DEI: Report From USC Annenberg: “Entertainment Industry Contraction Affects Inclusion”

From USC Annenberg:

The word of the year in entertainment seems to be “contraction” and according to a new study, the term can be applied not only to sluggish production numbers but also to Hollywood’s efforts on inclusion.

The report, by Professor Stacy L. Smith and the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative updates the organization’s longitudinal analysis of top-grossing movies. The investigation now covers the 1,700 top films from 2007 to 2023, and provides a specific look at the 100 top movies of 2023. A total of 75,328 speaking characters were evaluated across all 17 years of the study, which explores gender, race/ethnicity, LGBTQ+ identity, and characters with disabilities.

Fewer girls and women filled leading roles in 2023 compared to 2022 — the figure plummeted to 30%, on par with 2010 and a 14 percentage point decline from the year prior. The findings for all speaking characters reveal that little has changed for girls/women on screen in more than a decade and a half. Only 32% of speaking characters in 2023 were girls/women, compared to 30% in 2007. A mere 11% of stories were gender-balanced, or featured girls and women in 45-54.9% of all speaking roles. Less than 1% of all characters were gender non-binary in 2023.

“No matter how you examine the data, 2023 was not the ‘Year of the Woman.’ We continue to report the same trends for girls and women on screen, year in and year out,” said Stacy L. Smith. “It is clear that there is either a dismissal of women as an audience for more than one or two films per year, a refusal to find ways to create meaningful change, or both. If the industry wants to survive its current moment, it must examine its failure to employ half the population on screen.”

The findings on race/ethnicity show similarly lethargic movement. There was a significant increase among protagonists—37 movies, compared to 31 in 2022 featured an individual from an underrepresented racial/ethnic group in a lead/co lead role. However, while this is progress since 2007 (13 films) it is barely higher than the previous benchmark reached in 2021 (35 films).

Across all speaking characters, only two findings of note emerged. First, the percentage of White (56%) characters decreased significantly from 2022 (62%) and 2007 (78%). Second, the percentage of Asian characters in 2023 (18%) was significantly higher than in 2007 (3%), though on par with 2022 (16%). There were no other significant changes for any other racial/ethnic groups across 17 years. Overall, though, the percentage of underrepresented characters (44%) was similar to the percentage of the U.S. population that identifies with an underrepresented racial/ethnic group (41.1%).

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