Kevin Feige, the president of Marvel Studios, seems to be leaning in and taking note of Hollywood’s need to diversify and include women behind the camera, but does that mean we’ll see a woman behind the camera anytime soon? Rumors are that we will.
Female movie directors are scarce in Hollywood for many reasons. When we begin to examine the culture of superhero franchises, the odds of women being involved as writers, characters or any other major players get grim.
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But rumors are beginning to circulate through Hollywood that Selma director Ava DuVernay may be directing Chadwick Boseman in Black Panther for Marvel. Here’s what Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige had to say in a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
When THR asked Feige if he feels pressure to find a black director for Black Panther or a woman for the female superhero movie Captain Marvel, he addressed the issue head-on.
“It’s an issue across the industry, for sure. And the issue is, we need to find the best director for any given movie. And that’s really where we always start. If diversity is part of that, it’s great. It’s important. You will start to see things across the industry as a whole change as more filmmakers come up through the ranks and become part of making movies like this,” said Feige.
Though we agree with his answer, we’re happy THR pressed him further, asking if he would have liked to have had a woman director on one of these movies by now.
“I think it will happen sooner rather than later, without giving too much away. But you look back sometimes, and it’s just the nature of this industry, or the nature of the culture. But there’s a big shift happening. What’s exciting about Marvel [is to] go back and look at the source material. It’s been diverse in a cutting-edge way going back to the ’60s, and I think we’ve represented that effortlessly and accurately in the movies we’ve made up to this point, but certainly with Black Panther and Captain Marvel doing it in a much more overt and purposeful way.”
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Of course, Ava DuVernay (Selma) comes to mind as a woman who may be able to step into the Marvel universe and add her point of view as a female African-American director. THR asked if she was under consideration for Black Panther.
“We’ve met with her for sure. We’ve met with a number of people for a number of movies. She has been one of them.”
OK, so we’re still waiting for confirmation that Ava DuVernay has been added to their roster, but in the meantime, we’re excited Marvel is finally engaging in conversation and acknowledging that the studio needs to diversify.
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