SUNY Oswego student Madison Gordon and faculty advisor Juliet Giglio aim to create a safe space for female students who hope to work in the entertainment industry through the Women In Entertainment Club. 

Giglio -- a creative writing faculty member who is a professional screenwriter and novelist, and teaches various screenwriting courses at Oswego -- said she was looking back on her career in the entertainment industry and the little support that she had, which sparked an idea to create this group.

“I had been thinking about it, and in all my years in the business, I never had a great mentor, and I never had a female mentor,” said Giglio. “It bothers me… and I started thinking, wouldn’t it be cool if there was a club that was just for women and it could be part social and part mentoring and in part informational.”

Giglio brought up the idea to her "Intermediate Screenwriting" class (CRW 301), which happened to have a close-knit group of female students enrolled. One of those students was Gordon, who immediately took charge of getting the club up and running.

“I may have sparked the idea but Madison was driving the ship,” said Giglio.

Gordon, a junior who double majors in broadcasting and in cinema and screen studies, said she had been looking for another way to get involved on campus that applied to her career interests. The Women In Entertainment Club was an opportunity that came at the perfect time.

“It’s no secret that [the industry] is mostly male-driven… and one of the reasons I was so interested is because it’s the same for sports,” said Gordon, who is also a student-athlete on the women’s volleyball team. “Women don’t gain as much traction as they could and it’s nice to know that we can create a group of women who can support each other in the entertainment industry. Being able to have this for women [so they] can leave college and have this support system is really important.”

The club also inspired her to continue the work of her great aunt Mitzi Shore, who founded The Comedy Store, a world-famous comedy club in Los Angeles.

“I don’t want to say I owe it to her, but it makes sense to me that I have this great idol in my life and I have the opportunity to continue her legacy in a way and expand it outside of comedy and in the entertainment industry itself,” said Gordon.

After Gordon demonstrated her passion for the project and leadership skills to Giglio, she decided it would only make sense for Gordon to be president. The rest of the executive board is made up of other female students from the same "Intermediate Screenwriting" class that started it all. As Gordon says, it is “a club made by women, for women.”

Finalizing the club

Last summer, Gordon and Giglio created a plan to pitch the club in the fall 2023 semester. They presented their idea to the Student Engagement and Leadership Office, who helped them finalize it to get approval from the Student Association Senate.

Giglio wanted to make sure the club was not only a social space for students but also something that could help them develop professionally after college and connect them to the industry.

“I’m a member of New York Women in Film… of the TV Academy… of the Writers Guild, and there are all these different women I meet throughout those organizations,” said Giglio. “I just ask them ‘Hey could you talk to this undergrad student who’s looking at the business?’ and they say 'sure.' Because women, we want to help each other.”

Gordon noticed something similar as she also connected with women in the industry and invited them to Oswego to speak, saying none of them expected anything in return.

“The women who have offered to come and speak don’t want money because they also feel this cause is very important and they’re doing this out of their love for the idea,” said Gordon.

Some of these women include a producer from the hit Netflix series “Bridgerton” and an Oswego alum, Kirby Socker, who worked on “The Late Late Show With James Corden.” 

“This is where Maddy has been amazing because originally I thought I was going to have to book all of the people, and Maddy [got] us our first guests,” said Giglio.

And the guests didn’t stop with film and television. Gordon had an idea to expand the club to serve a wider audience.

“Maddy also saw that there's a good portion of our members who are in marketing because this club isn’t just for filmmakers or people who want to work in TV… it’s for any aspect of working in the entertainment business,” said Giglio. “So Madison has no fear… she found this amazing woman [in marketing] and reached out… I think there is very much a need for this.”

Giglio is proud to see the leadership and commitment the student executive board has shown.

“They’ve been a strong e-board. They put a lot of thought and intention into everything and I guide them,” said Giglio.

Overwhelming student support

During the Spring 2024 Student Involvement Fair, Gordon, Giglio and the rest of the board’s hard work paid off as the student body showed overwhelming interest in the club.

“We ran out of space on our sign-up sheet. We had 68 women sign up and it was awesome,” Gordon said of the involvement fair experience. “That’s why [I think] this club is important, because as professor Giglio said, she has been in the entertainment industry and has seen it, but for young women who are my age we haven’t been out there yet. And it’s nice to know going in that you have a support system who you can always rely on.”

Their first meeting was also successful, with over 30 students in attendance. In the beginning, they focused on the social aspect of the club, creating bonds with one another in a lighthearted way.

“For the initial meeting, we did something called speed chatting, which is kind of like speed dating. So that was my idea but then they really made the idea come alive,” said Giglio.

