TV OFF: HOLLYWOOD’S GOING THROUGH IT. TIME TO DIY, INNOVATE, AND EMBRACE NEW MODELS
By Felicia Pride
TV writer + producer, filmmaker, and CEO of HONEY CHILE
Hollywood is undergoing some incredibly painful and no-turning-back transitions and that’s putting it nicely. Consolidation. Cancelled shows. Shelved projects. Massive layoffs. Production drought. Slashing of DEI initiatives.
Everyone is feeling it. And it’s no secret that historically excluded storytellers will be impacted the most.
2024 started with a stark conclusion from the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative (AII): The major studios’ pledges to hire more female and people of color filmmakers were “performative acts.”
In fact, Stacy L Smith, the founder of AII, declared: “Five years after #MeToo exploded and two years following the murder of George Floyd, Hollywood has evidenced little change for women and underrepresented directors — particularly women of color…”
Dr. Smith also stated, “No matter how you examine the data, 2023 was not the ‘Year of the Woman. 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.”
All of which have dire consequences. In an article entitled, “Why Representation Matters,” writer Cole Bowman explained that “the term ‘symbolic annihilation’ refers to the erasure of people — specifically categories of people like women, people of color, people with disabilities, and members of the LGBTQ+ community — from popular media.”
Symbolic annihilation can contribute to social disempowerment and erasure from public consciousness.
THE FACTS
I could go on and on with receipts about the continued diversity gap in Hollywood across the board, despite:
- In an average week, the 156+ million women in the U.S. consume five more hours of media than men. (Nielsen)
- Women moviegoers bought the majority of opening weekend, domestic tickets for three of the top 10 films and five of the top 20 films released in theaters in 2023. (UCLA’s Hollywood Diversity Report)
- BIPOC moviegoers bought the majority of opening weekend domestic tickets for seven of the top 10 films and 14 of the top 20 films released in theaters in 2023. (UCLA’s Hollywood Diversity Report)
- In 2023, theatrical films with casts that were 31–40% BIPOC enjoyed the highest median global box office receipts, while films with casts that were less than 11 percent BIPOC were the poorest performers, echoing a pattern evident the last four years. (UCLA’s Hollywood Diversity Report)
- The top movies from 2014 to 2017 starring women earned more than male-led films, whether they were made for less than $10 million or for $100 million or more. (CAA)
- Actress and producer Dakota Johnson stated in an interview just how difficult it is to get female-centered projects produced: “Everyone who makes decisions is afraid. They want to do the safe thing, and the safe thing is really boring.” If a successful actress is experiencing difficulty getting women-centered projects produced… where does that leave the rest of us?
And as The Hollywood Reporter pointed out: “Beginning in 2021, the consulting firm McKinsey has published a series of reports exploring the entertainment industry’s representation and inclusion of historically excluded people.
Along the way, the analysts totaled up the potential financial revenue that Hollywood could stand to gain if it adopted more culturally inclusive business solutions: $10 billion per year from closing the Black inequity gap, an eye-popping $12 billion to $18 billion from properly valuing Latino professionals and consumers, and — in the latest report released today, conducted in collaboration with Gold House — $2 billion to $4.4 billion from more effectively tapping the Asian and Pacific Islander market.”
A struggling industry is willingly leaving money on the table?
It’s not adding up.
A CHANGE GOTTA COME
About four years ago, I launched my independent production company, HONEY CHILE, that develops, creates, and produces stories by, for, or about Black women 40+, across film, TV, digital, audio, books, and events. Honeys, as we like to call our audience.
Stories “by,” meaning anything that I or a Honey creates, no matter what it is about. Stories “for” meaning anything Honeys may be interested in (created by anyone), which is wide because our palettes are vast. And “about” means explicitly centering a Honey.
I started HONEY CHILE because:
- I believe more writers deserve more agency in Hollywood, which is an essay for another day. But as creators, we need ways to build and wield leverage.
- I am an entrepreneur with a marketing background and saw a need to serve a target audience, and one with incredible social + financial capital as well as global influence. Honeys range from Beyoncé to Kamala Harris. But with the understanding that a target audience is only where you start, the potential to appeal to additional audiences is also vast.
- I want to actually make projects because our audience deserves stories about themselves or that cater to their diverse tastes. The funny thing about Hollywood is that they don’t make nearly as many projects when you think of all the great material that flows through it. And especially if those stories don’t fit ever-changing mandates or greenlighters’ “preferences”.
Since HONEY CHILE launched, we’ve:
- Put projects in development at Amazon and Lifetime, and setup a project at CBS Studios.
- Produced three podcasts, including our most recent, IT’S GOOD OVER HERE, as well as CHILE, PLEASE, which was nominated twice for an NAACP Image Award.
