December 13, 2023

Setting the Scene: Celebrating YOU – and Gender, Work, Family, and Care On Screen

Setting the Scene is a newsletter for media creators from the Entertainment-Focused Narrative and Culture Change Practice at New America's Better Life Lab. Issue 3.

Hello again from Vicki Shabo at New America's Better Life Lab! 

In this third issue of our Setting the Scene newsletter, we're reflecting on 2023, our first full year of working closely with the entertainment industry to amplify stories about gender, work, family, and care – and the systems that can help or harm progress. I’m so grateful for your insights, support, and encouragement. 

We’ve learned so much from the creatives, executives, social impact leaders, industry researchers, and partners in content integration we've connected with, and are thrilled to be sharing our expertise and feedback to support important, entertaining creative work.

We’re mindful that this has been an unprecedented year in the entertainment industry. We know that the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes centered on the very issues at the core of our work: Fair pay, working conditions, representation and inclusion of underrepresented voices, and the ability to thrive at work and at home. Rollbacks to DEI within media companies also implicate diverse and inclusive representation on screen and behind the scenes. We hope 2024 brings stability, inclusion, fairness, and justice.

Thanks to your interest and support, in 2023 we had the opportunity to:

• Conduct eight briefings and workshops sponsored by Guilds, partners and supporters; 

• Collaborate with fantastic partners on three new resource guides to help creatives dig into abortion and pregnancy decisions in the context of work-family concerns, caregiving, the climate crisis, work, workers and care – as well as continue to disseminate our original resource guide, Rescripting gender, work, family and care; 

• Publish five opinion pieces in national outlets that highlight how gender, work, family and care show up on screen, including our first piece in the Hollywood Reporter; and

• Engage in more than 30 conversations with media leaders to share our expertise and offer insights.

For writers, showrunners and execs: Whether you’re heads-down in a new season of an established show or just starting a new project, please reach out if we can help – and remember that our resources are here for you. 

We can support you at any stage of the creative process! Just this week, I had the privilege of spending an hour with a Women in Film fellow, discussing how her characters’ work, family and care issues – and upending gender stereotypes – fit into her script. It was a highlight of my week, and I can’t wait to talk more to her and to other creatives who’ve recently reached out! 

I hope this season is filled with peace in your lives and in the world, and we look forward to working with you in 2024.

With appreciation,

Vicki Shabo

shabo@newamerica.org

Vicki Shabo (she/her)

Senior Fellow: Gender Equity, Paid Leave & Care Policy and Strategy

Founder, Entertainment-Focused Narrative and Culture Change Practice 

Better Life Lab @ New America

We love to see it! We applaud:

• Partners who uplifted our new resource guide, Re-Scripting Abortion: Re-Scripting Depictions of Abortion on Screen! Check out a short video from friends at Hollywood Health & Society here and the Representation Project’s newsletter here.

• Romper for publishing our op-ed with Abortion Onscreen about work-family context in abortion and pregnancy stories, with beautiful artwork elevating P-Valley, Station 19 and Grey’s Anatomy for their contextual storytelling.

• Television shows that affirm the desire of women to both work and be parents. We recently highlighted Netflix’s Virgin River on Instagram here, and we LOVED dialogue in Lessons in Chemistry on Apple+ that called out the bootstraps myth: We can't ask people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps because not all people have bootstraps to pull.

• Chloe Domont’s thriller film, Fair Play, which gave us the chance to write an essay for Women’s Media Center about toxic “bro” work culture as the film’s real villain.

We'll be back in January with more news you can use! Happy holidays and a sweet new year!

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About New America

New America is dedicated to renewing the promise of America by continuing the quest to realize our nation's highest ideals. New America's home office is located on the traditional land of the Nacotchtank and Piscataway Peoples.

About the Better Life Lab

The Better Life Lab works in solidarity with the movement for work-family justice to elevate the value of care, advance intersectional gender equity, and transform policy, practice and culture so people and families can thrive. We provide original research and reporting that challenges existing narratives around work and family. As connectors and conveners, we translate that, the work of academics and partners, and the stories of working families into accessible, solutions-focused stories, practical tools and policy and workplace interventions. We creatively amplify them to the widest possible audiences for the greatest impact.