Today is Women’s Equality Day, which was recognized as a holiday in 1971 by the U.S Congress to remember the 19th Amendment of the Constitution. It says that “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex”. It's a day we remember the long fight for women rights reforms and realizing that we still have a long way to go.  It may be almost fifty years later but we still have domestic violence,  genital mutilation,  sex trafficking, the wage gap and a low conviction rate for rapists.  The people have spoken out from the streets to boardrooms, with video footage of mansplaining, women fighting back, and women bringing their issues to the public's attention. Unfortunately, even though progress has been made some parts of the ceiling remain unbroken and social media has made sexual harassment, stalking, and trolling even easier.

Film industry changes

In 2015, Jennifer Lawrence wrote an essay on equal pay in the film industry since then many other actresses have stepped up to demand a change. They include Hilary Swank from "Boys Don't Cry,"  who revealed that she couldn’t cover her health insurance on her salary. Emma Stone, Michelle Rodriguez, Emilia Fox and Robin Wright from the"House of Cards" all demanded to be paid the same as their male counterparts.  Many others have spoken out like Viola Davis best known for her role in "How to Get Away With Murder" who said that “if a woman does the same job as a man, she should be paid the same amount of money. She just should. That’s just the way the world should work. ” Actresses aren’t the only ones demanding equal pay many female directors and even the BBC director general, Tony Hall, has said that he hopes they can close the gender pay gap sooner than 2020, after an impressive intervention by more than 40 of its most high-profile female stars.

How to help

There are many ways for you to get involved - from supporting women in their careers to donating to Women’s Rights organizations. Some of these organizations include Women For Women International, Equality Now, Lady Parts Justice, Global Fund For Women, National Organization For Women, and National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. All of these organizations help women in different parts of the world. The most effective way to change the law is to call your representatives and vote your elections. People are also using social media to get their message out to the general public and using their creativity to create memes, gifs, and documentaries about women’s rights that are very popular these days. Remember that on August 26th,  we celebrate the women who fought for equality and remember to keep fighting for the cause.

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Back in 2010, Mr. Gustavo Ron brought to the screen Sally Nicholls debut 2008 novel, Ways to Live Forever. Documenting the life of a boy suffering from leukemia, the films stars many talented individuals, two of which are celebrating a little something special today. Actors Ben Chaplin and Emilia Fox not only star in this heartfelt film but also share the same birthday!

Born Emilia Rose Elizabeth Fox, this lovely English actress became widely known for her role as Dr. Nikki Alexander on the BBC crime drama, Silent Witness, after joining the cast in 2004. Fox has continued to have a very successful career in both TV and Film having starred in Merlin as Morgause, Flashbacks of A Fool as Sister Jean, and of course in our very own Ways to Live Forever as the mother. These are but a few projects that Fox has taken part in!

Mr. Ben Chaplin was born Benedict John Greenwood on July 31st of 1969 in England. After being applauded for his performance as Tom Wingfield in Sam Mendes’ stage production of The Glass Menagerie (1995), he went on to star in both TV and film productions, some of his most recent being, Mad Dogs as Joel, Little Boy as Ben Eagle, and like Ms. Fox, Ways to Live Forever as the father.

From all of us at WWMPC we would like to wish you both a very happy and joyous birthday, cheers to you, Ben and Emilia!

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By definition, a parent is a person that brings up and cares for a child. Parenting a child comes with ups and downs and is never easy. Every day, parents push themselves in order to protect and provide for their family. It is a very crucial role that takes a lot of discipline and compassion to assure the proper development of their child. It is not a temporary job. From the birth of the child, taking his first breaths of the real world until the end, parents will be there. This Parent's Day, we recognize that being a parent can be very stressful at times, but it can also be something very beautiful.

Where would people be without parents? Without any guidance, children run the risk of becoming delinquents and unaware of what is virtuous and moral. Some parents have it easier than others.  Often, people think that once they are ready to have children, everything will be perfect. In regards to parents who have a child with special needs, it wasn’t what they expected. They are placed in a position of constantly having to care for another person powered by their endless love; it’s a characteristic that every parent seems to hold.

As shown in the movie Ways to Live Forever, being the parent of a child with an illness/disability can be an emotional roller coaster. In the movie, the main character named Sam, portrayed by Robbie Kay, is diagnosed with leukemia. As the movie goes on, it shows him and his newly made best friend, also terminal, attempting to complete things on a bucket list and trying to “live forever” through the artwork of video recording and writing a book. It also depicts how the parents of these children go through this way of life providing a better existence for their children who are ill.

