Auteurs and Artists
Every year at a pre-Oscar bash, the Academy Award-winning producer Cathy Schulman tells a favorite anecdote. The day after she won the Oscar for Crash in 2006, she was riding in an elevator after returning her rented jewels to Neil Lane. Next to her was a young woman who was visibly (and verbally) incredulous that she was standing next to "the woman in the brown dress on stage" who had actually produced the film that won Oscar's biggest prize the previous night.
Now Schulman’s hope is to inspire a new generation of women to dream big, both in front of and behind the camera.
Last night, Peter and Tara Guber, along with Glamour magazine, Perrier Jouet, MaxMara and MAC Cosmetics, hosted the third-annual Women in Film cocktail party. While the hosts themselves were actually out of town for the Thursday soiree, Finola Dwyer (An Education), Sally Menke (Inglourious Basterds), Gwendolyn Yates Whittle (Avatar), Christina Innis (The Hurt Locker), Sandy Powell and Patrice Vermette (The Young Victoria) and Best Actress nominee Gabourey Sidibe (Precious) were amomg the guests who packed the Guber’s private residence in Bel-Air to toast the 2010 Female Oscar nominees.
CLOSE UP: Angie Harmon and Camilla Belle.
And syrupy sentiment aside, it's hard to get more heartening than watching an entire industry rally around its talent without all of the cynicism that accompanies awards season — especially when the cause is advocating for women, still an under-represented demographic in filmmaking. Those who were in attendance clearly still celebrate art for art’s sake.
I have to confess that having moved to L.A. from New York two years ago, I've only recently been exposed on a larger scale to the inside world of entertainment; awards season is a new phenomenon to me. Though I'm an avid film watcher, I wasn’t always glued to my TV on Oscars night and probably couldn’t have told you whether the Golden Globes or SAG awards came before or after then on the award season schedule. But nothing makes the jaded iceberg melt more then seeing colleagues support one another — in any artistic field.
GIRL TALK: Mena Suvari (in a serious up-do) with Gabourey Sidibe.
Since 1973, the Women in Film Foundation has done just that. With an amazing roster of members, they have supported each other with an extensive network of contacts, educational programs, scholarships, film finishing funds, grants, access to employment opportunities and numerous practical services in support of the art of filmmaking. As Jane Fleming, president of WIF put it, "We want to train the next generation of women to take their place at the Oscars." Amen.
Veteran fashion editor, photographer and writer Hellin Kay has been a staffer at Women's Wear Daily and Russian Vogue, among others. This is her first story for Style Section L.A.