Dinner With Dames #17, With Tammy Wood (Recap)

Dinner with Dames Case File

Who: Tammy Wood, Executive Producer of Twisted Sisters, Betrayed, and more, & Cinefemme board, fiscal sponsorees, and referrals – Stacy Jill Calvert, Ilse Fernandez, Michelle Kantor, Mariscela Mendez, Jenna Payne, and myself, Kate Rees Davies

What: Dinner 2.7 – a casual discussion on industry issues facing women & ways to excel in their careers over dinner & drinks. Special thanks to Roadmap Writers for sponsoring with some wine!

When: Wednesday August 15, 2018

Where: A house in Culver City

Why: To propel women to bigger and better career opportunities within studios and networks

When you get an email from dynamic, writer, producer and director Jenna Payne, inviting you to the renowned Dinner with Dames hosted by the fabulous ladies of Cinefemme, you black out that date in your diary as a must attend!

The guest of honor was unscripted executive producer Tammy Wood. Tammy is a veteran of the industry and her latest show –  Khloe Kardashian’s Twisted Sisters – will premiere in September. The true crime show will explore how and why siblings have broken the law and include interviews with immediate family members, friends, investigators and law enforcement to learn what triggered their path towards a life of crime.

Cinefemme’s fearless leader, executive director Michelle Kantor, hosted this wonderful, intimate evening of female filmmakers dining with Tammy at her home, so we could chat about all things entertainment and be inspired by Tammy’s generous spirit, as she shared information on her illustrious career and her tips for succeeding.

Tammy Wood, is talented, kind, and lovely. She got her start in the business in 1994 as an assistant production coordinator on the iconic Tim Burton movie Ed Wood, starring Johnny Depp and Sarah Jessica Parker. Since then she has helmed unscripted shows and documentaries for major networks including the Discovery Channel, History Channel, and Animal Planet. Her shows have won awards and been nominated for the prestigious Emmy Award.

As a creative producer myself with projects in the early stages of development, getting an invite to this wonderful dinner with Tammy Wood was an honor. As an independent filmmaker, it is rare to get into the room with people who work for networks and I found Tammy to be so generous and inspiring with her stories of the shows that she has worked on. It was like a masterclass in producing.

Tammy took time out of her very busy schedule and kindly agreed to join Cinefemme for their monthly Dinner with Dames mentorship series where eight women dine with a Hollywood power player, and Tammy even talked about her own pursuits of documentary work outside of unscripted television. It was refreshing to see that even when you’ve “made it” you continue to have passion projects and new goals.

My name is Kate Rees Davies, and I have directed features, shorts, music videos commercials and web series. Directing found me back in 2008 when I auditioned as an actress for a commercial. The producer asked if I’d be interested in directing it, so I rose to the challenge. I hired a woman director of photography, who really helped with my vision and was amazing to work with. Her name was Zoe White and at the time she was a student. I knew she had talent and would go far in the industry and I was right. Ten years later she just finished shooting the entire second season of A Handmaid’s Tale, and it looks phenomenal!

Being a woman in Hollywood, it is a rare opportunity to get the chance to break bread with industry power players, and the dinner offered the opportunity to hear Tammy’s advice and ask her candid questions, which she answered so graciously.

The evening started with some chit chat over wine in Michelle’s warm and welcoming kitchen and once all the guests had arrived we moved to the dinner table and tucked in to the sumptuous feast. We all went around the table and introduced ourselves and discussed works in progress or productions we had just wrapped.

When Cinefemme’s co-leader of The LA Directors Collective, Stacy Jill Calvert spoke of her Family Secrets mixed media installation project, it was fascinating. She said it inspired her to develop a documentary called Jake, Janie and Me. Director of photography Mariscela Mendez and producer Ilse Fernandez talked about their own careers in unscripted. Ilse and Tammy had worked at Viacom around the same time and knew some of the same people, reminding everyone what a small world Hollywood can be!

Tammy shared stories of how she has worked with some of the same crew members on some of her shows for years, and when her long-time DP mentioned he would like to direct, she felt confident in giving him a chance. He didn’t disappoint her. Working on such a tight knit show you become like family. You really get to know your crew. She also talked about how sometimes hard decisions have to be made in an industry where the overall budgets for shows seem to be shrinking but expectations seem to be climbing.

She divulged some information on her latest project which signed Khloe Kardashian as one of the executive producers and how social media is changing the industry. She mused that the show might not have been ordered to series without such a huge social media following.

I am a former employee of The Weinstein Company, so we touched on sexual harassment and safety on set for women. Women are finally speaking out, and there is hope that sets will be a safer workplace for us where we will get the same opportunities as our male colleagues. There are definitely changes in the workplace, but one area that hasn’t seen much change is pay equity. Tammy regaled us with some of her battles to get the same pay as her male equals and the challenges she can face when going onto a new job.

Tammy was a perfect dinner guest, she listened to everyone and answered questions with ease. The time flew by and I think we could have sat there all night, but Tammy’s schedule is very busy and the night sadly came to an end.

Tammy’s generosity didn’t end there. Before the dinner, we were encouraged by Jenna to submit a quick elevator pitch for Tammy to digest. I have a documentary about Women in Rock and Roll that I am developing, and her advice was amazing. I left with much food for thought and will definitely take the advice to help move my project forward. I hope we get to meet Tammy again either on or off the set as she is a delight to be around and sounds to me like the perfect boss. I have no doubt her new project will be a huge success. We all left inspired and ready to take on the world.

Video editing credit: Laura Riboli

About Cinefemme:

Cinefemme is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by women filmmakers, for women filmmakers in 2002.  Cinefemme provides fiscal sponsorship to women filmmakers and artists, as well as peer-to-peer networking, mentorship, and strategy for project fundraising.  By advancing women’s careers in film and the arts, we empower women’s voices to create gender parity in the arts and equal representation in the media.

About Kate Rees Davies:

Kate Rees Davies is an award winning Director, Producer, and Actress originally from the UK. She is a huge advocate for seeing and creating change in the entertainment industry, including more stories by women and diverse communities that are highly skilled and poorly represented. She has been a Los Angelena for nearly 10 years after coming here to study directing at UCLA where she received the Laurel Hummel academic scholarship. She has had six films at Cannes as a director, and her latest feature, Altered Perception, starring Jon Huertas (This is Us, Castle) recently had a US theatrical release. Kate serves on the board of three organizations that focus on underrepresented communities in the entertainment industry and is a proud member of Cinefemme.