The Emmy-nominated team behind a new documentary has a few notes about how Hollywood portrays abortion on screen.

Hollywood Does Abortion, which made its world premiere on June 7 at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, traces how movies and TV series have depicted abortion care over the past 50 years. Throughout 95 minutes of expert interviews and archival footage—from Maude in the 1970s through more recent shows like Jane the Virgin—the film shows that Hollywood has frequently stigmatized abortion care, judged characters who want to end their pregnancy, and suggested getting an abortion is the lowest point in a character’s life.

“We’ve all seen so many abortion storylines at various points—and they’re almost all really really bad,” Kimberly Mutcherson, the film’s legal and policy advisor, told Rewire News Group.

Mutcherson, a Rutgers Law School professor, spoke with Rewire News Group about the Supreme Court, Scandal, and why misinformed abortion storytelling can “be a really dangerous thing.”

This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.

What was the first time you saw an abortion storyline on screen?

The one that I remember most distinctly is Dirty Dancing [from 1987]. I went to my first abortion rights march when I was in high school, so it was something I cared about.

That storyline focused on somebody who got a really unsafe abortion and then needed care. It was really a reminder of what can happen when people don’t have access to safe abortion care, and that it can be deadly. Also, the people around her were like, ‘She needs an abortion let’s figure out how to make that happen for her.’”

It was very well done in the context of how Hollywood tends to deal with abortion storylines.

How did this portrayal shape your understanding of what abortion was?

I don’t think it impacted how I perceived abortion. It certainly impacted my sense of why it was so crucial that abortion remain accessible and remain legal.

What I liked about that storyline was that it was not one where all of the people around her were shaming her or treating her as though she was making an immoral choice. The men in her life were really supportive—none of whom were the person who got her........

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