26. February 2014
by SchspIN
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Kein Jahr für Regisseurinnen – 2013 – A Bad Year for Female Directors

Kein Jahr für Regisseurinnen – die Top 100 deutschen Kinofilme 2013, die Top 20-Listen von 2001 bis 2013 und die Filmförderung 2013 (FFA)

Heute – in fünf bunten Bildern – geht es um die Top 100 deutschen Kinofilme 2013: die Genres, die Frauenanteile in den Bereichen Regie, Drehbuch und Produktion, das Alter und Geschlecht der erstgenannten Rollen. Dazu eine Untersuchung der Top 20 deutschen Kinofilme 2001 bis 2013 in den genannten Positionen, und schließlich ein kurzer Blick auf von der FFA im Jahr 2013 geförderte Filmprojekte.

Die Liste der 100 an den Kinokassen erfolgreichsten deutsche Kinofilme stammt von der Filmförderungsanstalt FFA. Auf Platz 1 FACK JU GÖHTE, Regie und Drehbuch Bora Dagtekin, erstgenannte Rolle: Zeki Müller (Elyas M’Barek). Der Film ist übrigens auch die Nummer 1 der internationalen Liste, d.h. aller Filme in deutschen Kinos 2013, mit gut 5,6 Mio. verkauften Eintrittskarten. Auf Platz 100 der deutschen Produktionen steht STAUB AUF [Weiterlesen – Read On]

20. February 2014
by SchspIN
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Berlin Int. Film Festival 2014 and the Celluloid Ceiling

Berlin International Film Festival 2014 and the Celluloid Ceiling

Today let’s have a look at the films in competition at the 64^th International Film Festival Berlin and at an intervention by Bosnian director Jasmila Žbanić on gender imbalance in the film business.

Last sunday was the final day of this year’s – snowfree – Berlinale. Two events especially stuck out for me in those 11 exciting and inspring days and nights: I was lucky to get a ticket for the premiere of the Japanese competition entry 小さいおうち/ CHIISAI O UCHI (The little House) by Yôji Yamada. A wonderful film! One of the leading actresses, Haru Kuroki, was awarded a Silver Bear.

And secondly, I met Bosnian director Jasmila Žbanić, whose very impressive and touching film ESMA’S SECRET: GRBAVICA I saw 8 years ago, when it won the Golden Bear at the 2006 Berlinale.

Žbanić participated in this year’s panel discussion „Get yourself connected – a discussion on the status of women in film and gender equity“ organized by the International Women’s Film Festival Dortmund Köln, and she started the event with an intervention which I may use in this blog. Hvala puno!

But bevore we get to that here are some statistics on this year’s Berlinale competition: 20 films were in it, among them BA RI YAN HUO (Black Coal, Thin Ice), which won the Golden Bear for director Yinan Diao. Continue Reading →

12. February 2014
by SchspIN
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Komödie statt Krimi: Die Top 100 dt. Kinofilme 2012 – Top 100 German Films 2012: Comedy over Crime

English Version follows German.

Komödie statt Krimi: Die Top 100 deutschen Kinofilme 2012

Morgen, am 13. Februar, gibt die Filmförderungsanstalt FFA die Statistiken für 2013 bekannt, darunter die Jahresliste der an den Kinokassen 100 erfolgreichsten deutschen Filme des vergangenen Jahres, die Top 100. Diese werde ich demnächst näher betrachten, zuvor soll es aber heute um die 100 erfolgreichsten deutschen Filme 2012 gehen: die Genres, die Frauen- und Männeranteile in den Gewerken Gewerke Regie, Drehbuch und Produzent/in, und die erstgenannten Rollen in den Besetzungslisten.

Letzten März hatte ich die Top 12 Filme im 6-Gewerke-Check ausgewertet (Deutsche Top Kinofilme 2012) und im Juni dann 11 Gewerke von u.a. den Top 17 Filmen (Kunst oder Kommerz, wo arbeiten die Filmfrauen? Teil 1 Die Gewerke).
Als ich mich auf die Suche nach den deutschen Kinofilmen von 2013 machte, landete ich bei der FFA und ihren umfassenden – wenn auch etwas versteckten – Listen, (die sich leider auch nicht direkt verlinken lassen. FFA-Webseite -> Marktdaten -> Filmhitlisten -> Jahresliste (deutsch) -> Jahr wählen), und erfuhr, dass sie während der Berlinale veröffentlicht werden. 100 Filme sind ja mal eine größere Datenmenge für eine Auswertung, und warum dann nicht zuvor noch die 100 Filme des Vorjahrs betrachten? Darum soll es heute gehen: [Weiterlesen – Read On]

31. January 2014
by SchspIN
Comments Off on Grimmepreisnominierungen – Check – Nominations for German TV Awards

Grimmepreisnominierungen – Check – Nominations for German TV Awards

English Version follows German.

