{"id":192254,"date":"2019-07-28T07:49:43","date_gmt":"2019-07-28T07:49:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=192254"},"modified":"2019-07-31T05:40:22","modified_gmt":"2019-07-31T05:40:22","slug":"hollywood-and-the-matter-of-fact-abortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=192254","title":{"rendered":"Hollywood and the Matter-of-Fact Abortion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cara Buckley \u2013 New York Times July 18, 2019<\/h1>\n
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Click to enlarge<\/p><\/div>\n

At a recent conference outside Los Angeles, a national women\u2019s rights lawyer stood before a select group of Hollywood heavyweights to issue a demand and a plea. With a woman\u2019s right to choose in jeopardy, the lawyer, Fatima Goss Graves, said, more abortions should be portrayed in narratives onscreen. \u201cThe stories on abortion do not match our reality,\u201d she said.<\/span><\/p>\n

The attendees \u2014 agents, celebrities and producers at an invitation-only diversity summit held by the talent agency CAA \u2014 took Goss Graves\u2019s message in stride. As it turns out, the industry has already begun shedding one of its longest-held taboos. In recent years, abortions are taking place or being talked about on television at record levels, often on shows created or written by women.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re definitely seeing more of the matter-of-fact \u2018I am pregnant, I don\u2019t want to be, I\u2019m going to have an abortion,\u2019\u201d said Gretchen Sisson, a sociologist at University of California, San Francisco whose research includes tracking how abortion<\/a> is characterized onscreen. \u201cAnd it\u2019s gone way up in 2019.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So far, halfway through the year, nearly two dozen characters in streaming shows, movies and television have had or talked about having abortions, many unapologetically, a development that would have been unthinkable a decade ago \u2014 and one that has angered some abortion foes.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the pilot for \u201cShrill,\u201d Abby, the single millennial played by Aidy Bryant, professes to feel \u201cpowerful\u201d after having terminated her unplanned pregnancy. On one of the final episodes of \u201cVeep\u201d Anna Chlumsky\u2019s pregnant political aide lays into abortion opponents protesting outside a clinic, hollering, \u201cI even prayed a little, and here I am.\u201d On \u201cShe\u2019s Gotta Have It,\u201d the ambitious Clorinda, played by Margot Bingham, defends her decision to the baby\u2019s father, saying anything she does with her body is her choice. Nine of the 11 people credited with writing those episodes were women.<\/span><\/p>\n

These portrayals, like others on the series \u201cGlow\u201d and \u201cDear White People,\u201d are a marked departure from how abortion was depicted, or not, in story lines from the \u201980s through the early aughts. Characters facing unplanned pregnancies then usually agonized about what to do or, if the show was set in the past, weighed back-alley procedures. Babies were often carried to term or lost to miscarriage. Terminations led to psychological or physical problems or death. It\u2019s not that today\u2019s characters come to their decisions without deliberation, but that they are decisive and forthright, like Becky, the music executive played by Gabourey Sidibe in \u201cEmpire.\u201d \u201cMy situation is not getting any easier,\u201d she says at one point, \u201cbut I have decided to terminate.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Sisson focuses on television and streaming series that air and run in America, along with movies, though some small indie films, she said, might not hit her radar. For 1987, a time of far fewer shows, she counted three depictions of abortion in TV and film: One on \u201cSt. Elsewhere,\u201d another on \u201cDynasty\u201d that led to infertility, and the botched procedure in \u201cDirty Dancing\u201d that left the dance instructor played by Cynthia Rhodes gravely hurt.<\/span><\/p>\n

But for 2018, Sisson found 18 instances of characters having, disclosing, considering or mentioning abortions. A little more than halfway through 2019, that figure was already at 21, and Sisson expects this year to match or outpace her tally from 2017, when the figure hit a high of 34.<\/span><\/p>\n

That more characters are having abortions with fewer regrets jibes with research in the United States. Women who have had abortions overwhelmingly say they made the right decision<\/strong><\/span><\/a>, according to a study released in 2015. In another example of art beginning to imitate life, more onscreen characters of color are opting for the procedure. Sisson pointed to the effect of Olivia Pope, played by Kerry Washington, having an abortion a few years ago on \u201cScandal.\u201d (Shonda Rhimes told The Hollywood Reporter in 2017 that she was pressured by ABC to cut the scene but held firm; ABC would not comment.) \u201cShonda Rhimes opened it up so it can be on network prime,\u201d Sisson said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Still, the recent surge in abortion story lines tends to be clustered on cable and streaming shows, and with the explosion of new series, it is unclear how much the percentage of depictions has changed as a whole.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn terms of narrative broadcast prime time, over four years, it\u2019s been pretty thin,\u201d said Kate Langrall Folb, director of H<\/strong><\/span><\/a>ollywood, Health & Society<\/strong><\/span>,<\/a> an initiative at the University of Southern California promoting accurate representation of health issues.<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition, Sisson said that the use of Plan B contraception is not widely portrayed, and that adverse outcomes are still depicted on shows that are set before Roe v. Wade. There are also scant shows that focus on abortion providers, though a movie is in the works starring Michelle Williams <\/a><\/strong><\/span>as an underground abortionist before Roe vs. Wade.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lara Shapiro, a writer whose credits include \u201cThe Americans\u201d (she is also an acquaintance of this reporter), said producers repeatedly passed on a television pilot she wrote about a fictional \u201960s-era Roman Catholic doctor who reluctantly performs an abortion; the script itself opened the door to other jobs. \u201cPeople like to read something that\u2019s provocative, but when it comes to putting themselves on the line, they have advertisers and politics and subscribers to answer to,\u201d Shapiro said.<\/span><\/p>\n

