The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

There’s been a bit of disappointment regarding the quality of the Ramadan series this year. Only a handful of shows and programmes are worth watching, and even that might be considered an exaggeration for some viewers. Unfortunately, the disappointment continues after Daily News Egypt uploaded a survey analysis about women’s participation in this year’s dramas. The results were quite shocking!

The first smack in the face was when we read that this Ramadan season has the least number of series since 2010. Last year exceeded the 25 series in 2019 by five. As far as female leads are concerned, only eight of this year’s dramas have female protagonists, which is at least 5% less than 2018. According to the news source, the eight dramas are “Zai El Shams”, starring Dina Al-Sherbini; “Hadotet Mora”, starring Ghada Abdel Razek; “Hekayty”, starring Yasmin Sabry; “Badal Al Hadota Talata”, starring Dounia Samir Ghanem; “Super Mario,” starring Emy Samir Ghanem; “Princess Bissa”, starring Mai Ezz ElDein, and finally “Mamlaket ElGhagar,” with Fifi Abdo and Horaya Farghaly in co-leading roles.

Other fields in the film industry are in desperate need of more female influence. Maryam Naoum, a prominent name in the scriptwriting world, is currently considered the only female writer this season, as director of the writing team in “Zai El Shams”. Imagine that. Only one person out of a population of 100 million people?!

Writing is not the only field, where one woman is soaking up all the spotlight. Just like last year, one female director is at the forefront and is impressively directing two series, “Sha2et Fesal” and “Hogan”, and that is the gifted, Shereen Adel.

The lack of females in the shooting and production fields is somewhat made up for in the singing department. We hear the beautiful voice of Angham, singing in the introduction of “Hekayet Mora”, Carmen Soliman in “Hekayty”, and Donya Samir Ghanem in her own series, “Badal Al Hadota Talata”.

On the positive side, the President of National Council of Women (NCW), Maya Morsi, announced days before the start of Ramadan that the NCW had formulated a committee to monitor the image of women in the series, commercials, and programmes to be screened on television during the holy month. Hopefully, with such positive steps in the right direction, we will find at least the twice the number of women in all the various fields of the film industry next year.