About the Film

Miss Representation is an award-winning documentary that debuted at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. The film critically examines the representation of women and girls in American media. Furthermore, it explores how misrepresentation in the media contributes to the continued underrepresentation of women in positions of power. For more information about the film and the Miss Representation organization, please visit www.missrepresentation.org.

About the Panel

• Denny Dillon is a stage and screen actor, comedian, writer, and visual artist. Nominated for a Tony and winner of the CableACE award for best actress in a comedy series, Dillon is also a Saturday Night Live alumna. In recent years, Dillon has redirected her creative energies to the visual arts. Her pen and ink drawings and multimedia pieces have been exhibited in galleries and are sought by art collectors. She owns The Drawing Room, an art gallery in Stone Ridge, and serves on the Rosendale Theatre Collective Advisory Board.
• Ann Gibbons has decades of experience in communication and print journalism. She has worked as a writer, managing editor, executive editor, and public relations professional. Two of her favorite career moments were overseeing the reporting team that exposed Sprague Electric’s pollution of the Hoosic River and founding The Hartford Woman, the first women’s regional news magazine in the United States. Presently, Gibbons is a feature writer and police reporter at the Daily Freeman.
• Dion Ogust is a critically-acclaimed photographer, videographer, and photojournalist. Her photography appears on numerous book and CD covers and her videos are featured on websites, television, and other public venues. Ogust has been published in the New York Times, Time Magazine, Acoustic Guitar, Hudson Valley Magazine, House, and the Woodstock Times. She has served on Board of Directors of the Center for Photography in Woodstock and participates in the Onteora Student Mentor Program. She is also a painter and printmaker.
• Nicole Quinn is an acclaimed writer, director, actor, and producer. In addition to her work as a playwright, Quinn is an accomplished screenwriter. She has written for HBO, Showtime, the major television networks, and Jodie Foster’s Egg Pictures. She is the founder and owner of BlueBarnProductions. Quinn also serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the Rosendale Theatre Collective and teaches a playwrighting workshop at Rondout Valley High School.
• Cassandra Lee Walker is an actor, comedian, and singer currently based in New York City. Some of her recent work includes Don’t Go into the Woods, a rock and roll horror movie musical directed by Vincent D’Onofrio, projects with College Humor, an online comedy sketch group, and studying and performing with The Upright Citizens Brigade.
• Adele Calcavecchio, our discussion moderator, is an actor with forty years of experience on Ulster County stages. She is also a retired teacher and a retired Bed and Breakfast owner. She currently serves on the boards of the Kingston AAUW, the Arts Society of Kingston, and Performing Arts of Woodstock.

Facts and Figures – Why should you care?

• Male characters outnumber female characters by 3 to 1 in family films.
• In 2008 and 2010, of all the speaking roles in the 100 top-grossing movies, 32.8% were female, 67.2% were male.
• From 2006 to 2009, not a single female character was depicted in G-rated family films in the field of medical science, as a business leader, in law, or politics. In these films, 85.5% of all working characters are male and 19.5% are female; in reality, 50% of the workforce is female.
• In the entertainment industry, only 7% of directors, 13% of writers, and 20% of producers are female. Greater female involvement in the creative process is crucial to more accurate representation of women in the media. On average, when even one woman writer works on a film, there is a 10.4% increase in screen time for women characters.
• About two-thirds of reporters, writers and, newsroom supervisors are male.
• Of the top 100 syndicated opinion columnists in the United States, only one-third are female.
• Only 20% of news articles are about women, and many of those stories are about violence and victimhood.
• In the 2010 midterm elections, women lost seats in Congress for the first time in 30 years.
• Women make up 51% of the population and only 17% of Congress.
• The U.S. ranks 90^th in the world for women in national legislatures.
• In U.S. history, 34 women have served as governors, 2,319 men have served as governors.
• A mere 3% of Fortune 500 CEOs are female.
• Women hold only 3% of influential positions in the mainstream media (telecommunication, entertainment, publishing, and advertising).
• Women represent more than 86% of America’s purchasing power.

 See you at 7:15 at the Rosendale Theatre. Be there!