The comedy boss of Britain's ITV channel says she has banned existing and new comedy series featuring all-male writing teams or ones that have just "a token woman", with no comedies with an all-male writing team that will be commissioned by the British commercial TV channel anymore.
"I won't commission anything with an all-male writing team," Saskia Schuster, ITV's head of comedy, said at the Diverse Festival on Monday where she was part of a panel discussion with the title "Why employing more women writers in comedy matters", according to reports by the BBC and others.
Saskia Schuster said she took the action after an audit of ITV comedies showed "a significant lack" of women in scripted commissions. For every 5 scripts sent to her by men, she would receive only one from a woman.
Saskia Schuster said that "too often the writing room is not sensitively run. It can be aggressive and slightly bullying".
She has now changed ITV's contracts so any shows that are commissioned or recommissioned "must aim towards 50:50 gender representation".
