Are Male and Female Actors Compensated & Given the Same Opportunities in Show Business?
Introduction
The purpose of our project was to see if statistically male and female actors are compensated and given the same opportunities in show business or if this was not the case due to gender (PLURETTI, 394). Our background research was done via scholarly articles that we found on Galileo. We wanted our research to gather information on what opportunities could be offered to both genders and what opportunities may not be (Simon, 1343). Where there certain roles that women did not have the option to do or were less successful? Are certain genres not successful for female leads? Could actresses only be successful if sexualized in show business? (PLURETTI, 396) We also wanted to see if males and females were compensated competitively or if males were paid more for roles simply because they are males (Eikhof, 846). From this starting point we went to work creating our survey that posed questions to our participants on how they felt actors were treated based on gender not specifically skillset (Levy39). Our project is important as we and many other see the inequality for male and females in the acting world not only in what opportunities they are offered for roles but also in pay. Our hope is that more people will speak out on the inequality, and we hope to see that change in our lifetimes.
Methods
The methods we used to collect our data was via a Qualtrics IBR approved survey that we published on our social media cites. We used a 25 question survey to gauge what our piers believed to be true, via their own experiences or their views on social media, news channels, or simply word of mouth accounts. We had our survey up for about one week and had 42 participants. We posted the link to the survey along with the caption, "Please take our survey about Fair Pay and opportunities for Female Actresses". We chose to give our participants the option to have their names listed or be be anonymous which most of our participants decided to do. To help us gauge what all demographics were included in our participants we did have some questions asking for them to share their age, race, sexual preference(s), and gender. We felt these questions necessary as it would help us see if most males felt things were fair across the board and if females disagreed or if it was simply based person to person that gender had no standing.
The Flyer included a link that took the participant straight to the survey, but we also added the link to the social media posts so that they could click on the link.
Results
The results of our survey yielded that the majority of the 42 participants felt that males and females were not paid equally nor were they given the same opportunities in show business. 56% of participants felt that the pay scale between male and female actors was not equal, while 12% said that they felt they were. One thing that was of note to our group was that 32% of our participants stated that they did not think that the opportunities or pay were gender specific per say but was based on the individual actor in question and years in showbsuiness.
Figure 1.
Figure 2.
Years of experience/range and specialized roles can provide an individual with more opportunities and pay scale. We asked our participants how they felt and and majority of our participants felt that female and male actors had the same potential for long career in showbusiness and that this was not gender specific but based on the individual itself and their talent.
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Discussion
Our survey yielded 42 participants, 66.7% being female, 33.3% being male. With age ranges between 18-55 years old, 76% of the participants being under the age of 30 while 24% were 30 years or above. We concluded from our survey results that the majority of the feedback from survey participants felt that male and female actors are not treated and paid equally as a whole. However one of the outliers we received was that many felt that the actress in question made a difference on how they were paid and treated which made up 28-33% of our results. We found this interesting as it shows how much of a difference it can make when speaking about a particular individual rather than the gender as a whole. Many participants felt that time in the industry made a huge factor in pay scale. We concluded that with more female than male participants that the results could be somewhat bias. Through out history males and females have not been given all the same opportunities and not offered the same pay for similar work so it is no surprise that this extends to show business.
Conclusion
All and all we feel that our survey results we on par with what our research materials stated that males and females are not paid equally nor are they offered the same opportunities for acting roles. All this to be said we feel that over the years this has improved greatly as there are more voices that speak out on behalf of female actresses and more than that females in the workforce. Our research also yielded that there has been improvement for minorities not only female actresses. The results from our 42 survey participants seemed to feel the same way as a whole, which we can only hope will help bring along changes in how women are treated in the workforce regardless of what the job entails.
Works Cited
Eikhof, D. R., Newsinger, J., Luchinskaya, D., & Aidley, D. (2019). And ... action? Gender, knowledge and inequalities in the UK screen industries. Gender, Work & Organization, 26(6), 840– 859. https://doi-org.proxygsu- bru1.galileo.usg.edu/10.1111/gwao.12318
Levy, E. (1989). The Democratic Elite: America’s Movie Stars. Qualitative Sociology, 12(1), 29–54. https://doi- org.proxygsu- bru1.galileo.usg.edu/10.1007/BF00989243
Simon, S. J. (2019). Hollywood power brokers: Gender and racial inequality in talent agencies. Gender, Work and Organization, 26(9), 1340– 1356. https://doi-org.proxygsu- bru1.galileo.usg.edu/10.1111/gwao.12365
PLURETTI, R., LINGEL, J., & SINNREICH, A. (2015). Toward an “Other” Dimension: An Essay on Transcendence of Gender and Sexuality. ETC: A Review of General Semantics, 72(4), 392–399.