Callie Khouri
Callie Khouri
Carolyn Ann "Callie" Khouriis a Lebanese American film and television screenwriter, producer, feminist, and director. In 1992 she won the Academy Award for Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen for the film Thelma & Louise, which was controversial upon its release because of its progressive representation of gender politics, but which subsequently became a classic...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionScreenwriter
Date of Birth27 November 1957
CitySan Antonio, TX
CountryUnited States of America
When people know I wrote 'Thelma and Louise,' they don't want to mess with me.
For me, the movies I like are all independent. And getting an independent feature made, it's like you get down to the selling organs part, and it just loses some of its luster.
I don't see the country audience looking forward to an out male singer. There are rumors about people but no one ever confirms because there is a tremendous amount of money at stake.
Kelly Clarkson is the most adorable person on the planet. She is just so nice.
One of the reasons I wanted to do a show about Nashville in Nashville was because when I lived here, the hardest thing to go out and hear was country music. Country was taking place inside the studio and it was an export.
Women who just don't like each other because the other one is a woman and "women don't like each other" myth - that's not interesting to me at all. How do you compete in the market place, how you stay relevant after many years of being in the public eye - all of that. To me, that's interesting and that's real.
Political stories in general are tough. They just don't appeal to as wide an audience.
I'm almost numb to misogyny at this point. It's just everywhere.
There's a lot of head-shaking and forehead-slapping when you start to realize just how deep-seated misogyny can be, how systemic and entrenched certain modes of thinking are that are still very much alive.
Every so often when I'm writing, a character might actually be a distinct person in my head - often not an actor or a face, literally a person who just seems to exist in my imagination. Then the challenge is finding somebody who is close enough to that to make me feel like I've ended up where I wanted to be.
Whenever I've seen shows or films set here, they just don't feel like the real Nashville to me.
I didn't think of 'Thelma and Louise' as a feminist movie.
I wrote 'Thelma & Louise' in 1988, and we shot it in 1990. Everyone kept saying, 'This is so groundbreaking... this is going to change the landscape,' but I don't see that result at all. When we saw some female studio executives, we were hopeful that more women would be hired as directors, but that didn't really seem to happen.
I think of feminism as more of a political ideology.