GLAAD’s 2016 Hollywood Report: “Historic Low” For Representation, Star Wars Call Out

Jill Pantozzi | May 2nd, 2016

GLAAD has released their 2016 Studio Responsibility Index. It’s kind of like the President’s State of the Union for Hollywood representation. There isn’t a lot of great news to report but GLAAD decided to call out Disney-owned Star Wars for its lack of LGBTQ+ characters.

From GLAAD.org:

This morning, GLAAD released its fourth annual Studio Responsibility Index (SRI), a report that maps the quantity, quality, and diversity of images of LGBT people in films released by the seven largest studios during the 2015 calendar year. After an improvement in our previous report, we found that racial diversity of LGBT characters drastically decreased and there remains a lack of substantial LGBT characters in mainstream films.

Way to go, Hollywood!

There was no change as to the percentage of films which depicted characters that were identified as lesbian, gay, bisexual, and/or transgender, just 22 out of 126 releases from the 2015 slate, from the previous year. Still terrible. Also, “Transgender representation is shockingly low with only one character in the mainstream releases of 2015 – whose brief appearance served as a punchline to laugh at when her identity is revealed.”

“Hollywood’s films lag far behind any other form of media when it comes to portrayals of LGBT characters,” said Sarah Kate Ellis, GLAAD President & CEO in the report. “Too often, the few LGBT characters that make it to the big screen are the target of a punchline or token characters. The film industry must embrace new and inclusive stories if it wants to remain competitive and relevant.” Here’s the most general summary:

No studios received a rating of “Good” for their 2015 releases. 20th Century Fox, Lionsgate Entertainment, Sony Columbia Pictures, and Universal Pictures all received ratings of “Adequate”, while Paramount Pictures, Walt Disney Studios, and Warner Brothers all received a “Failing” grade for their portrayals of LGBT people.

And a few specific notes I pulled out from GLAAD’s report:

• Interestingly, the stoner-spy thriller American Ultra positioned a gay CIA agent as the film’s moral center. In a genre that often only includes LGBT characters as villains or one-note stereotypes, it’s refreshing to see a gay character given substance and the same type of humanizing traits as non- LGBT characters.
• Freeheld is the only film distributed by a major studio last year to be nominated for a GLAAD Media Award.
• It’s rare for a Hollywood film to focus entirely on LGBT history, but 2015’s Stonewall fumbled the opportunity to shed light on a pivotal moment and went on to fail at the box office.
• The Diary of a Teenage Girl follows the sexual awakening of 15-year-old Minnie in 1970s San Francisco, whose sexual fluidity is portrayed as just another part of coming to understand herself, her desires, and what love really means.

But perhaps most interesting is the push GLAAD makes towards Walt Disney Studios, which not only produces animated features and other “family-friendly” fare, but also now includes the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Lucasfilm.

For the first time since beginning this report, GLAAD did not find any LGBT-inclusive content among Disney’s yearly slate of films. As recent successful animated films and TV programs have shown (Oscar-nominated ParaNorman, Cartoon Network’s Steven Universe), LGBT people appearing in “all-ages” programming – animated or not – is not the impossible notion it once was. LGBT people are already part of families and communities around the world, and film of all genres should reflect that.

As sci-fi projects have the special opportunity to create unique worlds whose advanced societies can serve as a commentary on our own, the most obvious place where Disney could include LGBT characters is in the upcoming eighth Star Wars film. 2015’s The Force Awakens has introduced a new and diverse central trio, which allows the creators opportunity to tell fresh stories as they develop their backstory. Recent official novels in the franchise featured lesbian and gay characters that could also be easily written in to the story.

So glad they said it. Not that many of us haven’t been saying the same. Even director J.J. Abrams agrees that it makes no sense for there to be zero LGBTQ+ characters in the galaxy. While fandom may be pushing for Stormpilot to happen, I personally hope the rewrites to Episode VIII mean we’ll get confirmation of something at least. And it’s anyone’s guess what we’ll see in Rogue One.

As far as their recommendations to Hollywood and creators at large, GLAAD said “Not only must there be a larger number of LGBT roles, but they must be built with substance and purpose.”

“Humor can be a powerful tool for holding a mirror up to society and challenging the norm, but when crafted without thought, it has much the opposite effect and bolsters ignorance and prejudice,” they wrote. “Filmmakers should examine what message they are really sending when they rely on thoughtless humor to exploit an already marginalized community.”

You can read more observations and recommendations here. The full report, broken down by studio, methodology, etc. can be found here.