Lena Dunham has co-produced a short animated documentary on Planned Parenthood. At a time when the cancer screening, STI checking, birth control and safe abortion provider faces losing thousands in federal funding as the Trump administration begins its steps towards power, knowing what Planned Parenthood does and fights for is integral.
100 Years, premiered on Dunham’s Lenny Letter and Now This Her, sees Meryl Streep, Hari Nef, Mindy Kaling, Jennifer Lawrence, Constance Wu and America Ferrera all lend their voices as film narrators.
“We’ve been working on the film for over a year in an attempt to shed light on Planned Parenthood’s remarkable history and ongoing battle to keep serving the people who show up to their health centres every day of the year,” Dunham told the Hollywood Reporter. “I really think it’s the best cartoon about the history of reproductive freedom ever made, but it may also be the only cartoon about the history of reproductive freedom ever made.”
The film traces the beginnings of Planned Parenthood with its founder Margaret Sanger, the creation of birth control, the landmark Roe v. Wade case that extended the right to privacy for women having abortions and the damaging Hyde Amendment that disallowed women from using federal aid for terminations.
Dunham spoke of the upcoming Women’s March, in which thousands are expected to protest before Donald Trump’s inauguration. “The spirit behind this video will hopefully take us into the Women’s March on Washington this weekend, where we will be showing our new president that we’re not going to allow a hundred years of progress to disappear overnight,” she said.
