Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are taking steps to make their film production company more inclusive.
Fanshen Cox DiGiovanni, the head of strategic outreach at Pearl Street Films, which has helped produce recent Damon/Affleck movies like “Jason Bourne” and “Live By Night,” announced on Monday that the company will adopt an inclusion rider for all future projects.
The pledge arrives a week after Frances McDormand implored powerful Hollywood types in her Best Actress Oscar’s speech to use their sway to ensure racial and gender diversity on sets. An inclusion rider is a stipulation actors can demand in their contracts to require the powers that be make sure real life demographics are reflected in front of and behind the camera.
“Black Panther” star Michael B. Jordan was among the first after McDormand’s plea to reveal he would use the rider for all films under his Outlier Society production company.
″@michaelb4jordan Thank you for always supporting broader representation in the industry,” Cox DiGiovanni tweeted. “On behalf of Pearl Street Films, Matt Damon, @benaffleck, Jennifer Todd, Drew Vinton & I will be adopting the #InclusionRider for all of our projects moving forward.” Todd and Vinton are other executives at the company.
.@michaelb4jordan Thank you for always supporting broader representation in the industry. On behalf of Pearl Street Films, Matt Damon, @BenAffleck, Jennifer Todd, Drew Vinton & I will be adopting the #InclusionRider for all of our projects moving forward. https://t.co/ODit24D2Rb
The Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, the foremost think tank tackling diversity issues in Hollywood and that includes Cox DiGiovanni as a board member, congratulated Pearl Street Films on the announcement.
Affleck and Damon have been relatively quiet in recent conversations regarding diversity and women’s rights in the entertainment industry after they both found themselves at the center of their own separate controversies.
Affleck has since apologized for “acting inappropriately” after actress Hilarie Burton said he sexually harassed her during a 2003 TRL interview. He’s remained silent, however, about accusations that he groped makeup artist Annamarie Tendler at a Golden Globes party in 2014.
After multiple interviews gone wrong, Damon finally admitted that he “should get in the back seat and close my mouth for a while.”
In the coming years, Pearl Street Films is set to produce big-budget projects like Affleck’s long-rumored standalone Batman flick, as well as a remake of the courtroom drama “Witness for the Prosecution.”
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