Kurz und knapp: ein Check der 17 fiktionalen Grimmepreisnominierungen 2014

Zum Wochenende gibt es ein paar bunte Bildchen: es geht los mit dem erweiterten 6-Gewerke-Check der Nominierungen zum Grimmepreis 2014 im Wettbewerb Fiktion / Einzelsendungen, die diese Woche bekannt gegeben wurden, und zwei Größen zur Besetzung.
Die Auswertung ging diesmal recht schnell, da die Seite vom Grimmeinstitut die meisten Zahlen aufführt. Interessanterweise wird an erster Stelle das Drehbuch genannt, danach erst die Regie. Die Produzent/innen werden nicht genannt (die habe ich aus der Crew United Datenbank), dafür gab es Angaben zu den Redakteur/innen, die ich erstmals in einer SchspIN-Auswertung einbeziehe. Der schnelle Besetzungscheck untersucht die erstgenannten Rollen und die Geschlechterverteilung im auf der Grimmepreisseite genannten Hauptcast.Gestern las ich die schwedische Schlagzeile „Männen dominerar filmbranschen i Norden“, ähnliches gilt auch hier, das viele Pink sticht schon ziemlich in die Augen – was aber auch an der Einstellung meines Monitors liegen kann. [Weiterlesen – Read On]

27. January 2014
by SchspIN
Comments Off on ZDF Fernsehfilme der Woche 2013 – TV Movies of the Week on ZDF 2013

ZDF Fernsehfilme der Woche 2013 – TV Movies of the Week on ZDF 2013

English Version follows German.

ZDF Fernsehfilme der Woche 2013

Kurzfassung: eine Analyse der Rollen- und Altersverteilung nach Geschlechtern von den 46 Filmen der ZDF-Reihe „Fernsehfilm der Woche“ 2012. Wieder einmal gibt es deutlich mehr und ältere Männer- als Frauenrollen. Ein Hoffnungsschimmer: mehr als 50 % der Besetzungslisten werden von Schauspielerinnen angeführt.

Montags um 20.15 Uhr läuft im Zweiten Programm regelmäßig der Fernsehfilm der Woche. Allerdings, wer denkt, in dieser Reihe werden keine Krimi gesendet, täuscht sich, denn tatsächlich gab es 2013 bei den 46 Filmen dieser Rubrik einen 3/4 Anteil von Krimis und Thrillern. Die Filme wurden – mal wieder – sehr mehrheitlich von Männern inszeniert, der Frauenanteil in der Regie lag bei 9 % (im Regieverband ist der Anteil 24 %, in der Abbildung links mit der kleinen grünen Raute dargestellt) und bei den Drehbüchern sind die entsprechenden Frauenanteile 35 % (Fernsehfilme) und 40 % (VDD).

Das bedeutet, dass nur jede 3. Geschichte von einer Frau geschrieben wurde und weniger als jede 10. von einer Frau filmisch umgesetzt wurde.
Ist das schlimm? Erzählen alle Männer Geschichten komplett anders als es alle Frauen tun würden? Natürlich nicht. Aber natürlich ist so ein Ungleichgewicht natürlich auch nicht. Es wäre [Weiterlesen – Read On]

24. January 2014
by SchspIN
Comments Off on Women’s Patience…

Women’s Patience…

Women’s Patience is Men’s Power

Last Wednesday evening a panel discussion took place in the Green Salon of the Volksbühne Berlin, hosted by WIFT Germany with the topic “Who plays a part on German TV? Female image between TV reality and real life”. Moderated by Dr. Sylvia Nagel (director / producer, ProQuote), the film ladies Dr. Christine Otto (author, VDD), Käthe Niemeyer (director), Winka Wulff (Film- and TV producer, Polyphon) und Anja Dihrberg (Casting Director, BVC) gave a brilliant performance with engaging, competent and entertaining discussions. I was also there presenting some facts and figures from my blog and will wirte a bit more about the discussion at a later date.
Tomorrow, Saturday 25th, journalist Jörg Wagner will broadcast extracts from the discussion and interviews with parts of the audience on Radioeins RBB, a German radio station, in his programme MEDIENMAGAZIN between 6 and 7 p.m.
Shortly after the discussion I read a tweet on Twitter that criticized the composition of the panel: @VeraLi asked why there were no men on the panel, adding that men also shape TV, and that in situations of all-male panels there is criticism as well.

