stable,” Lauzen said in an interview.

“They’ve been remarkably stable for more than a quarter of a century.” Hollywood Inc.When Natalie Portman called out the “all-male” slate of best director nominees at Sunday’s Golden Globes award show, the A-list Hollywood crowd in the ballroom let out a muffled gasp.

Overall, women made up 23% of all directors, writers, producers, executive producers, editors and directors of photography on the 250 top-grossing films in 2025, according to Lauzen’s report: “T...