\Los Angeles, Mar 6 (PTI) Filmmaker JJ Abrams is willing to include more women and minorities in his projects.
The 49-year-old "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" helmer is asking agents working with his production company, Bad Robot, to send him more women and people of colour for writing, producing and directing posts, reported The Wrap.
"Any list that we have for projects, it needs to be representative of this country, which roughly breaks down to 50 percent women, 12 percent black, 18 percent Hispanic, 6 percent Asian," Abrams said.
He also referred the #OscarsSoWhite controversy as the wake-up call for the industry.
"The Oscar controversy was sort of a wake-up call to us.
People were saying, 'It's so great you guys made "Star Wars" and you had a representative cast.' But we realized it has to be a systemic approach," he said.
"The Oscar issue was symptomatic of a problem; it wasn't the problem. The Oscars is the last stop on the train. The first stop is what gets made," he added.