I am all in favour of men (from the world of TV or else) discussing the issue openly, of men sitting on panels and taking a stand. Definitely.
For Wednesday there were no arguments against a man on the podium – there just happened to be no man present. The professional organizations for example (like the script writers’ and the casting directors’ guilds) where asked to name a representative and they sent a woman. And actually without men the discussion reached an unusual level of personal closeness to the issue.
Why is that?
Because there were five women on the podium deeply and multiply affected by the issue, in ways unexperienced by men. They are affected, because they work in the German television business, which is tougher for women than for their male colleagues. They are affected as part of the female TV audience that are regularly confronted with fossil female images. And they are affected because they are older than 40.
In German fictional television there is a distinct male majority of screen characters, women over 40 appear far more seldom than men of the same age, far far more male than female directors stage the scripts that are written by a majority of men, for TV channels headed by men.

Of course male filmmakers can talk about this issue, about stereotypied role clichés and about how difficult it is to fight this situation and enforce alternative, pathbreaking new stories and formats against the tv channels.
But to adopt the qualfied demand for the inclusion of women in discussions, panels, talkshows, leadership positions and more (in other words: the discussion of quota and better representation) and simply turn it around in favour of men is well-meant, friendly and understanding, but unfortunately a long way off the crux of the matter, and maybe easier said than thought about. This is a general thought on this, and not directed at @VeraLi and her tweets specifically.

This reflex, if we want to call it that, to simply turn around political demands, this sort of sense of justice, comes to nothing. It does not make sense to call for a quota for men, because they are not discriminated against as a group in society. Women on the other hand are.
It does not make much sense to side the phrase fom many job advertisments – “applications by women will be preferentially favoured if they are comparably qualified” and “we would like to encourage women’s applications” with an inverted “applications by men will be preferentially favoured if they are comparably qualified”. Both is not possible at the same time, and these types of job advertisments have been developed to fight the underrepresentation of women in the public and private sector on many levels.

Since I started blogging a year ago I have hoped for a public discussion in Germany on film, television and gender injustice, and for more than half a year I have advocated an event like this week’s, and therefore I am very happy that it took place as the – long overdue – first act of this discussion. (This may be untrue of course, because naturally I don’t know of all events and discussion in this town or country, maybe some have taken place already which would be great!). In any case to me and many others, that were present that evening in the Green Salon, it appeared to have been a premiere, finally finally a discussion on a wider scale, supported by strong data, of a topic that has been causing great pains to many of us for years, women as well as men.

“Wer spielt im deutschen Fernsehen eine Rolle? / Who plays a part on German TV?”
January 22, 2014, Grüner Salon der Volksbühne Berlin. Photo: WIFT Germany

By the way, in addition to tomorrow’s radio programme MEDIENMAGAZIN another radio channel will be reporting on the panel discussion, but probably not until March or April: the show ZEITPUNKTE on the RBB-channel KULTURRADIO. ZEITPUNKTE (points in time) is a programme dealing with female political issues, at least that is how the programme was introduced on Wednesday night. (I could not fight an English expression for Frauenpolitik, politics for women? so I used “female political issues”.)
Yes of course, reports on the panel discussion and even more importantly on the problems discussed therein is a good thing, whether on the radio, in newspapers, on television, on the interhet or whereever. But: this is not a women’s issue.
It is not a women’s issue when the television programmes are bad. It is not a women’s issue when actresses don’t have work. It is not a women’s issue when women from a certain age onwards disappear from German TV screens. It is not a men’s issue when 5 men and 1 woman are guests in a talk show. It is not a men’s issue when 94 % of the TATORTE (Crime Scene. Germany’s most popular crime investigation TV series) are directed by men. These a society’s issues. Media issues. Political issues. Economical issues.
I am looking forward to the report on KULTURRADIO, but at the same time I am hoping for articles in the feuilleton and media pages or the economic section of major daily or weekly newspapers.

