WeForShe
A women's advocacy group that finds practical ways to bring about a gender-balanced landscape in television.
WeForShe is proud to introduce the scripts and writers of the 2017 WriteHer List.
Despite awareness of gender disparity being at an all time high, the stats for women remain stagnant. The 2015-2016 Boxed In Report revealed, “women comprise 26% of creators, directors, writers, producers, executive producers, editors, and directors of photography working on broadcast network, cable, and streaming programs – no change from 2012-2013.”
WeForShe's goal is to improve the numbers of female storytellers employed in the industry. By sourcing industry executives for their favorite scripts, we provide the town with a curated list of the best available female-driven scripts. In just a couple years, the WriteHer List has become a go-to resource for industry-vetted, quality female-driven scripts available for television. We’ve seen writers showcased on our list get staffed, have pilots optioned, find new representation and set up deals at networks.
All levels of writers are represented. The range of stories and voices represented on the list reflect the rich perspectives and experiences that make up our human experiences. Some are funny, some are dark; all are worth your time.
Congratulations to the incredible writers on the list and thank you to those wonderful individuals who participated in the list. Below is the WriteHer List's 17 for 2017.
The 2017 WriteHer List
ADOPTIVE BEHAVIOR
BY Cindy Fang
A Chinese woman adopted by a white family and raised in the Midwest, has her world turned upside down when her biological mother arrives from China to reconnect.
Contact: Rina Brannen at UTA
Genre: Half Hour
I KNOW WHO YOU REALLY ARE, BITCH
By Tess Rafferty
After a feminist ad exec discovers she is inadvertently having an office affair with her college ex-bestfriend's husband, she allows her trainwreck ex-bestie and her two daughters to move in to make it up to them.
Contact: Robin Budd at Viewfinder Management
Genre: Half Hour
BAKED
By Nancy Duff
A recent widow and a society matron, brought together by a secret from their past, realize that in order to survive their golden years, they’ll need to work together and bring a failing marijuana bakery to new heights.
Contact: nanduff@gmail.com
Genre: One Hour
IN REAL LIFE
By Karen DiConcetto
JORDAN, 16, lost her best friend, DAVID, nine months ago in a mass shooting. The series explores how she and her single mom, PAULA, 36, deal with their new reality and struggle to move forward with their day-to-day lives.
Contact: Doug Fronk, Valarie Phillips and Debbee Klein at Paradigm Talent Agency
Genre: One Hour
*Jennifer Lynch is attached to direct and Olive Bridge Entertainment is attached to produce.
BLACKTHORN
By Bianca Sams
BLACKTHORN follows Davion Littlefield, an investigative journalist and tv host, after the suspicious death of someone she loves. Hell bent on finding the truth at any cost, Davion thrusts herself into a dangerous rabbit hole of military secrets and conspiracies.
Contact: Manal Hammad at Abrams Artists and Chelsea Benson at Echo Lake Management
Genre: One Hour
LIMERICK
By Lorelei Ignas
A Park Avenue OB-GYN whose alcoholism nearly destroyed her career must struggle to stay sober, employed, and sane in the red suburbs of Pennsylvania after accepting a controversial job at one of the few remaining women's health clinics in the country that performs abortions after 22 weeks.
Contact: Garrett Greer at Rain Management Group, Amanda Burnett, Lily Safran, Matt Baldovsky at UTA
Genre: One Hour
BORDERLINE
By Susan Beavers
In El Salvador, Carmen is a respected physician. In Los Angeles, she's just another underpaid Latina competing for babysitting and cleaning jobs. In Los Angeles, Jamie was a well-to-do mother of two. When Keith left, she was just another divorcee' with court-ordered child support and a non-compliant ex. Carmen is pissed off but needs work. Jamie is broke but needs help. If you overlook culture, ego, personality, and resentment from the kids... it's a perfect fit.
Contact: Jeff Greenberg at Gersh
Genre: Half Hour
MOLLY
By Melissa Rundle
When her mother mysteriously disappears, an honor roll student must forge a new path - one that takes her from prep school princess to drug queen pin.
Contact: Amotz Zakai at Echo Lake Entertainment
Genre: One Hour YA
In development at Lifetime
CLEO
By Julia Fontana
CLEO is about Cleopatra before Cleopatra. It imagines the Egyptian queen’s teenage years, meeting the most powerful woman who ever lived at the time when she was least powerful. This show is about what doesn't appear in history books: Cleopatra's origin story.
