On 8 March, International Women’s Day, a collective of Indian women ad filmmakers launched ‘She Directs Ads’, an industry-first initiative dedicated to amplifying and championing the voices of women directors in advertising. The SDA platform is set to celebrate talent, forge connections, and create pathways, all while fostering a strong, supportive community for women in the industry, and paving the way for a more inclusive future.
 
In a conversation with Manifest on the sidelines of the launch, ad film directors Kopal Naithani, who’s also the founder of the collective, and founder, Superfly Films; Akanksha Seda, director, Good Morning Films; Surya Balakrishnan, founder-director, Footloose films; Sonal Batra, and Tarannum Pasricha shared their thoughts behind the collective’s formation.

They also revealed the insight behind the SDA logo and deliberated on gender stereotypes in advertising - particularly in genres like car and bike commercials, while spelling out the collective’s short-term and long-term goals.

With a growing membership of 60, the community aims to empower women directors in the industry by creating visibility.

Speaking about what inspired the formation of an Indian women’s collective for ad filmmakers, Naithani says, “I have been in the industry for 25 years now, and at one point of time in my career, I thought I would become a director. At that time, I saw men becoming directors and women opting out to become producers.”

She continued, “Eventually I did become a director and have been directing ad films for 15-odd years, and it’s been a long and, now, fruitful journey, but it took way too long.”

Over the past couple of years, when Naithani randomly asked creatives about the number of women directors they knew, she was surprised to learn that only a handful were known. 

"Even I hadn't heard of many of the directors,” she confessed.

During her time at See It Be It, a career acceleration program at Cannes Lions last year, she got to witness the incredible support and energy that women brought to one another, which got her thinking if there could be such a community or collective that she could form here in India.

The collective held its first impromptu meeting in August last year. “The first thing that Kopal said when we all met was, ‘don't worry, we're not becoming a union. We're not going to be ‘naari mukti’,” recalls Pasricha.

“We're not going to live in victimhood, and this space is just so all of us can come together and be united. At first, we didn't meet with an agenda, per se. We started with forming a WhatsApp group,” she added.

It took the group a while to recognise that there was enough momentum for them to become a collective.

The process of choosing a name took several weeks. 

“There was total democracy, and we voted for the names that we liked from this whole long list of suggestions on the WhatsApp group. So, it took a while to just come up with the voice of who we are going to be. And of course, we constantly had to remind ourselves that we're not going to become ‘naari shakti’,” disclosed Pasricha.

The group’s logo (below) is designed by Studio Ping Pong, and symbolises emerging from ‘behind the scenes’ to the forefront and making themselves visible. 

The SDA Collective logo

Added Naithani, “We have never done something like this before. We had no reference point to what a collective looks like. There was a lot of internal discussion between us on what our end game was, and what we were going to look like. And honestly, the journey is still on to find the right people who believe in us as a voice. We have lots of options, we are self-funded and self-supporting. And we do this between our jobs, which is direction. All of that took time.”

Eventually, around January this year, the group decided to launch on 8 March, International Women’s Day, 'because it ‘just made so much sense’. 

The goal

The intent behind SDA is to build a community for women directors in advertising and have a concrete platform for them to be celebrated, shared the members.

“There is no specific agenda, but for us, it's very important to have this first kind of a collective that says that here is all of us together. We have voices, we have talent, we have skill, and we celebrate each other,” explains Batra.

There's also a notion in the industry that women don't get along with each other, which the SDA is out to disprove. 

“I think somewhere we also want to say that we get along so well that here are all of us celebrating each other. We may compete with each other, but we're also happy to share each other's wins and sorrows,” she added.

Naithani weighs in, “The thing is that we are all, fortunately or unfortunately, bonded by our similar experiences, and a lot of it has to do with our gender. When we met the first time, we spoke about our journeys and bonded over those points. The plan is to make it easier for younger girls to enter the industry because all of us are winners in our lives.”

She also spells out her wish to bring about gender balance in the technical crew, through this initiative. 

Sharing an experience from a past shoot, she said, "I was trying to get a lot of technical heads, preferably women. And someone from the production team asked me, ‘is it for an all-female crew?’ Nobody says ‘all-male’ crew, as that's a given. The crew is crew, right?"

"So through this journey, if we can contribute to balancing things out, paving an easier path for girls, giving them hope that ‘no, you don't have to convert to producers - there is a future for you as directors’, I think that's a win for all of us,” Naithani emphasised.

Breaking biases

Despite progress, the advertising and film industry remains a male-dominated space. The women directors address the systemic changes that are needed to bridge the gender gap: “A collective like ours, one collective at a time,” quips Seda.

She continues, “I mean, yes, it is systemic. The good news is that the needle is moving on, that we can see it, feel it every day. It's not the same as it used to be 10 years ago. Who would have thought that there would be 60 women advertising directors? It stumps all of us even now. So, I think, step one is awareness.”

The filmmakers are hopeful that slowly but surely, tiny changes are taking place in the industry.

Seda said, “The desire is there. And that's good. The desire exists because those in decision-making positions in agencies and offices, clients, and brands - are also changing. It's not all male today, although it is still a little skewed, but it's changing slowly. As that mix becomes more diverse, the questions start becoming more curious. With more curiosity comes more awareness. With awareness, then comes a risk-taking potential and a risk-taking appetite. You take a punt on someone, and decide to work with people who you've not worked with.”

The women are aware that while change is already afoot, it's not going to happen overnight.

Seda added, “It's going to take years. We are here as part of the step to move that needle along. And the first thing that collectives like ours, ICW, and the Women Cinematographers Association do is say, ‘here we are, find us. If you won't find us, we'll find you.’ But there is no longer a need to say that there is a lack of skilled female talent in the industry. There just isn't.” So, there's no one single way to bridge that gap, but at least the first step is solid awareness.

