QUICK TAKES - May 12, 2009

San Diego State University’s Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film, which for years has been monitoring Hollywood’s employment figures in prominent jobs such as directing, writing and producing, today is releasing a first-time study of lower-profile movie positions.

The conclusion: Women were “dramatically underrepresented,” according to Martha Lauzen, executive director of the center.

Looking at credits for the top 250 films of 2008 in domestic gross, the center found that women were 44% of production supervisors, 25% of production managers, 20% of production designers, 5% of sound designers, 5% of supervising sound editors, 1% of key grips and 1% of gaffers.

Because this was the first time it had compiled such statistics, the center could not offer figures for how the employment picture compared with other years.

-- Lee Margulies