- Produced and released our feature film proof of concept LOOK BACK AT IT on the film festival circuit. It won the Audience Award at BlackStar Film Festival and was nominated for a Humanitas Prize in Screenwriting among other honors. Our goal is to produce the feature length version in 2025.
- Co-hosted the first HONEY CHILE Fest, a sold-out event where hundreds of Honeys convened in Baltimore, my hometown.
- Built an audience following across social and email of nearly 60,000.
- Survived the 2023 writers’ and actors’ strikes.
And for the last four years, I have personally financed HONEY CHILE.
Fun fact from a Women in Film study: 66.7% of the female entrepreneurs invest six- to seven-figures of their own money to fund their screen industry business, whereas only 20% of the male entrepreneurs invested as high of sums.
For years, I have been trying to crack a model of patronage for the cinematic and media arts.
I also wondered if there was a way for audiences and entities to be empowered to support what they want to see in a systematic way?
Out of this, The HONEY Fund was born.
ON PATRONAGE
The HONEY Fund is a fiscally-sponsored fundraising effort — meaning all donations are tax writeoffs — that would allow HONEY CHILE to fund a slate of independent projects across audio, digital, film, and TV that centers on historically excluded voices, stories, collaborators, and audiences.
All donations are tax-deductible through our fiscal sponsor, Women of Color Unite (WOCU), a social action organization founded and led by Cheryl Bedford, a Honey, that focuses on fair access, treatment, and pay for women of color in all aspects of the entertainment and media industries.
The HONEY Fund aims to:
- Employ Honeys and other historically excluded people in production and marketing roles.
- Provide real world experience and training to Honeys and other historically excluded people interested in careers in entertainment.
- Provide roles and opportunities to actors and actresses who are often ignored or forgotten by Hollywood.
- Help to develop an innovative financing and fundraising model that can be duplicated by other creators and communities.
- Build an ecosystem of donors with a shared vision to support the work they want to see in the world.
GETTING CREATIVE
I’m encouraged by what seems to be renewed interest in independent episodic television models.
Personally, I’d love to see a return of web series, especially if we can figure out the financials so that it is profitable for all involved.
And it looks like some TV producers are heading back to YouTube.
I am encouraged by more equitable financing models, like that used by the Sing Sing filmmakers.
I am encouraged by short form streamers and the possibility that the appetite for indie film is healthy.
ON EQUITY
But encouragement isn’t enough. We’re talking equity.
I was recently asked to give a keynote address about gender equity in storytelling.
And as part of my keynote, I shared a few different definitions of the word:
First definition of equity: a. justice according to natural law or right; specifically: freedom from bias or favoritism.
b. something that is equitable: dealing fairly and equally with all concerned.
So much to unpack. Beginning with the inclusion of the word right. Because it implies that morality should be enough… and we know it ain’t.
We’re not going to achieve equity because it is the right thing to do, even though it is.
I also love the use of the word freedom from bias or favoritism. I don’t think I’ll see freedom from bias or favoritism in my lifetime, but I do believe that the historically excluded should prioritize our own pursuits of freedom, which is more often found in self-actualization and community.
And lastly, I love the inclusion of all concerned. None of us will be free until all of us are free. So equity is about the WHOLE.
A second definition of equity is:
2a: the money value of a property or of an interest in a property in excess of claims or liens against it
b: the common stock of a corporation
c: a risk interest or ownership right in property
d: a right, claim, or interest existing or valid in equity
Lots of great keywords. Money. We need it.
We need it from a salary perspective, funding, investment, budgets. We need money. And our work deserves it.
Property. We have to understand the value of our intellectual property. It is the most valuable asset that we own.
And speaking of:
Ownership: We have to find ways to own some of our work, fully or partly, and license it versus sell it completely.
And a last, third definition. I’m just going to focus on the last part of it.
3c: a body of legal doctrines and rules developed to enlarge, supplement, or override a narrow rigid system of law
It’s the word override for me. Specifically, override a narrow rigid system of law. These institutions have rigid systems that perpetuate inequities.
There’s only so much we can do from within before we need to consider how we can disengage, override, dismantle, and / or start our own.
I don’t see how we achieve equity in Hollywood or beyond for that matter, given where this country is headed in the forthcoming administration, without doing it ourselves.
MORE DEPRESSING STATS
The truth is, a relatively small group of folk in Hollywood, many of them older white men, decide what shows and films get made.
And apparently, there is an old guard problem.
A woman executive said it herself in a Women in Film study: “There are a lot of women in roles who can make decisions, but are just one stakeholder in the decision-making process. My boss ultimately makes a decision and I can try to influence him, but our stakeholder group is all men and then me.”
That same study also identified that only 18% of production companies with non-studio funding are women-owned and women-owned production companies only receive 18.6% of studio subsidized film deals.