“Who plays a part on German TV?” is a social and media political question, that concerns and affects both men and women – and in many cases is a burning issue for both.

————————————–

It’s Friday today, and also the birthday of Klaus Nomi, who unfortunately died much too early. Nomi was a brilliant singer and an impressive personality and never complied with conventions and role clicés. Today he would have been 70. With a recording of his song Simple Man from 1982 I wish all readers of SchspIN a happy weekend.

Yes I’m a simple man
Come now and take my hand
Now Together, Never to be lonely
Yes I’m a simple man
I do the best I can
Now Together, just remember only
It’s so simple

14. January 2014
by SchspIN
Comments Off on 25 Spielfilme in der Lola-Vorauswahl – 25 Films preselected for the German Film Awards

25 Spielfilme in der Lola-Vorauswahl – 25 Films preselected for the German Film Awards

English Version follows German.

Vor ein paar Tagen wurde von der Deutschen Filmakademie die Vorauswahl für die diesjährigen Deutschen Filmpreise bekannt gegeben, eine Jury hatte aus allen angemeldeten deutschen Kinofilmen des letzten Jahres eine Reihe programmfüllender Spielfilme, Kinderfilme und Dokumentarfilme ausgewählt, dazu wurde noch eine kleine Anzahl von Einzelleistungen nachbenannt (d.h. diese Filme sind nicht für eine Nominierung in allen Kategorien angemeldet).
Aus dieser Vorauswahl wird nun per grob gewerkeweiser Abstimmung unter den Mitgliedern der Filmakademie die Nominiertenliste ermittelt, und daraus dann die Preisträger/innen gewählt.

Ich habe für heute die 25 vorausgewählten programmfüllenden Spielfilme im 6-Gewerke-Check ausgewertet, d.h. jeweils für Regie, Drehbuch, Produzent/in, Kamera, Ton und Schnitt den prozentualen Frauenanteil ausgerechnet. Nein, in 7 Gewerken, Szenenbild kam noch dazu. In der Datenbank von crew united sind gut die Hälfte aller in den aufgenommenen Filmproduktionen tätigen Szenenbildleute Frauen (53,4 %). Im Berufsverband beträgt der Frauenanteil 32,5 %. Der Berufsverband hieß seit der Gründung 1983 SFK Verband der Szenenbildner, Filmarchitekten und Kostümbildner, er wurde im August 2013 umbenannt in VSK Verband der Berufsgruppen Szenenbild und Kostümbild – eine gute Entscheidung!

Die Filme: Gewerke ohne Frauen / ohne Männer?

Abbildung 1 zeigt Klassen, von links nach rechts [Weiterlesen – Read On]

2. January 2014
by SchspIN
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For Heaven’s Sake, Look at the Ratings!

UM HIMMELS WILLEN (For Heaven’s Sake, a series on ARD, one of Germany’s public-service broadcasters) was Germany’s most successful TV series in 2013, just like in the year before. On average 6.6 Mio. people watched each episode, in 2012 it were 7.1 Mio. Most successful series is defined by the extrapolated supposedly highest mean TV audience numbers.
Actually my plan was to analyse the complete series of 156 episodes in 12 seasons, behind the camera (6-sections-check) and in front of it (main and supporting casts), but unfortunately the data that is publically available is rather incomplete. So instead let’s ponder on TV ratings instead. They exist, but they should not be taken too seriously.

What do we need these ratings for? Do they help us choose a film to watch, or do they help the broadcasters to assemble their programmes? Does a show get better or worse through (the knowledge of) ratings? Does the future of a series depend on it? Or are they a measure for the popularity of a show, the people in it or the makers? Are they for checking the effects of PR campaings? Are they fundamental for selling air time for advertising? Are they needed to distribution the television licence fees? Are good ratings a matter of prestige for broadcasting companies and heads of programming? And are they correct numbers?
How do ratings influence future viewings? What if I find out how many people allegedly watched a programme that I also watched and liked? Will I like it even better and feel reassured in my TV taste? What if only few people watched ,my’ programme, and the reviews were bad? If it turns out that only people younger than 14 and older than 60 watched it? Will that make me feel bad so that I would pretend not to have liked it or to have watched something else? („only saw it very briefly while switching channels“)
Or the other way around: Will I continue watching a series that I disliked but that got good ratings and suddenly start to become a fan? Do I need „Likes“ for my orientation? Are ratings all about money?

