Jill Soloway
Jill Soloway
Jill Soloway is an American comedian, playwright, feminist, Emmy-winning television writer, and award-winning director who won the Best Director award at the Sundance Film Festival for directing and writing the film Afternoon Delight. She is also known for her work on Six Feet Under and for creating, writing, executive producing, and directing the Amazon original series Transparent...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionScreenwriter
Date of Birth26 September 1965
CityChicago, IL
CountryUnited States of America
I'd always have a sort of automatic urge to share what I'm doing with other people.
Because so many rooms are run by men they're just used to women being the "that" - to be adored and dreamed about.
I think people don't really actually talk about what their real issue is, which is that white, cis men - not straight men, but cis men - have had their hands on the narrative ever since filmmaking has begun.
There are a lot of men with feminine leadership styles and there are a lot of women with masculine leadership styles.
I want women to be the subject, not the object.
I still see storytelling for men by men that is always reinforcing the male gaze.
Along the way, female filmmakers will have the feeling that they're not good enough. And that's really just a result of being "otherized" from the moment they're born. Keep an eye out for all those insecurities, and even expect them. Borrow white male privilege and just move through the world as if it was created for you. You have to kind of talk yourself into an imaginary space where the world is on your side and expects you to speak and wants you to speak. You have to create that space for yourself over and over again. Every hour sometimes.
When I write, I lose time. I'm happy in a way that I have a hard time finding in real life. The intimacy between my brain and my fingers and my computer... Yet knowing that that intimacy will find an audience... It's very satisfying. It's like having the safety of being alone with the ego reward of being known.
As you grow and change, you become possibly someone else. You want to go back to your family of origin and say, ‘Do you still love me? Would you still love me if I become X or Y or Z? When will you stop loving me? Is this unconditional love and if not what are the conditions?’
The only way things will change will be when we're all wilder, louder, riskier, sillier, unexpectedly overflowing with surprise.
Some of you guys are going to boo, but I'm going to say it anyway. I don't like dogs.
I like to create a community where people want to come and have a good time and do their best work.
I was the kind of Jew who'd be in a bar, somebody would say it's Yom Kippur, and I'd go, 'Really?'