Kristen Stewart slams Hollywood for ‘backsliding’ on women’s progress

Kristen Stewart has condemned Hollywood for what she calls a "devastating" reversal in opportunities for women directors, saying the industry has regressed after the momentum of the #MeToo movement.

Speaking at a women's luncheon in Los Angeles hosted by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the "Twilight" star and filmmaker said she was "so angry" that female representation behind the camera has declined again.

"The backsliding from a brief moment of progress is statistically devastating," Stewart told the audience. "Such a pitiful number of films from the past year have been made by women."

Stewart, who recently directed "The Chronology of Water", referenced The Celluloid Ceiling report, which tracks gender representation in film. The study found that only 11 of 2024's top 100 highest-grossing films were directed by women — a sharp drop from 16 in 2020.

While the #MeToo movement in 2017 initially brought a reckoning across the industry, the momentum appears to have faded. In 2018, only four of the top 100 films were directed by women, but that number rose to 16 by 2020 before sliding again.

Stewart's fiery speech — attended by Sarah Paulson, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Tessa Thompson, Riley Keough, Claire Foy, and Kate Hudson — drew repeated applause. "In a post-MeToo moment, it seemed possible that stories made by and for women were finally getting their due," she said. "But I can now attest to the bare-knuckle brawling it takes every step of the way when the content is too dark, too taboo."

Photos: Collected

She spoke of the industry's persistent resistance to honest portrayals of women's experiences. "The violence of silencing — it's like we're not even supposed to be angry," she said, her voice rising. "But I can eat this podium with a fork and knife. I'm so angry."

Calling out Hollywood's "boys' club business model," Stewart urged her peers to resist tokenisation and take back creative power. "I'm not grateful to a business model that pretends to include us while belittling our perspectives. Let's start printing our own currency."

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