Gender in UK Film Crews

The gender representation of UK film crews (2009-13), broken down by department, creative role and genre.

The gender representation of UK film crews (2009-13), broken down by department, creative role and genre.

The report on gender within UK film crews, covering 2009 to 2013, reveals that women made up 26.2% of the crew members on British films during this period. This percentage varied slightly based on budget, with films costing over £500,000 employing 27.5% women, while those under £500,000 employed 25.3%. Departments with the lowest female representation included Transportation (7.7%) and Special Effects (8.9%), while departments like Make-up, Casting, and Costume had majority female workforces, with over 60% female employees.

Key creative roles within the UK film industry continue to be dominated by men, with only 6.4% of composers and 14% of directors being women. Casting and Costume departments were the exceptions, with the majority of these roles held by women. When comparing UK films to the highest-grossing films in the US, British films employed more women across almost all key roles, with the exception of editors, where US films had slightly more female representation.

Despite these findings, the percentage of women working in UK film crews has remained largely unchanged over the past five years, indicating slow progress in gender representation. There remains a significant disparity in key creative positions, and even though British films tend to employ more women than their Hollywood counterparts, the underrepresentation of women in critical roles persists.