Origins

In the 1970s, though many women acted in major motion pictures, almost none directed them. In 1974, Mathilde Krim

Mathilde Krim

Mathilde Krim, Ph.D. is the founding chairman of amfAR, an association for AIDS research.-Biography:Krim received her Ph.D. from the University of Geneva, Switzerland, in 1953...

, a scientist and Rockefeller Foundation

Rockefeller Foundation

The Rockefeller Foundation is a prominent philanthropic organization and private foundation based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The preeminent institution established by the six-generation Rockefeller family, it was founded by John D. Rockefeller , along with his son John D. Rockefeller, Jr...

 board member, approached the American Film Institute

American Film Institute

The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...

 (A.F.I.) about using her influence with the foundation to help women in film. Jan Haag, the Admissions and Awards Administrator at A.F.I., set up a meeting with Krim to discuss possible options. Haag, anticipating at least $200,000, needed to revise her ideas when Krim informed her that she could easily secure only $30,000. A $200,000 grant would need to go through the formal, time-consuming review process that did not necessarily ensure a positive outcome.

To accommodate the limited budget, Haag and Antonio Vellani, A.F.I. administrator and future director of its Center for Advanced Film Studies (CAFS), submitted a plan to Krim to create the Directing Workshop for Women (DWW), based on the Directing Workshop at the CAFS. To save money, DWW students would use the CAFS equipment and the CAFS students would act as producers, cinematographers, etc. for DWW projects. Though the women could use CAFS equipment, the DWW needed additional editing equipment, which would cost $14,000. After these expenses were met, each student would received a budget of $300 per film to cover expenses and would make two films. The A.F.I. also formalized an agreement with the Screen Actors Guild

Screen Actors Guild

The Screen Actors Guild is an American labor union representing over 200,000 film and television principal performers and background performers worldwide...

, which allowed their actors to volunteer to act in DWW films.

Once the A.F.I. officially obtained the Rockefeller Foundation’s grant for the program, Haag’s next step was to establish a review board to choose twelve students for admission. The applicant review board Haag and Vellani decided on consisted of four successful women: Joan Didion

Joan Didion

Joan Didion is an American author best known for her novels and her literary journalism. Her novels and essays explore the disintegration of American morals and cultural chaos, where the overriding theme is individual and social fragmentation...

, a famous writer; Marcia Nasiter, Vice President of United Artists; Kitty Hawks, an agent; and Barbara Schultz, an executive at PBS.

History

The organization received much interest, and many of its applicants were famous actresses, writers, producers, etc. The initial twelve students the review board chose did not include any of the famous actresses who applied; in fact, the review board excluded the prominent thespian

Actor

An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...

s intentionally, opting, instead, to choose unknown women. But Haag and Vellani believed admitting a few famous names would not only bring recognition to the program, i.e. media attention, but also help women exercise enough influence to step into directing very soon. With only unknown names, they feared that the DWW would become an admirable program that would never wield enough power to help women direct major motion pictures. Haag managed to expand the number of students to nineteen, thus including some well known actresses as well as at least one minority woman.

The nineteen women admitted were: Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou is an American author and poet who has been called "America's most visible black female autobiographer" by scholar Joanne M. Braxton. She is best known for her series of six autobiographical volumes, which focus on her childhood and early adult experiences. The first and most highly...

 (writer), Karen Arthur (actress), Ellen Burstyn

Ellen Burstyn

Ellen Burstyn is a leading American actress of film, stage, and television. Burstyn's career began in theatre during the late 1950s, and over the next ten years she appeared in several films and television series before joining the Actors Studio in 1967...

 (actress), Juleen Compton (actress), Lee Grant

Lee Grant

Lee Grant is an American stage, film and television actress, and film director. She was blacklisted for 12 years from film work beginning in the mid-1950s, but worked in the theatre, and would eventually win the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Felicia Carp in the...

 (actress), Nessa Hyams (casting director), Margot Kidder

Margot Kidder

Margaret Ruth "Margot" Kidder is a Canadian-born American actress. She is perhaps best known for playing Lois Lane in the four Superman movies opposite Christopher Reeve, a role that brought her to widespread recognition....

 (actress), Joanna Lee

Joanna Lee (actor)

Joanna Lee was an American actress, writer and producer.-Early life:Lee was born in Newark, New Jersey; by the time she was 20, she was a divorced single mother with a son, Craig Lee.-Career:...

 (writer), Lynne Littman (producer), Kathleen Nolan (actress), Julia Phillips

Julia Phillips

Julia Phillips was a film producer and author. She is remembered for being the first woman to win an Academy Award as a film's producer, and for a best selling tell-all memoir.-Early life:...

 (producer), Susan Martin (actress/producer), Marjorie Mullen (script supervisor), Giovanna Nigro (producer, writer, director), Susan Oliver

Susan Oliver

Susan Oliver was an American actress, television director and aviator.-Early life and family:Susan Oliver was born Charlotte Gercke, the daughter of journalist George Gercke and astrology practitioner Ruth Hale Oliver, in New York City in 1932. Her parents divorced when she was still a child...

 (actress), Gail Parent (writer), Marion Rothman (editor), Lily Tomlin

Lily Tomlin

Mary Jean "Lily" Tomlin is an American actress, comedienne, writer, and producer. Tomlin has been a major force in American comedy since the late 1960's when she began a career as a stand up comedian and became a featured performer on television's Laugh-in...

 (actress, comedienne), and Nancy Walker (actress).

Despite the limited funds, the DWW enjoyed enough notoriety to ensure a larger amount of financial support in its subsequent cycles. For example, Nessa Hyams went on to direct episodes of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman

Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman

Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman is an American soap opera parody that aired in daily syndication from January 1976 to May 1977. The series was produced by Norman Lear, directed by Joan Darling and starred Louise Lasser...

. For its second cycle, the Rockefeller Foundation approved a $100,000 grant. In its fourth cycle, the A.F.I. decided to stop admitting famous actresses, and just as Haag feared, shortly afterwards, the media lost much of its interest.

The DWW still exists today with two goals: to offer women career opportunities to direct films and offer them educational opportunities to learn to develop their filmmaking skills. Several early films received Academy Award nominations and many alumni have won awards at film festivals, including Cannes

Cannes Film Festival

The Cannes International Film Festival , is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films of all genres including documentaries from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is among the world's most prestigious and publicized film festivals...

.

Sources

• Haag, Jan. “The Dream of the Marble Bridge: The Founding of the Directing Workshop
• For Women of the American Film Institute, A History.” By Jan Haag. 2002.
• http://janhaag.com/ESessays.html (29 January 2007).
• New York Times, 1974-1977
• Los Angeles Times, 1974-1977