21st March, Mumbai: In the past five years, there has been a revolution in the representation of women in stories and on screen. More women in leadership roles, investments in female-centric narratives, and encouragement of writers to present stories from a female perspective have all been the face of change. Amazon Prime Video has succeeded in driving many of these improvements, whether it is through the films Jalsa or Sherni, or the television shows Four More Shots, Hush Hush, or Made in Heaven. Aparna Purohit, CEO of APV India Originals, exclusively discussed the impact of empowering female storytellers on the industry in an interview.
According to Aparna, the only images of women she could recall seeing on television while she was growing up wers these advertisements for cooking equipment, detergents, washing powder, and makeup featured only women cooking, cleaning, getting ready for men, taking care of the kids, etc. “In essence, there was no example to follow. Future is one such concept. Hence, I consider the visuals, substance, and movies of the digital age that you watch on TV to be of utmost importance. It is crucial to be represented.” Aprarna stated.
APV has been working hard to ensure improved representation, and Aparna emphasised this by saying, “In terms of what we can do, what we are doing, I believe the last year has been absolutely remarkable. Knowing how crucial it is to support the entire creative economy, Prime Video partnered on two projects that are of utmost importance. No matter if it’s just Prime Video or one of our other rivals you know, it’s critical to support the complete fraternity.”
“We launched a project called Maitri, which is really significant:, she continued. “It’s a project that encourages female interaction, dialogue, and collaboration while also providing a secure environment where women may openly express their goals, knowledge, and experiences, in order to spare the generation that will follow us from having to suffer all the difficulties we do.”
The necessity of having women in positions of authority was emphasised by Aparna, who also noted that it was “very intriguing to remark that there aren’t enough women in positions of influence. “Women will not be able to move the needle on change unless they hold influential positions. In order to prevent anyone from telling us where other female cinematographers are, we have proactively built a database of women writers, women technicians, editors, producers, and production designers. We can quickly offer them recommendations and suggestions thanks to this list.”
She also mentioned that she has made it mandatory for women writers to participate in all closed-door discussions. “We’ve virtually enacted it as a law. Anybody coming into our office to propose a show now knows that unless there are women in the writers’ room, their project won’t be approved. Even though it has taken some time, the project’s failure is now widely acknowledged in the field, thus there must be adequate women representation. In order to prevent our own prejudices from showing up in the content we are producing, we also make sure that there is a tale that features characters from the LGBTQ+ community.”
Aparna Purohit, CEO of APV India Originals, reveals what she has done to make workplace women-inclusive!
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