And when women directors are given a greenlight to make a film, this is what happens more often than not:
From the mouth of a woman executive: “At the studio I work for, there were two movies with equivalent production budgets — one with a female director and the other with a male director. She had more credits than he did. The studio let him run his film autonomously. They questioned every creative choice of the female director and undermined the relationship. It was clear the studio didn’t trust her.”
On top of the fact, historically, women’s films have been marketed less and have had less spent on them.
LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT
Soooo, for women (we’re not even breaking it down by race), we’re not getting much studio funding for our production companies, we’re putting more of our own money into our businesses and if we’re able to break through the studio system as a filmmaker, chances are we’re going to be undermined.
So what does that mean for those of us who are marginalized?
Here’s what I think:
1. We have to define success on our own terms. Billions of streams can’t be it. Billion dollar box offices can’t be either. But we need to be clear that our audiences are not small. They are also global. And catering to our audiences in big and “small” ways usually has a domino effect and a diversified ROI.
2. We have to find ways to make our work. It is imperative that we find ways to make our work. But, I’m not one of those who says grab your iPhone, make a movie. Creating can be expensive.
But as we are trying to develop new ways of attracting funds, can we start with low-hanging fruit?
Is it an IG series instead of a short film? Do we rent out a small community theater and put work up on its feet? Do we turn a movie into a podcast or a novel? Do we stream a play on Twitch, getting our Kai Cenat on?
Another benefit of making is that we get to hire. We get to choose your collaborators.
And we can make work without biased or market interference, which our audiences also deserve.
3. We need to build our audiences. I believe if you have the people on your side, you’re unstoppable. It is why Hollywood has chased after the influencers. Building our audiences also allows us to cut out the middle people. It allows us to market and sell to our audiences directly. It also allows us to hear from them directly about the stories they want to see in the world.
4. We have to build new systems. We need to build careers on our own terms. We need to build companies. We need to build ecosystems. We need to build new tables. We need to build new ways of doing things. We need to take risks.
And we have to find new ways to finance, produce, and distribute work.
IT’S TIME TO CENTER DIY
It’s become clear to me that in order to see ourselves in ALL of our glory, we’re going to have to do it ourselves.
That’s where the HONEY Fund comes in for me.
Because all of this talk about DIY is cute, but the fact remains: WE NEED MONEY.
The HONEY Fund reimagines what partnership looks like among folk who support what they want to see in the world, and value the power of historically excluded communities telling their own stories.
We see the writing on the wall in Hollywood and we WON’T let our audience be left behind.
Our goal is threefold:
MAKE independent film, television, digital, and audio projects
MARKET those projects through effective, culturally-specific campaigns
DEVELOP Honey and other historically excluded creators through artist development initiatives related to our projects
We have a robust slate of projects that the HONEY Fund will support from indie film to podcasts to docuseries.
We will make as we go and will continue to pour our own funds into project-making.
What I do know for sure is that it is the people who wield our power through our attention and our dollars.
We’re looking for CHAMPIONS with the vision to support a model of patronage. And the HONEY Fund offers various perks depending on donation level.
Together, we can build our own table and throw a banquet where everyone eats. We don’t have to wait for Hollywood to let us tell our stories.
You don’t need permission when you have capital.
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Learn more about the HONEY Fund. We’d love to have you become a HONEY Champion today, tomorrow for Giving Tuesday, and beyond.
Felicia Pride is a TV writer / producer and an award-winning filmmaker (BEL-AIR, GREY’S ANATOMY, QUEEN SUGAR). She founded and runs HONEY CHILE, an independent media + production company catering to Black women 40+ and is the host of their recently-launched podcast IT’S GOOD OVER HERE, a followup to their twice NAACP Image Award-nominated podcast Chile, Please. HONEY CHILE currently has shows in development at Amazon and Lifetime and one setup at CBS Studios. Felicia also has series in development at Netflix.
In film, Felicia’s the writer and executive producer of REALLY LOVE, which debuted on Netflix and became a Top Ten Movie on the platform. She also has features in development at Universal, Sony, and AGC Studios. She made her directorial debut with tender, an award-winning short film which aired on STARZ, and recently finished the festival circuit with LOOK BACK AT IT, a proof of concept for her directorial feature debut, which was nominated for an Humanitas Prize for screenwriting.
Felicia’s career in media and entertainment has spanned almost twenty-five years and has included roles in marketing, distribution, impact, editorial, and education. From helping social justice organizations raise seven figures for media projects to assisting hundreds of filmmakers craft release strategies, Felicia is considered a “swiss army knife” because of her unique, multifaceted experience as a storyteller, marketer, and entrepreneur.
Felicia has helped thousands of writers and other storytellers thrive creatively, especially those who are historically excluded, through her former platform The Create Daily. These days, she continues to support storytellers through HONEY CHILE’s educational arm, The Sweet Build. Sign up for its newsletter for storytellers.
