Boys club beware: Lisa Wilkinson’s gutsy move is part of a new wave of women getting what they want
LISA Wilkinson’s gutsy decision to leave Nine has kickstarted a new movement that will change the face of Australian television.
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DEPENDING on which meme you read on Google, it was either Harvard psychologist Timothy Leary or Hollywood siren Marilyn Monroe who once said: “women who seek equality to men lack ambition.”
After the last week in Australian television, the next time you read that quote on an Instagram post or quotebot, it could well be attributed to Lisa Wilkinson.
With an ace up her sleeve in the form of the most lucrative contract for any personality — man or woman — on Australian TV, the former Today show co-host played her Nine bosses for jokers, after they baulked at matching her pay with that of co-star Karl Stefanovic.
In a deal that made headlines around the world, the 47-year-old, one-time magazine editor emerged with a new salary package estimated at $2.3 million for appearances on The Project, its new Sunday series and other programs still to be announced; as well as contentious third party deals with digital masthead, The Huffington Post and other advertisers likely to follow her “every woman” brand from Nine to Ten.
For Australia’s third rating network, pushed to the brink of bankruptcy earlier this year, it was a bold move, positioning Ten on the front foot for a shot at a debt-free recovery in 2018.
Studio 10 presenter Ita Buttrose, a mentor to Wilkinson and media maven who built her career on playing men at their own game, said: “what [the Wilkinson deal] says is that Channel 10 is in for the long haul. People who thought perhaps this network was struggling should think again. This is a station that’s got plans and they will reveal what those are at the upfronts [each network’s annual program showcase] on November 9 ... but it clearly shows you Ten is alive and well.”
New CBS owners, lead by chairman and chief executive Les Moonves, would be delighted with their presenters’ flag-waving, ahead of the $70 billion US network’s takeover of Ten next month.
On a feminist note, Buttrose said Wilkinson’s move spoke volumes of broader changes in media, where women were “finding their voice again.”
Using the same technology that has changed the TV landscape — both in terms of content and how we consume it — female filmmakers, activists, actors and anyone with something to say are finding a way to amplify their ambitions to a global audience; once dictated to by largely male studio executives, who controlled the conversation, media corporations and their culture.
For Wilkinson, it was a line in the sand on pay parity.
For other women, it was about taking to social media and joining the ‘me too’ campaign, exposing the Harvey Weinsteins in their world.
For the TV industry, it was an unmistakeable memo: underestimate women at your peril.
THE (FEMALE) REVOLUTION WILL BE TELEVISED
The power of ‘she’ was captured en masse last week by the ‘me too’ hashtag, a viral social media movement triggered after the take-down of one of the entertainment industry titans, Harvey Weinstein, on sexual misconduct charges.
The movie producer, accused of abusing his power and trading sexual favours for work opportunities, was finally (after almost three decades of terrorising women) and suddenly shunned by Hollywood, when two of his most high-profile alleged victims, actors Rose McGowan and Ashley Judd, went on the record with their historical rape and harassment claims against him.
In the media storm of headlines and bad publicity which followed, Who’s The Boss and Charmed star Alyssa Milano urged more women to show how widespread harassment and sexual violence was by retweeting their own experiences, by telling their stories and linking them together with the #metoo hashtag.
In the first 24 hours, more than 12 million people on Facebook and 650,000 on Twitter added their testimonies, including Ellen DeGeneres, Lady Gaga, Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Lawrence.
It would produce a steady, painful but powerful stream of rape survivor stories, expose systemic and worldwide corporate abuse issues — breaking the terrible silence which has protected perpetrators.
Milano would tell US breakfast show, Good Morning America: “we are going to be vocal until this stops. Not one more. It stops here.”
It follows a year in TV which has made hits of female-driven dramas including Margaret Atwood’s A Handmaid’s Tale and Big Little Lies, an adaptation of a best-selling Australian novel, starring Nicole Kidman as a wealthy woman keeping secret the sexual violence in her seemingly perfect marriage.
BAD BOYS CLUB
With police investigating Weinstein in London, New York and Los Angeles, the ripple effect has already been felt by other badly-behaved members of the small screen’s “boys club.”
Within days of The New York Times and New Yorker magazine reports of Weinstein’s multiple misdeeds, Amazon Studios president, Roy Price was forced to resign after Isa Hackett, a producer on the streaming service’s popular drama, The Man In The High Castle, claimed the executive pressured her for sex and, among other grubby exchanges, made a lewd joke playing off the title of another Amazon comedy series, I Love Dick.
His boss Jeff Bezos, the tech mogul with the deepest pockets of any media organisation in the world, moved swiftly to cut Price loose, protective of its global reputation and big-budget plans beyond the niche content it has launched the platform on.
Local TV executives had their warning shot late last year when Seven boss Tim Worner was publicly humiliated by the damaging revelations of his former mistress Amber Harrison.
Still regarded as lucky to have kept his job over the tawdry, but consensual affair, Worner was a wake-up call for the industry to rid itself of similar dirty laundry.
NEW WAVE
If newsreader Tracey Spicer has her way, Aussie offenders face being named and shamed after she put out a call for those who had their own Weinstein-style allegations to confess all to her.
What followed, she claims was an “absolute tsunami of sexual assault, intimidation and abuse.”
“There are 30 to 40 alleged offenders so far and I would say the vast majority of them would have more than one case against them.”
The author of The Good Girl Stripped Bare, who has worked for Nine, Ten and Sky, has fashioned herself as a champion for women in the local media who have lost out in the gender wars.
Spicer first hit the headlines when she sued Ten for discrimination and unfair dismissal after being sidelined, then sacked, soon after returning from maternity leave.
She has apparently teamed with a female police officer on her investigations, which could prove a powder keg for even more salacious headlines and more heads to roll.
While any determination by women to reclaim their power or an equal place with their male peers is more often than not met with a predictable cry of reverse sexism by threatened men, Spicer said her campaign was about justice — for some, long overdue.
“We are not going at this like a bull at a gate, we are being very careful and we are bringing everyone into the tent — police, lawyers, unions, managers and obviously women who have been affected because we want to do this properly.”
AMBITION IS NOT A DIRTY WORD
In the meantime, Ten executives — led by the industry’s only female chief programming officer Beverly McGarvey — were preparing to expand on the role Wilkinson will play when she finally begins her much-touted gig next year.
Ten’s programming plans will be unveiled at the network’s November 9 upfronts, where Wilkinson is expected to be the superstar attraction.
Buttrose, for one, will welcome her — seeing Nine’s misstep in not retaining her as the stroke of luck Ten may need.
“Maybe [Nine] underestimated how strongly she felt [about equal pay]. Maybe they didn’t understand that she felt so strongly and that she would leave. Perhaps they really didn’t listen to what she was saying. That’s been their mistake. Here at Ten, we’re delighted she’s coming over and looking forward to seeing her soon. It’s great,” said Buttrose.
After all, she urges, there should be more ambitious women in the world.
“Generally speaking, women don’t push themselves forward. I think they need to emulate men in that regard. Men have no problem in saying, ‘I want a piece of that and I think I really do a great job.’ Women really need to push themselves forward more ... so many women are very circumspect about their talents. They think if they work hard they’ll be noticed and rewarded, but it isn’t like that,” Buttrose explained. “You’ve got to say ‘hey, look, I’m here and I want that job, or I want to be recognised, or I want more money.’ Whatever your ambition is ... you have to let people know you have ambition.”