While Hollywood has long seemed uncertain of what to do with women of a certain age, Emmy nominee Constance Zimmer took the stage at TheWrap’s 2025 Power Women Summit, presented by STARZ #TakeTheLead, on Tuesday with a message: Life is just beginning for women in their 50s and 60s, and it’s time for film and TV to reflect that.
Zimmer urged entertainment professionals to bring real stories of middle-aged women to the forefront, specifically in its portrayals of menopause, rather than making it the butt of the joke.
President and CEO of the Geena Davis Institute Madeline Di Nonno introduced the actress and activist at the Maybourne Beverly Hills in Los Angeles, who passionately detailed the value of women in middle age while headlining the event’s “Redefining the Narratives of Midlife and Menopause in Film & TV: We’re Not Your Mother’s Midlife Crisis!” panel.
“In Hollywood, women over 40 continue to appear on screen like they exist outside of biology,” Zimmer told the mainstage audience. “They are just older versions of 30 year olds. Where are the real women living who are in between their 50s and their 60s?”
“Everyone argues about what their superpower would be, power of flight, the ability to speak to animals, the power of invisibility,” she said. “Well, I already possess the power of invisibility, and that is called being a middle-aged woman who lives in the world.”
A new report from the Geena Davis Institute debuted exclusively at Power Women Summit found that, of the 225 films released between 2009 and 2024 prominently featuring a female character over 40, only 6% — 14 films — mentioned menopause. Zimmer noted that most of the mentions happened as an aside or a joke at the expense of the character.
“You’re either angry or you’re hot, and it’s not that kind of hot,” she quipped. “Only one film had a meaningful menopause storyline, one in 15 years.”
Actor, director, and advocate Constance Zimmer brought pure energy to the #PowerWomenSummit2025 stage for her one-women panel on menopause in film & TV, presented in collaboration with @GeenaDavisOrg pic.twitter.com/OnDRwsmU5x
— TheWrap (@TheWrap) December 3, 2025
Zimmer’s address, presented in collaboration with the Geena Davis Institute (GDI), called for Hollywood to embrace authentic female storytelling, which includes menopause. The 55-year-old actress added that 14% of women under 40 say TV and film was their first exposure to the concept of menopause. And 21% of men were first introduced to the concept from entertainment media.
Zimmer said that entertainers and storytellers “have an obligation” to educate viewers on the human condition.
“They write the bitch, the cougar, the ice queen, the woman who finally says no and is suddenly a monster,” she said of the generalizations often made about women over 40. “But here’s the truth: A woman in perimenopause, or menopause, is just beginning her journey into the rest of her life. Menopause is only the on ramp, folks.
“She’s not losing control. She’s gaining perspective. That is powerful, that is not pitiful,” she added.
The “UnReal” actress cited a few examples of when Hollywood got it right, including Phoebe Waller Bridge’s “Fleabag” monologue, Sharon Horgan’s menopause coach on “Bad Sisters” and Sally Wainwright’s series “Riot Women,” a series about five menopausal women who formed a punk rock band. Zimmer shared that when she played the “badass bitch, rage-aholic, emotional terrorist” executive Quinn King on “UnReal,” she did not quite have the words to conceptualize what her character was going through.
“I assumed that she was simply the result of a woman fighting to be heard in a man’s world,” she said. “Then January of last year, it hit me: Quinn was in perimenopause.”
The advocate left the audience with a rallying cry, empowering the women in the room and beyond that they “are not aging out.”
“You are aging into your agency, into your wisdom, into your boundaries, into your voice, into the version of you that no longer bends herself into shapes for other people’s comfort,” she said.
“We need to share our stories. We need to be included in your shows. We need to demand representation that looks like us, not like the filtered fantasy of a woman who never bleeds, never sweats, never changes, never puts herself first — a woman who finds beauty and freedom in aging. We are not a punchline. We are a demographic revolution,” Zimmer continued. “Being in midlife does not make us irrelevant. It makes us undeniable.”
TheWrap’s Power Women Summit presented by STARZ #TakeTheLead is the essential gathering of the most influential women across entertainment and media. The event aims to inspire and empower women across the landscape of their professional careers and personal lives. PWS provides one day of keynotes, panels, workshops and networking. For more information visit: thewrap.com/pws. For all Power Women Summit 2025 coverage, click here.
