Cameron Diaz Says Hollywood Feels Different After #MeToo: “The Industry Is So Different”
Cameron Diaz is feeling the change in Hollywood, and she’s here for it. After a decade away from the big screen, the actress has returned to film and noticed something different — something she never experienced before.
“The industry is so different,” Cameron said on Netflix’s Skip Intro podcast.
“I mean, I definitely have to say that the #MeToo movement changed everything. It’s palpable. You walk onto the set and it is different,” she added.
She remembers a time when being on set as a woman came with its own set of challenges.”It wasn’t just the higher-ups, you know what I mean? There was always just like that one guy, you know, on set that you were always going, ‘Oh God, here he comes again,’” she admitted.
For years, she and other women in the industry had to deal with inappropriate behavior, often laughing it off just to get through the day. “Some people you have to be forceful with and put up the boundaries. Others, you can’t give them the time of day. But it has changed. It’s not the same,” she shared.
But things are different now. As Cameron stated: “I’ve never in my entire career had HR come in prior to a movie and talk about what is appropriate and inappropriate behavior and a hotline, which Netflix has, to call anonymously to report any issues that you might be feeling. I was like, ‘Wow, that is amazing.’”
For Cameron, who rose to fame in 1994’s The Mask, the shift is something she never thought she’d see. While filming her upcoming movie, Back in Action, she felt something she’d never truly felt before — safety.
“The level of security and safety you feel as a woman now on set is — I had never felt that before this film… #MeToo happened several years after I stopped making movies,” she said.
Looking back, the Annie actress reflected on how women in Hollywood had to “walk a tightrope” for so long. “And tightropes are dangerous. But when you get good at walking the tightrope and you can, like, manage it all, there is some sort of empowerment that you feel. But it’s a false sense of empowerment, because what you’re really doing is just staving off the inevitable, which is at any moment something could crush you that’s bigger than you,” she shared.
