If last year’s Women in Hollywood came in
the midst of a reckoning, then what happens
now, in the aftermath of the seismic shift that
was the #MeToo movement? This year’s hon-
orees are defined by a question mark: Where
do we go from here?
For the 2019 Women in Hollywood, the
answer comes with plotting a path unknown.
“No point in going down that same Old Town
Road,” says ELLE Icon Dolly Parton. “We
got other roads to travel.” Yes, Parton was
referencing her decision to pass on a collab-
oration with Lil Nas X, but her directive holds
true for all. New roads are leading to projects
that blow the lid off once-taboo topics, like
Bombshell, a film that follows the Fox News
scandal involving Roger Ailes. “The story it’s
trying to tell is broader than Fox News. It’s
much more about sexual harassment and
the women,” says Nicole Kidman, who plays
Gretchen Carlson. Mindy Kaling’s Late Night
explores the power imbalance of a writers’
room, where a woman of color sits at the table
among a sea of white men. “That experience
[of a diversity hire] is so universal for so many
women who are trying to do something that
they were not trained to do, and who have
ambition, and who don’t see people who look
like them succeeding,” Kaling says.
And even more stories of barrier-breaking
badassery await on the following pages: Natalie
Portman reflects on the modern definition of
feminism (“When you show a woman being a
complete human being, with the bad as well as
the good, that’s feminist”); Scarlett Johansson
explores the sense of being trapped in Mar-
riage Story; Zendaya admits her daily battle
with anxiety; Gwyneth Paltrow reveals her
“ambition has been unleashed” as a company
founder; and the three-woman dream team
of Queen & Slim have an important dialogue
about the added weight they carry with their
art. We can all acknowledge that the founda-
tion was set—now it’s time to raise the roof. ▪IN HOLLYWOOD
W
O
MEN
NOVEMBER 2019NICOLE KIDMAN, ZENDAYA, SCARLETT JOHANSSON,
JODIE TURNER-SMITH, MELINA MATSOUKAS,
LENA WAITHE, NATALIE PORTMAN, MINDY KALING,
GWYNETH PALTROW, AND DOLLY PARTON
PORTFOLIO PHOTOGRAPHED BY ZOEY GROSSMAN.UPLOADED BY "What's News" vk.com/wsnws TELEGRAM: t.me/whatsnws