Jennifer Lawrence calls out 'toxic masculinity' on film sets

Jennifer Lawrence never shies away from saying what she really thinks, especially when it comes to the inner workings of Hollywood.

Last week, she spoke out about how she was asked to lose weight for the Hunger Games franchise, and now she is talking about how toxic masculinity can ruin film sets - and how she prefers to work with female directors as they are 'calmer and the best decision makers'.

During a roundtable event organised by The Hollywood Reporter, the Silver Linings Playbook star also called out director Bryan Singer, who she worked with on X-Men, saying he threw some of the biggest 'hissy fits' on set. 

J-Law was joined by fellow actors including The Crown's Claire Foy and Emma Corrin, Danielle Deadwyler, Michelle Williams and Michelle Yeoh. 

Talking about her new role in AppleTV+ film Causeway and her experience working with a female director again, she said: “It was incredible to not be around toxic masculinity. To get a little break from it.

“We disagreed, and we listened to each other. Sometimes I was wrong and would learn that I was wrong, and sometimes I was right.

“There were no huge fights. If an actor had a personal thing and wanted to leave early, instead of going, ‘Oh! Well, we’d all love to leave early!’ we’d put our heads together and go, ‘OK. How can we figure this out?'”

She said about working with Lila Neugebauer: "She was my third female director and they are the calmest, best decision-makers I’ve ever worked with. I absolutely love working with female directors.”

Jennifer went on to call out one male director, saying: "And it did always just make us laugh about how we ended up with, ‘Women shouldn’t be in roles like this because we’re so emotional.’ 

"I mean, I’ve worked with Bryan Singer. I’ve seen emotional men. I’ve seen the biggest hissy fits thrown on set.” 

In the past, other actors have admitted that the director can be hard to work with. In 2020, Halle Berry said: “Bryan’s not the easiest dude to work with, I would sometimes be very angry with him. I got into a few fights with him, said a few cuss words out of sheer frustration.”

Causeway is available to watch now on AppleTV+.