Gordon and the rest of the executive board came up with creative icebreaker questions, such as “favorite streaming service… celebrity crush, a show that didn’t need a second season, if you were on an island what three movies would you bring, if you were on a show what character would you play,” said Gordon.

As the semester continues, the meetings are focused more on professional development and building career connections, including providing students with mentors from the industry.

“There will always be a guest, and then once we have an idea of the areas each person is thinking about going into in the business, in the meeting after spring break we’ll be [assigning] them their mentors,” said Giglio. “A person they’re expected to contact who’s waiting to talk to them.”

Giglio believes that, although mentorship experience is important, the bonds the women in the club make with each other are equally as important.

“The mentorships will help these women, but the best bonds they’re going to make is with each other. Especially if everyone is working in different aspects of the business,” said Giglio. “Someone could be working on a TV show and reach out to another person from the club and be like ‘They’re looking for cinematographers, [or] they’re looking for editors. Why don’t you come on over?’ And so that’s the space I want to create for people.”

Empowering female students

Giglio, who has decades of experience in the entertainment industry, has seen firsthand the harm caused by underrepresentation, especially in film.

“I think it’s better than it was, but at the top levels if you look at all the top executives in the studios and networks, I think they’re like 75 percent male, and so what happens is … their idea of what’s going to be a good movie is different than a woman’s idea of that,” said Giglio.

And it not only impacts women already in the industry. Giglio also observes a lack of female students enrolled in entertainment-related classes, or involved in similar extracurriculars.

“There’s Film Club, and [a female student] is running it which is great, but it still kind of skews male-driven, and if you look at a lot of the production classes they skew male-driven,” said Giglio. “In my screenwriting classes, as we get into the upper levels I start to have more men.”

Even after the recent box office hit “Barbie,” Giglio still fears male film executives are overlooking what women want to see on the big screen.

“I think they were all stunned by how well 'Barbie' did and their knee-jerk reaction was ‘Well, let’s go make some more toy movies,’ and that’s not what 'Barbie' is at all,” said Giglio. “We all know it’s a feminist movie that speaks to the problems with having a patriarchy… so as long as there is not gender equality in the people at the top, I think we’re going to continue to struggle.”

Especially after the 2024 Oscar nominations were revealed, Giglio and Gordon were disheartened by some choices made by the academy.

“So ['Barbie'] was nominated for Best Picture, nominated for Best Screenplay, nominated for Best Supporting Actor, and you’re telling me it did that without a good director?... I think they really slighted [Greta Gerwig],” Giglio said.

“I feel bad for [Gerwig and Margot Robbie, who plays Barbie]. I’m upset. The movie did so well and it kind of just proves the point of the movie to a certain extent,” said Gordon.

In the ceremony's 95-year history, only eight women have been nominated for Best Director at the Oscars, and only three have won. The eighth woman, Justine Triet, was nominated this year for "Anatomy of a Fall."

However, Giglio feels more optimistic about women's place in television, as she’s noticing some change after recent female-led series that have had success.

“In terms of the number of feature film writers who are women and who produce movies, it’s between 20 and 30 percent, so it’s low. But then you look at television and there are a lot more female writers,” explained Giglio. “You look at a show like 'Abbott Elementary' created by Quinta [Brunson], an amazing show [that] wins at the Emmys. It’s doing great.”

Giglio and Gordon are hopeful that Oswego’s Women in Entertainment Club is part of the solution to this ongoing problem.

“I think that’s where this club comes into play because I’m too old now. It’s the next generation and I see all these women, and I want to help create a spot where… [it’s] a safe space,” said Giglio. “A place where you can complain about the movies that were made, you can talk about what you really want to see.”

Gordon hopes that female students learn how they can make a difference together.

“It’s a club for women who are interested in making a change in the industry as well and who understand what our goal is, and who also understand that being a woman in entertainment also means being able to help other women,” said Gordon. “It’s a team effort to make a change and it’s not just going to be up to me or my e-board. I feel like it’s up to everyone to be able to make that change.”

In addition to Gordon, the executive board of Oswego's Women In Entertainment Club include Angel Hall (vice president), Arlene Mercedes de la Cruz (secretary), Halle Collins (public relations), Isabel Mulhern (treasurer), Neveah Scott (CTS) and Juliet Giglio (faculty advisor).

Women in Entertainment club meets on Monday nights at 6 p.m., six times throughout the semester. For more information, students can follow and/or message the Women In Entertainment club on Instagram at @womeninentertainment.