Contact: Elana Barry at Circle of Confusion & Mickey Berman, Amanda Burnett at UTA
Genre: One Hour
MULTIPLES
By Alyssa Hill
A family drama set in an alternative future where the U.S. has established a one child policy, and twins, not exempt from the rule, are split up via a special adoption process.
Contact: Taryn Ariel at ICM, Hannah Ozer at Kaplan Perone
Genre: One Hour
DJINN
By Tania Lotia
When Ayesha, a young Muslim girl in rural Nevada, is pulled into an FBI investigation of her community, she turns to a demon for help.
Contact: Angela Dallas at CAA, Gerardo Machado at Laurelmont Management
Genre: One Hour
PRETTY GIRL
By Lorna Osunsanmi
A 15 year old obese teenager uses her sarcasm and dry wit to survive the woes of high school, but that won’t help her stay alive.
Contact: Wendi Niad at Niad Management
Genre: One Hour
ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE
BY Shaina Steinberg
Set in the 12th century, amidst endless war and conflict, Eleanor of Aquitaine is destined to become the only woman to sit on the thrones of both France and England. Married against her will, Eleanor is a rebel who will shape her own future and change history forever.
Contact: Sean Barclay and David Rubin at Gersh
Genre: One Hour
SILO
By Jacqueline Gould
A viral video, revealing the suicide of a fourteen year old girl, instigates an Interpol investigation. SILO is an international mystery connecting people from all over the world that evokes the examination of the pervasive evils propagated by social media and the internet.
Contact: Carmen Bonnici at Pacific Artists Management, Chelsea Benson at Echo Lake Entertainment
Genre: One Hour
FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS
By Diane Ruggiero
Ex-Olympian Rosalie tends to her injured housebound aunt and finds new purpose in life fighting crime in the neighborhood and driving the local cops crazy in the process.
Contact: Lily Safran at UTA
Genre: OneHour
*UTV attached
STATE OF EMERGENCY
By Annie Brunner
After a devastating earthquake hits Venezuela, Dr. Ellen Bennett and her team of experts put their lives on hold to help save others, but Ellen’s haunted memories threaten to destroy not only the amazing work they’re doing, but her entire world.
Contact: Zadoc Angell at Echo Lake Entertainment
Genre: One Hour
GHOSTED
By Melinda Hill
In the aftermath of her boyfriend’s mysterious disappearance, comedian Melinda Hill struggles to get her life back on track with the help of a gratitude coach and a pansexual millennial YouTube star.
Contact: Matt Snow at Paradigm
Genre: Half Hour
Although there was not room for them on the list's 17 for 2017, the following unique voices and stories are presented for additional consideration.
ANGELICA
By Eliza Lee
The story of four women in a small Mid-West American town that will soon be left with the only abortion clinic in the state.
Contact: Jonathan Hung of Hung Entertainment
One Hour: One Hour
Co-created with Jen McGowan
MISS/UNDERSTOOD
By Jessica Kardos
When straight-laced Kat Campbell goes off the deep end after the death of her best friend, she lands herself in juvi where her fellow reprobates teach her that life isn't so black and white.
Contact: Ian Greenstein at Gersh
Genre: One Hour
THE LETTERS
By Dani Bailes
After discovering her mother's extensive correspondence with a notorious serial killer, Violet Bryce finds herself entangled in family secrets when a similar murder occurs in her own backyard.
Contact: Zadoc Angell at Echo Lake Entertainment
Genre: One Hour
PARISH
By Ashley Sims
When her girlfriend goes missing on the eve of her debutante ball, outsider Maya Bishop must unlock the generations-old secrets of her deceased parents and the dark voodoo underbelly of the town she hates to uncover what happened to the love of her life in this supernatural, multi-generational teen drama.
Contact: Jessica Jordan, Wirehouse Entertainment
Genre: One Hour
MEDIUM WELL
By Christina Brosman
Marjorie has spent the last decade as an assistant to a celebrity chef and a wife to her high school sweetheart. Now in her 30’s, she’s finally ready to admit that she wants a culinary career of her own...and a divorce.
Contact: Merideth Bajana and Laura Leonard at Grandview
Genre: Half Hour
*Where we were able to confirm additional rights holders, it was noted. Scripts are listed in alphabetical order.