Sign on a café in Berlin: Like us on the facebook – and get a free Espresso

Some years back I told a friend about the Argentinian feature film EL ABRAZO PARTIDO (director: Daniel Burman) that I had seen in the competition of the Berlin International Film Festival. My friend wanted to look it up in some film rating index, which – according to him – contained „all important and good films“, but not El Abrazo Partido. So it could not really be a good film. Indeed? Sometimes the TV Ratings business reminds me of this encounter. If something gets low ratings it can’t be really good (mind you, ever so often when a film on a public channel gets good ratings people say „well, but it was only people over 60 that watched it“ – so they would be a less good audience?)

Having said that I’d like to stress my doubts that the figures published as TV ratings correlate to the actual number of people watching. They are but estimates, the GfK’s extrapolations of the rate measurement results from 5,000 households with a total of 10,500 persons, of the use of television, or rather the switching-on of TV sets.

Are the 5.000 households an adaqute sample representating the approximately 78 mio. people older than 3 in Germany?
Are the transmitted results correct, i.e. does rate measurement box switched on correspond with having watched programme?
Do the conclusions drawn from the extrapolated data make sense?
Are there interest groups and lobby organizations for television audiences, just like they exist for public transport and German rail? (granted, that is a different topic)

In digital times TV shows are not only watched on television. However, the GfK disregards those among the 10.500 people that watch a programme on the internet, or record it for later use, or watch it in the media centers of the broadcasters, or watch it at a friend’s house or in a pub. How about those that switch on the telly and the measurement box but are not watching the screen but are on the phone in another room, do the washing-up, play on the x-box, doze off on the settee? Are they rateable audience? And what about those that cheat a little bit about their TV watching?

Now, regarding the evaluation and interpretation of TV ratings let’s look at an example from December. On the 27th Sat1 showed a gala show for the birthday of actor / director Til Schweiger (he turned 50 on Dec. 19), the following day the ratings were published. This is what the internet magazine DWDL wrote (and it’s in German but I will translate it): Little Interest in the Birthday of Til Schweiger. The audience certainly did not wait for this. “Happy Birthday – Til Schweiger” was only watched by 1,49 million, which only adds up to grotty 5,0 percent. It did not really look brighter in the target audience. Only 820.000 wanted to celebrate the actor’s birthday with Sat!. The grotty share in market of 7,6 percent for those between 14 and 49 certainly won’t call for a celebration today in Unterföhring“ (that’s the small place in the south of Germany where the station Sat1 is located).
Why so much malice? Does the author draw a personal pleasure from a show getting a smaller audience than anticipated and hoped for? But let’s have a look at the news on media news site MEEDIA of the same day, here we find the following information, on the page with the heading „Birthday show for Til Schweiger is a total Flop“: Among other smaller stations SUPER RTL was convincing. “Asterix“ allures more than a million viewers to Super RTL. (…) 1.13 mio. people watched „Asterix and the Big Fight“ that’s a good 3.6 %. 3.6 % are good and 5 % are grotty – 1.49 mio. is a Flop whereas 1.13 mio. are convincing?

To better understand numbers like these here are some more: Cologne has 1.024 mio. inhabitants, at the 2013 German general election the Pirate Party were elected by nearly 960,000 people, that’s grotty 2.2 percent of the cast votes. The second most successful German feature film of 2012 – CLOUD ATLAS – sold 1.14 mio. tickets. 1.49 mio. spectators will have visited the Hamburger Schauspielhaus (Germany’s largest theatre) after 1,240 sold-out performances. So a TV audience of 1.49 mio. is not really dazzling but certainly not negligible.