Kudos to all the parents out there who have children with disabilities and illnesses. Parents Day is a day to celebrate and thank all parents for their hard work and unfailing support for their kids. To the parents whose kids aren’t disabled or have an illness, take this moment to be grateful and realize what others are going through. Parenting children with special needs may apply to everyone including celebrities. Here is a list of celebrities that have children who have special needs.

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Motherhood is something unimaginably difficult to those who’ve never experienced it. From physically tending to a growing child, to influencing who that child grows up to be, motherhood is full of struggles that show why we should appreciate mothers on this special day. Though nothing can be done to perfection, mothers always make that effort for their children, or as the saying goes “mother knows best.” Every  situation brings something different, and in those times moms have to make difficult decisions as to what’s best for their child.

In today’s society, mother’s have every right to seek fulfilling careers and, at times, that’s combined with the desire to give their child financial comforts while foregoing spending a lot of time with them. In the film The Nightingale (distributed by World Wide Motion Pictures Corporation) Quan Ying is burdened by her desire to give her child a comfortable life, and to achieve that, she and her husband work tireless hours. However, when Quan Ying is faced with not having anyone to take care of her daughter Renxing, she makes the difficult decision to have her daughter join her grandfather on a trip to his hometown. This resolve was difficult since it was done without telling her husband, who would have vetoed her decision. Ultimately, the journey turns out for the best, as Renxing gains a more mature worldview on this journey, though it was a difficult one.

Sometimes life takes unexpected turns, and health makes the struggle of motherhood a lot more difficult. In the the film The Lovely Patient, Katherine is faced with putting the burden of relying on her son for support after she suffers a stroke. Despite the situation, their relationship is made stronger in the struggle.

In Ways to Live Forever, young Sam McQueen has leukemia, and his mother, Amanda, along with other adults, do the best they can so that he can have as normal a life as possible. Though she is unable to heal her child’s ailment, she does the best she can so that he can have a happy and normal life.

Lastly, these are just some film examples of how difficult it is to be a mother. The world is full of stories of different circumstances making motherhood have it’s happy moments and it's sad ones. Today is Mother’s Day, and we all should take the time to make it a special one for our own mothers so that they know how much we appreciate all they do to try and give us the best.

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Actress Emilia Fox opened up to Good Housekeeping for the August 2015 issue about her hopes and views on marriage and men.

After a recent trip to Ethiopia as an ambassador for ActionAid, the 41 year-old Fox stated she “would love to get married again.” The actress describes herself as a hopeless romantic, and hopes that she can marry once again. Emilia Fox was married to Jared Harris in 2005, but the two were divorced after three years.

The Ways To Live Forever actress told the magazine, “When I was in Ethiopia and saw families with siblings who look after each other, I thought how we can get caught up in our work. But what is more important than family life? So, yes, I would love more children!” She also mentioned it would be nice for her daughter to have more siblings to grow up with.

Fox recalls that in her youth she had “a very idyllic childhood, of innocence and wild gardens and running around in Dorset pressing wild flowers, making scrapbooks and being by the sea in rock pools.”

She encourages romance and chivalry, as she wholeheartedly stated that she “believes in equality…But equally I love it when gentlemen are allowed to be gentlemen…I don’t think we want to kill that off with the word feminism—when a gentleman is kind to you and opens a door, or gives up his seat or says something nice, we must encourage that too,” and believes equality should live hand-in-hand with chivalry.

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“The British are coming” to US TV audiences and the public is going wild. More and more Americans are enjoying British TV shows such as Doctor Who, Downton Abbey, and Sherlock, and have fallen in love with talented actors like Benedict Cumberbatch and Hugh Bonneville. Another of these TV show treasures is the crime drama Silent Witness, similar in style to Bones, which has been on the air in the UK since 1996 and has a loyal following. While the program hasn’t aired yet in the states, it is just as compelling and deserves to find a new following.

The great Emilia Fox plays a complicated character with a difficult past in her role as Dr. Nikki Alexander. The talented cast of the show also includes William Gaminara, who plays Professor Leo Dalton, and Tom Ward playing Dr. Harry Cunningham, a humorous Forensic Pathologist who solves crime in an unconventional way. While US audiences are no strangers to crime drama, the British crime shows have a style all their own, oftentimes being more realistic and well-crafted. Emilia Fox states in a Digital Spy article that the last two episodes were “the hardest scenes I've had to do.” The episodes are stand alone stories with new detail being revealed about Dr. Nikki Alexander’s personal life. Silent Witness is ending its eighteenth season and its twentieth anniversary, and the cast and crew have grown into a family so much that even Rose, Emilia Fox’s daughter, has a special place on set. Emilia Fox says that she enjoys having her on set and being a mother. Her parental role wasn’t a far stretch from her role as the mother in Ways to Live Forever, distributed by World Wide Motion Pictures, where her character takes care of her son with leukemia.

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