Academy Award Winner Geena Davis Talks About Breaking Gender Barriers to American University Students

Actress Geena Davis speaking at American University on Saturday, October 18th, 2014.
(The Eagle/ Alejandro Alvarez)

“I’d rather play baseball than play the girlfriend of someone playing baseball” said Geena Davis as she spoke to American University students on October 28th. Davis has always been known to take on the parts of strong women such as the gritty pitcher in “A League of Their Own”. She went on to win an Academy Award for her part in “The Accidental Tourist”. But Davis said the film that made the biggest impact on her was 1991’s “Thelma and Louise”. Davis played the part of “Thelma Dickinson” a woman who leaves her abusive husband and spends time living for herself. Davis said the role, “ changed the course of my life. It cemented my passion for empowering women, and it has driven my commitment ever since then.” She now chooses roles with “the audience in mind.”

Davis began to work in women’s rights after she founded the Geena Davis Institute on Women in the Media in 2007. Davis became driven to changing the way women were viewed in the media after watching children’s television with her daughter. The actress felt there were no strong girls for her daughter to connect to. She pointed out that women in G-rated movies wear the same amount of sexually revealing clothing as women in R-rated movies. She also said women make up only 17 percent of background actors in American movies but represent 50 percent of America’s population. Davis asked the audience, “"What message are we sending to boys and girls  if the female characters are one-dimensional, sidelined, stereotyped, hyper-sexualized, or simply not there at all?"

Davis finds hope in movies such as “Tangled” and “Frozen” which retell classic fairy tales in a way that is more empowering towards women. However, she believes Hollywood still has a long way to go.

American University students had mixed reactions on Davis’s speech. Sophomore Kay Link said, “I think she brought up a topic that hasn’t been talked about enough. While a lot of people think “Frozen” has changed women’s roles in film, it is more of an outlier than the norm.” However, not everyone felt as strong about the topic as Davis. Fellow sophomore Gina Larson said, “I think Davis and the Davis Institute are fighting for a good cause. However, we should be pushing more women to run for office or other powerful positions. This would create a change in what we see in films.”