TV are among other things also influenced by the TV slot, by chance and by bad luck. A film or documentary, a series or report, that are scheduled for a sunday night at 8.15 p.m. are starting badly because that is the time of the TATORT (Germany’s most popular crime series), so a great part of the audience would probably watch that no matter what. Then the image of a channel will probably have an effect. And Chance. My film is on at 8.15 p.m. on a week day, things look good, no unusual competition, but then suddenly something happens politically so there are newsflashes and special coverage on TV. Or maybe a Royal Baby is born, or a new pope elected, or there is a football match being covered. In 2013 the television programme with the highest rationgs was the men’s football champions league final, more than 21 mio. watched that on ZDF. It was only determined 4 weeks before in the semi-finals that there would be two German teams in the final, at which point most TV channels would have set their programmes, which then obviously had less chances of a large audience.
On a side note: Thomas Bellut (director general of the ZDF) justified the 50 mio. € that the ZDF paid for one year’s champions league broadcasting (which were broadcast on free TV station Sat1 up to then) especially with wanting to attract new and younger audiences for the HEUTE JOURNAL (a news magazine) that would be broadcast during half-time. Apparently judging from the ratings this plan has come off partially, but maybe it’s just that viewers with the rate measuring boxes left them on during the heute journal but went to the bathroom, or to the kitchen to get more beer, or they turned down the sound and analyzed the first half of the match.
And then there’s also bad luck. The bad luck of hearing of a great show, film or episode too late, after it had already been on, being told by friends who had seen and recommended it. But this sort of bad luck is not so bad any more as in the old day because we have the internet. And of course there are repeats.

Striving for the highest ratings and fighting other channels and the effects this has on programme and people is shown in a vivid, amusing and bitter way in the third season of the Danish TV series BORGEN: the new, hip and young head of programming Alexander Hjort subordinates everything to the pursuit of high TV rates and popularity and forces Torben Friis, head of news, to turn the news broadcasts into some sort of spectacle. But that is a different topic.

Of course as an actress I am very happy when a film or series that I am is well received and watched by masses. Just as I am happy when some series’ episode that I enjoy as part of the audience is popular and will continue to be produced and broadcast. But for that I – and hopefully the broadcasters – don’t need the ratings. I am also quite sympathetic with great shows that are broadcast on less popular channels and therefore don’t get large audiences (according to the ratings). This goes for quite a number of series being shown on arte (BORGEN, THE SLAP, TOP OF THE LAKE) which all deserve ratings like TATORT, men’s football, FARMER WANTS A WIFE or I’M A CELEBRITY.

But let’s look at another example that shows the absurdity of the ratings quite well: DER TATORTREINIGER (the crime scene cleanup man). This is a funny series produced in the north of Germany by NDR. There were 4 episodes originally that were only seen by 50.000 viewers on average or even less. Of course it has to be taken into account that the episodes were first broadcast between December 23rd and 27th 2011, each time between 3.30 and 5.30 a.m. (!), and that they were hardly advertised. The same goes for the second round of screenings a few days later, episode 1 and 2 were shown on Wednesday Jan. 4 and thursday Jan. 5 2012 around 10.30 p.m., this was announced in a press release two days earlier (The Tatortreiniger with Bjarne Mädel). Episodes 3 and 4 weren’t shown again. Bad TV slots and poor PR. Despite all this a few people watched and loved it, and the Tatortreiniger was nominated for the Grimme Preis (important German TV award) and won in various categories in 2012 and 2013. Now the makers of the show were happy and more episodes were produced, – and broadcast! And today we can read (in German) on the website of the NDR „The Tatortreiniger enthuses both the audience and the critics“ – and this in spite of the poor treatment by the NDR itself, and despite poor ratings.

Maybe the fixation on ratings is a remains from the early days of television when perhaps the means for measuring audience were copied from theatre and cinema. Maybe it is some sort of sign of nostalgic longing for times when there were only two TV channles and the audience and ist choices were managable. Or it has to do with higher further better, with larger and larger viewer numbers – instead of just developing a diverse choice for everybody.
Klaus Pierwoß who was the successful director of Bremen Theater for many years once commented on an audience survey. Yes, so these are the preferences of the audience. If we abide by them we may only show operettas. But the theatre has other duties.
By the way, just recently the ZDF terminated two successful high-rated series, the LANDARZT (country doctor) and the FORSTHAUS FALKENAU (forester’s house Falkenau). They are to be replaced by crime series. But that is a different topic.

What is really strange is that basically we all doubt the rating measurements, don’t we? Yet at the same time we believe in them, they are the state of affairs, the golden calf of the industry. Reaching back to „For Heaven’s Sake“: „No, I am not superstitious, but I heard that superstitions also work if you don’t believe in them.“
TV ratings exist, but they should not be taken too seriously.

