Laying out data, Netflix touts inclusivity record

Netflix on Friday released a study it commissioned from top academic researchers that shows the streaming giant is outpacing much of the film industry in the inclusivity of its original films and television series.

For years, academic studies have sought to capture inequalities in Hollywood and to hold studios accountable for making film and Tvthat doesn’t reflect American demographics. Those studies have relied on box-office or ratings data, often leaving out streaming platforms.

Netflix is trying a different route with more transparency and company control. The streamer commissioned the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative to analyze its 2018 and 2019 original, live-action films and series. It presented the results to the media Thursday. The results were, as Annenberg Inclusion Initiative founder and director Stacy L. Smith noted, far more positive than most Annenberg reports, which have typically found only slow, sporadic improvement in the most popular films.

Netflix achieved gender parity among lead characters in both film (48.4 percent of leads were female) and TV (54.5 percent) in 2018 and 2019.

The study covers 126 movies and 180 series. It does not include documentaries, animation, international productions or content hosted on Netflix that it did not itself produce.

Netflix films were more likely to have women directing (23.1 percent), writing (25.2 percent) or producing (29 percent) than the top-grossing movies of 2018 and 2019. The correlation isn’t a perfect one since Netflix releases both large and small budget films whereas the majority of top movies at the box office come from higher-priced productions.

“The point of this benchmark is to constantly be held accountable,” said Scott Stuber, vice president of global film.