New campaign sees widespread support on 2015 red carpet
At the 2014 Screen Actors Guild Awards, Cate Blanchette called attention to an increasing prevalent social issue, on the red carpet and off. As she was interviewed by E!’s Giuliana Rancic, Blanchette noticed the camera slowly panning her body. Bending down to put her face back in focus, Blanchette said seven simple but powerful words.
“Do you do that to the guys?”
Launched by the Representation Project, the #AskHerMore campaign calls on reporters to bring more thought and quality to the questions asked of women in interviews.
The #askhermore campaign has been sweeping the red carpet at this year’s Hollywood awards ceremonies, most recently at the 87th Academy Awards.
“There’s nothing wrong with loving fashion and being interested in what they wear,” said Representation Project communications director Cristina Escobar in a statement. “But the problem is, that’s the only thing we talk about with women. Men are allowed to be their whole selves: they’re asked about their interests and passions […] It reinforces a message that women are valued for youth and appearance and men are valued for their accomplishments.”
Though the campaign began with the Representation Project, it recently caught on with several other media outlets, most notably Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls, a website founded by Meredith Walker and Amy Poehler to provide inspiration to young girls and women.
In a new video starring Heather Morris of Glee, Smart Girls blogger Dara Laine mocked traditional red carpet interviews. In several clips of Laine asking Morris “traditional” questions about “who” she’s wearing, what’s in her “clutch”, and how she likes her hair, Morris responds with mock seriousness to highlight the inanity.
“If we only ask women whether or not they’re hiding a baby bump,” Laine wrote in an article accompanying the video, “then how would we ever find out about Julianne Moore’s humanitarian work with the Save the Children organization? What about the production company Reese Witherspoon created because she wasn’t seeing enough great female characters for her and her peers to play?”
Witherspoon was notably vocal with her support of the campaign, posting to social media before the 87th Academy Awards, which took place Sunday, Feb. 22, and asking red carpet interviewers to ask more interesting and engaging questions of Hollywood’s female population.
“We’re more than just our dresses,” Witherspoon said on the red carpet. “We are so happy to be here and talk about the work that we’ve done.”
Witherspoon’s sentiments were shared by 2015 Best Supporting Actress winner Patricia Arquette, who addressed the issue in her interview with Ryan Seacrest when he asked about E!’s Mani Cam, absent from the red carpet this year.
“It’s pretty funny, there’s this silly mani-cam business going on and I was supposed to get a manicure this morning,” Arquette said. “But instead I was working on […] one of our projects with GiveLove.org, where we do ecological sanitation work in the neediest communities around the world.”
Arquette continued to draw attention to prevalent gender issues in the final words of her acceptance speech.
“To every woman who gave birth, to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else’s equal rights,” Arquette concluded. “It’s our time to have wage equality once and for all and equal rights for women.”
Arquette’s words met resounding applause, with Meryl Streep among her biggest supporters. Streep emphatically clapped and pointed to the Arquette on stage, all the while enthusiastically shouting, “Yes!”