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Actress launches petition for on-screen equality
STARS of stage and screen are flocking to support a petition, organised by Tufnell Park actress Kate Buffery, calling for more roles for women in film and television.
Ms Buffery, the star of the series Wish Me Luck and previous episodes of crime thriller Crime and Retribution, argues that there is a huge bias against women in drama – particularly older women.
She has collected almost 1,200 signatures from viewers and actors on behalf of the actors’ union Equity. They include Imelda Staunton, nominated for an Oscar for Vera Drake, and local actors Roger Lloyd Pack (“Trigger” in Only Fools and Horses) and former Starsky and Hutch star David Soul.
Mr Soul writes on the online petition: “How can you have one without the other?
“It’s time the viewers got educated as well and that’s a bigger job than us attacking the networks about parity.”
More than half the viewing public is female, according to figures, yet in TV drama for every female character there are two male characters – that’s 35.3 per cent female roles to 63.5 per cent male roles.
Ms Buffery said: “Whilst leading parts are frequently played by male actors over 45, women in this age group start to disappear from our screens.
“The message this sends to viewers is distorted and distorting. We call on all the major UK television channels to take action to correct this imbalance.”
She described an “old-fashioned kind of chauvinism” in TV and film where traditionally film executives are looking to grab young male audiences.
She added: “I suspect it is all based on the idea that once upon a time young men might have decided whether or not to go to the cinema, rather than their girlfriends deciding. Men, it is believed, also hold the TV remote control in the home. That’s no longer the case, if it ever was.”
TV and film has made great strides in popularising women-oriented films like Mamma Mia! and Calendar Girls and various costume dramas but, according to Ms Buffery, there are fewer films containing strong, single-minded, inspirational older women.
She said: “As well as ‘light’ films where women are portrayed as perhaps flirty and frivolous we want stronger characters representing the fact that women today should be equal in all society.”
Even the soap operas have slightly more men than women, according to Ms Buffery, although there is a much more even balance.
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