Sydney Sweeney blasts 'fake' female empowerment in Hollywood

Sydney Sweeney is no fan of Hollywood girlbosses who ‘fake’ support for other women

Sydney Sweeney sitting on the floor of a hotel room in a checkered jacket, dark pants and heels

Nov. 14, 2024 12:06 PM PT

Sydney Sweeney, since her breakout role in HBO’s “Euphoria,” has worked to prove she has much more to offer than just her looks.

The “White Lotus” actor in recent years has diversified her portfolio to showcase her acting chops and flexed her muscles as a producer with films “Immaculate” and “Anyone but You.” Despite her efforts, the 27-year-old star says, she feels Hollywood’s outward support for female creatives — especially from other women with well-established careers — has just been lip service.

“This entire industry, all people say is, ‘Women empowering other women.’ None of it’s happening,” she told Vanity Fair in an interview published Wednesday. “All of it is fake and a front for all the other s— that they say behind everyone’s back.”

Sweeney, founder of Fifty-Fifty Films, called out Tinseltown’s alleged faux feminism months after “Father of the Bride” producer Carol Baum dismissed her star power.

Speaking in April at a New York screening of her 1988 film “Dead Ringers,” Baum said “[Sweeney’s] not pretty, she can’t act. Why is she so hot?” Sweeney’s team swiftly hit back, lamenting “that a woman in the position to share her expertise and experience chooses instead to attack another woman.”

“If that’s what [Baum’s] learned in her decades in the industry and feels is appropriate to teach to her students, that’s shameful,” a spokesperson for Sweeney told The Times in April. “To unjustly disparage a fellow female producer speaks volumes about Ms. Baum’s character.”

Baum reportedly felt regret over her remarks, but the sting has clearly remained for Sweeney.

“It’s very disheartening to see women tear other women down, especially when women who are successful in other avenues of their industry see younger talent working really hard,” Sweeney said in Vanity Fair’s 2025 Hollywood issue.

This sense of competition and the tendency to discredit and shut out other women might be a feature in Hollywood and not a bug, Sweeney said. Though it might be a “generational problem,” she said, women grew up believing that only one woman can succeed, whether that woman is getting the man or climbing the ladder. “There’s only one one woman who can be, I don’t know, anything,” she added.

Sweeney, who did not reference Baum by name, told the magazine she’s just trying her best to continue making a name for herself. Still, she asked, “Why am I getting attacked?”

Years before the Baum insult, the two-time Emmy nominee had been candid about her journey to Hollywood, telling The Times in 2022 that it had been far from easy. For a while, she said, she had just been “fighting, fighting, fighting [for jobs].” When she began acting in her teen years, the stress of growing up also came with industry pressure.

“When you’re 16 and you don’t really like yourself, and you’re trying to figure out what the hell is gong on in your body and your makeup and your hormones, and people are telling you that you’re not good enough — that weight is so heavy,” Sweeney said at the time.

While Sweeney might feel unsupported by other women in Hollywood, she told The Times she can rely on her parents “who, no matter what, believed in me.”

Times staff writer Nardine Saad contributed to this report.