The ‘female gaze’

The directors debate on whether brands today are becoming more receptive to female-led creative storytelling, or do inherent biases persist.

Seda pointed out how initially she used to dismiss the need for a ‘female gaze’ in the script or story. 

“I used to scoff at that first because it just felt like tokenism - because ‘male gaze’ hence, female gaze. But it took a little maturity to understand the nuances of what that means. It is a different way of looking at storytelling, of looking at the human conditioning. It seeps into micro decisions - from casting to music to a single dialogue to the way we edit. It's not a question of better or worse, selling more, or selling less. It's a very subtle shift of perspective. And it's feeling refreshing to clients, viewers, and everybody. Only because it (the female gaze) did not exist up until some time back.”

She reiterated that it is not about ‘better or worse’, but just about a refreshing perspective on things. “Clients, brands, agencies, and writers - all are realising that a new perspective is needed. The decision-makers are seeing how women storytellers are going to be able to give a new spin to a brand campaign, an idea, or a story. And that's changing, and happening more and more often. Whenever we sit for client meetings and briefings, we're hearing those words more and more often, so it's refreshing for us as well,” Seda added.

Even as the filmmakers acknowledge that there are clients who are doing things differently, there remain certain categories and genres who still shy away from change.“They're still not as actively participating in choosing directors based on their skill set. While, of course, the female gaze is being celebrated, what we're also hoping to see in the future is that chances are given to women directors irrespective of their gender, but seeing what capacity they can bring on, what ideas they can bring on. It's not only about celebrating our female gaze but also celebrating the technical skills that we can bring as an individual. And for us, this collective wants to showcase that kind of power in our work,” stated Batra.

The directors do not hesitate to call out the deviant genres. There’s a very long list, they quip, the very obvious ones being car and bike commercials.

Pasricha said, “Basically the auto industry still feels that a guy knows his bike and his car. It's really refreshing to see at least women drivers in car films now.”

She reveals that despite her debut directorial ad being a bike ad (for Honda Unicorn), she hasn't got to work on a bike ad post that. 

“And even that I got because I agreed to whatever budget it was. Like, ‘I gotta do this!’”, she remarked. Batra also has a car film on her reel, but she hasn’t got a car ad after that.

Other 'discriminatory' genres are the men’s grooming, sports, and even tech sectors, the directors reveal, adding that, hence, often in these films the female gaze becomes the ‘weak’ point.

“It's a double-edged sword. If you don't have it on your reel, you can't pitch for it, and for you to add it on your reel you need to have something on the real,“ points out Batra.

But that is also changing slowly.

Kopal explained, “The thing is that with the automobile category, you need people who can look beyond what one has done. Somebody has to take a chance on somebody for it to happen. That’s where people get a little nervous. And this is a very age-old thing, that women creatives have been saying since forever, that no one gives them automobile ads. But it is true. However, the barriers are breaking slowly. But it's still not a go-to thing at all.

Seda added, “Genres are the smaller issue. The larger issue we're trying to address here is that there is a misconception, or a pre-conceived notion of a certain skill set that women will have, and hence a certain kind of work only finds its way to us. Whatever genre that may be, that's the misconception we'd like to break. There is no genre of advertising. Storytelling doesn't look at gender. And it never should.”

It applies the other way as well, she stated. “I'd like to see more and more men make sanitary pad commercials. Or, I'd like to see more and more men make baby ads. Typecasting works as much for male directors as it does for women. So this collective is just a way for us to say our skill set is genre agnostic.”

The irony is not lost on her, as she adds, “While we are saying, don't look at the gender, it is a gender collective. But that's necessary. The hope for the future is that choices of directors are made with a complete ungendered filter - Such that you're not approaching a man for a certain kind of script or a woman for a certain kind of script.”

Naithani believes that these kinds of collectives will keep popping up till the time there is no need for collectives. “There should not be a need for collectives, so it just comes down to that.”

Women professionals are often plagued by the ‘imposter syndrome’, and generally undersell themselves. For that, the collective also has on its agenda workshops and masterclasses from women financial advisors, who can specifically address the issue, to help women directors navigate financial negotiations in the industry.

“A lot of directors hide behind producers to do it. But the freelance culture is so big now. Back in the day, as a director, you were attached to a production house, but now it's all freelance. And the freelancers face a lot of the brunt of this,” says Nathani.

The directors believe this collective is going to help not only the younger people, but even the others who have been there for a while, to help them grow, as they help each other navigate the industry.

On the role that 'male allies' can play in fostering a more gender-inclusive ad filmmaking industry, Naithani believes they can play the ‘maximum’ role by supporting and hiring women directors. “They (men) are in hiring positions. So, take a chance on people. Take a chance on women directors.”

The group believes that while the awareness of things that need to change in the industry is always there, what's driving them is just the presence of each other, the kinetic energy of which in itself is ‘unmatchable’, professionally and personally.

“Women understand women best. The energy that comes from over 60 women coming together, celebrating each other, supporting each other, mentoring each other, and being so reachable to each other is so magical, energising, and refreshing, that sometimes that in itself is validation, affirmation, and a great sort of propulsion to continue to do what one is doing,” states Batra.

Balakrishnan summed it up by saying, “I don't know about our plan ahead, but where we're at, and the space where it's gotten to, is already so amazing.”

"This is about recognition, representation, and rewriting the narrative. There are many talented women directing advertisements in India, yet only a handful are recognised. It’s time the industry—and the world—sees and supports them. She Directs Ads is not just a platform—it’s a movement. One that aims to break barriers, inspire future generations, and reshape the advertising landscape, one step at a time,” Naithani signed off.