29. December 2013
by SchspIN
1 Comment

Review 2013: Talk on the Radio

There is a weekly radio show on the German station Deutschlandradio Kultur, every saturday from 9 to 11 a.m. called Radiofeuilleton – Im Gespräch (Conversations). This is a show with one or two expert guests in the studio and listeners calling in on changing topics. Once before on Sept. 8 I blogged on this show (Listening to the Radio), yesterday they broadcast the last show of 2013, so let’s look back on the whole year with 52 shows today.
The variety of topics with regularly switching male and female presenters is big, however the guest list is a bit more onesided: more than half the shows only had male guests (27 of 52), an all-female panel occured five times (approx. 10 %). 20 shows, this is less than 40 %, had male and female experts.

Of course there is no need for a gender parity on each show, but overall, looking on a year’s programmes, such an imbalance does seem quite remarkable (but not unique of course, considering the guest lists of talk shows on German TV, and possibly also in other countries), and not a positive signal. What might be the reasons? Are there really so many topics that only male experts can talk about? Is it just customary to mainly invite men, or is it thoughtlessness? Were female experts that had been invited simply reluctant to go on air? This summer I wrote to the people behind the show, I was promised an answer, but up to now I have not received it. Unfortunately.
Well, instead of speculating on possible reasons let’s just have a look at the topics of the shows with men-only– and women-only-panels. I have marked the shows with only one guest instead of two in red, not knowing whether only one person was invited or the second person had declined.

Topics of shows without men:

What changes should be due in family policy?
Allergies in Spring
Town vs. Country Life
A slap to the soul: how to deal with insults
Abolishing prostitution – in favour or against?

Topics of shows without women:

Broadcast Receiving Licence and Digitalization – what is the Future of Public Broadcasting?
Living in a sustainable Manner – a Self-Deception?
Believing in Globules – how effective is Homeopathy?
What will the Cinema’s Future be like?
Water – drink it or speculate with it
The Euro €€
Birds and Bird Watching
Planned Obsolence in Production
From Kant to Cosmos – The Universe
Running, how to do it
Big Data – Chances and Risks
Data Security in Times of Prism and Tempora
Problems with Maths
Work until you drop
Human Guinea Pigs? Pharmaceutical tests
Musical Encouragement in Germany
National Election 2013
How ill is our medical scheme?
The Internet – a safe Place for All?
Asylum Politics and Refugees
Rent Explosions, Gentrification, Vacancy: Living in Germany
Remembrance and Remembering – but how?
Inheriting and Bequeathing without Trouble
The Christmas Season – how much Consumption can we afford?
The Power of Music
Changing Horses in a Professional Career, how do you do it?
All you ever wanted to know about old Sayings and Proverbs

Let’s hope looking back on 2014 will be quite different.

5. December 2013
by SchspIN
2 Comments

Well done, Sister Equity!

Equity UK’s Jean Rogers on Equal Representation

A few weeks ago the French La Charte pour l’Égalité entre les Femmes et les Hommes dans le Secteur du Cinéma was signed (Vive la Nouvelle Révolution du Cinéma!), the effects of which will hopefully become apparent in the near future. A few years ago British actors’ union Equity launched a Viewers’ Petition for Equal Representation of Women in Film and Television Drama with the aim to abolish the 2:1 dominance of male over female roles on British television, and an even worse ratio for films, and also to fight the almost non-existent portrayal of the older woman. How did this petition come about and has it begun showing effects already? I am very happy to have been able to interview Equity’s Jean Rogers on these and many more questions.

Jean Rogers is a British actress, born just outside London. Her work in front of the camera includes THE PEACEMAKER, THE LAZARUS CHILD, more than 10 years as Dolly Skilbeck in ITV’s EMMERDALE and presenting a BBC TV Schools’ programme for 7 year olds called WATCH. She has appeared regularly on British stages e.g. the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry, theYork Theatre Royal, two seasons with the Chichester Festival Theatre and was a founder member of Sir Laurence Olivier’s National Theatre. In radio she clocked up over a thousand broadcasts for the BBC playing boys and girls, POETRY CORNER and LISTEN WITH MOTHER. Her recent work was in SNOW WHITE playing the wicked queen in a Christmas pantomime.
Jean has been an elected Councillor of the actors’ and performers’ union Equity for nearly twenty years and since 2004 Vice President. [Weiterlesen – Read On]