Film journalist Helen O'Hara launches podcast to accompany critically-acclaimed book

Released on 7th September, “Women vs Hollywood” is a new podcast from the Stripped Media family where host Helen O’Hara explores the fall and rise of women in Hollywood, from the silent era to the present day and into the future.

Hollywood was born just over a century ago, at a time of huge forward motion for women’s rights. With no rules in place to stop them, there were women who forged ahead in many areas of filmmaking. Yet, Hollywood soon came to embody the same old sexist standards. Women found themselves fighting a system that fed on their talent, creativity and beauty but refused to pay them the same respect as their male contemporaries. The more recent revelations of #metoo and #timesup show the insidious belief system is still in place to keep women sidelined in filmmaking. Women comprise fewer than 20% of lead characters and around 10% of directors - in a good year - and figures for intersectional identities are even worse.

Women Vs Hollywood is a new podcast hosted by film journalist Helen O’Hara that discusses the challenges that women face in the film industry. With the help of a fascinating roster of filmmakers, actors and experts, Helen aims to delve into the real problems faced by women in film. Based on her critically-acclaimed non-fiction book Women Vs Hollywood: The Fall And Rise Of Women In Film (a Radio 4 Book Of The Week earlier this year) O’Hara and guests - including film critic Pamela Hutchinson, Director of Festivals for the British Film Institute Tricia Tuttle, film historian Professor Shelly Stamp, and the hosts of the “Best Pick” podcast Jessica Regan and Tom Salinksy - examine how far sexism in Hollywood goes - and how to change the picture.

With episodes focused on subjects including ‘The Pay Gap’, ‘Awards’, ‘#MeToo’ and much more, this 10-part series will illuminate the story of women in Hollywood.

About Helen O’Hara:

Helen O’Hara is Empire magazine’s Editor-at-Large, and co-host of the award-nominated “The Empire Film Podcast”, the official podcast of the world’s biggest and best movie magazine. She has a regular film review slot on BBC Radio Ulster’s “The Ticket” show, co-hosted Stripped Media’s “His Darker Materials” about the BBC’s His Dark Materials show, and has her own podcast on Christmas movies, “Bah Humbug”. She has written three books on the subject of film, including the critically acclaimed Women Vs Hollywood: The Fall And Rise Of Women In Film. As a freelance journalist, she has written extensively for GQ, The Telegraph, The Pool, Digital Spy and Time Out.

About Stripped Media:

Stripped Media was founded by the multi-award-winning production team Tom Whalley, Dave Corkery and Kobi Omenaka. They started working together on the podcast “The Wire: Stripped” and realised that there would be an interesting opportunity to apply the same formula to other areas of pop culture. They formed Stripped Media with the aim of producing and facilitating other podcasters to make their own shows. Stripped Media productions include “Flixwatcher”, “His Darker Materials”, “90 Minute or Less Film Fest”, “Song By Song” and “The Bakedown”. Find out more at stripped.media.