That might change. Sisson found that the number of portrayals on television ticked up as more states and politicians sought to limit women\u2019s access to abortion and birth control.<\/span><\/p>\n

For some creators and writers, the connection with current politics is explicit. Lindy West<\/strong><\/span>,<\/a> a creator of \u201cShrill\u201d (she is also a contributing Op-Ed writer to The New York Times) has said that normalizing abortion was of foremost importance; she also started the hashtag #ShoutYourAbortion.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yet Rachel Axler, a co-executive producer on \u201cVeep,\u201d said she and the other writers had been prompted to write in an abortion not because of the news cycle, but because it made most sense for Chlumsky\u2019s character. \u201cFor this character, this was absolutely the right thing to do,\u201d Axler said.<\/span><\/p>\n

A 2018 episode of \u201cClaws\u201d similarly turned the tables on abortion opponents while also delving into competing perspectives. After Virginia, the nail technician played by Karrueche Tran, gets pregnant, characters weighed in via a Brady Bunch-style<\/strong><\/span><\/a> split screen. In the end, Virginia is accompanied to a clinic by her loving boyfriend. On the way out, the boyfriend tells gathered protesters, \u201cWe\u2019re getting married, everybody!\u201d eliciting cheers. One abortion protester cries, \u201cGod is good; he heard our prayers!\u201d But Virginia snaps back, \u201cWe still D-and-C\u2019ed that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Janine Sherman Barrois, the \u201cClaws\u201d showrunner, said the writers wanted to show Virginia making the decision and getting on with her day. \u201cMaybe it\u2019s part of the zeitgeist, but I think it came naturally out of a room of writers who\u2019ve grown up seeing how we\u2019ve progressed,\u201d Barrois said.<\/span><\/p>\n

West, Axler and Barrois all said they received no pushback from the networks and studios producing their shows. Hollywood\u2019s apparent normalization of abortion has aggravated but not surprised abortion foes, among them Cary Solomon and Chuck Konzelman, who wrote and directed the 2019 feature \u201cUnplanned,\u201d based on the memoir of a clinical director at Planned Parenthood who became an anti-abortion activist.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHollywood\u2019s run by the left,\u201d said Solomon, \u201cYou won\u2019t see pro-life stories on TV.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Solomon and Konzelman said they did not bother approaching Hollywood financiers or studios to make \u201cUnplanned,<\/strong><\/span><\/a>\u201d<\/strong> <\/span>which they produced in secrecy. They said that TV networks refused to run ads for the film, which was initially listed as \u201cpropaganda\u201d on Google.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cUnplanned\u201d has since earned more than $18 million<\/a> <\/strong><\/span>in the United States, and is enjoying brisk ticket sales in Canada despite meeting resistance<\/a><\/strong><\/span> there. \u201cA vacuum has been created, and those people that believe other than what the left believes are outraged, and they feel like they\u2019re being silenced,\u201d Solomon said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Another filmmaker, Nick Loeb, who directed the forthcoming \u201cRoe v. Wade,\u201d echoed the notion that Hollywood was neglecting swaths of anti-abortion Americans at its economic peril. Loeb, who is also known for his legal fight with his former partner Sofia Vergara over frozen embryos, said distributors have already made offers, sight unseen, for his film, which stars Jon Voight, Stacey Dash, and Loeb as the anti-abortion activist Bernard Nathanson.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNobody\u2019s speaking for us, Hollywood doesn\u2019t speak for us,\u201d Loeb said of those who oppose abortion, \u201cBut when people make movies for us, they\u2019re loved and they\u2019re adored.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hollywood portrays abortion as an everyday event. Filmmakers say they are simply reflecting modern life. Critics say they are trying to make abortion seem routine<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-192254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-The_Media"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=192254"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192254\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":192257,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192254\/revisions\/192257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=192254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=192254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=192254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}