WOMEN OF WISDOM AND POWER
After Lili’s award-winning 3 one-hour Women of Wisdom and Power specials aired on PBS, which also included a 2 hour live pledge show from the WLIW studios in New York she was flooded with stories from women across the U.S. They said the extraordinary women featured, like Jane Goodall, Gloria Steinem, Alanis Morissette, and Shirley MacLaine lit a fire under them and gave them the courage to go for their dreams.
Realizing the immensity of what this meant, Lili felt a passionate sense of urgency to re-ignite the feminist agenda. Convinced of the huge power media had to make social change, she decided to dedicate her life to finding a way to accelerate the education and economic empowerment of women and girls. She felt that educated and empowered women were the key to saving our freedom and the future pillars of democracy which were going to come under attack.
Funding and sources of capital were vastly inadequate for women. She decided to do something about it. Empowering women economically became her north star. It still is, as the backlash against women worldwide now has become an epidemic, an absolute emergency that demands that we take bold action.
International Women's Day was not well known in North America at the time. She decided to put it on the map. The TV broadcast of Women of Wisdom and Power said, “women are gathering in every city worldwide on International Women’s Day, their voices growing stronger every year.” (She had bought footage of the women marching worldwide for the broadcast). If it wasn’t quite true, she felt it would become so the more women heard it. The message was flowing across the airwaves prime time in 28 of the top 30 markets across the U.S.
She decided to spread this message because of a sense of outrage at the injustice of it all. The World March of Women marched in over 150 countries around the world on March 8, 2000, and it barely made the news. When they decided to do it again in 2005 Lili invested a great deal of time and effort to get up and down planes to meet with the major TV Networks and even Barbara Walters to make sure it was covered. Lili was shocked that something so significant for women globally would not make the news at all. It was as if it never happened. Can you imagine that? That is what fuelled her commitment to dedicate her life to producing Women’s Day Live.
WOMEN IN MEDIA - 2 HOUR LIVE SYMPOSIUM BEFORE A LIVE AUDIENCE AT THE TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
Lili produced and hosted a breakthrough look at the state of women’s progress in Hollywood. The Live show broadcast on Rogers Cable included Filmmakers from Europe and Canada with pre-produced segments featuring interviews with Oscar Winning Hollywood Producers from Lili Fini-Zanuck to renown superstar Sharon Stone.
SELECT PRODUCTIONS
THE BY MY SPIRIT CONCERT AND UNIVERSAL GATHERING
In 1992 she pulled off an impossible feat, having just learned about the By My Spirit Concert and International Spiritual Gathering in Toledo, Spain just months before. She ended up producing the Television event, actually saving the event from being cancelled as funding was not coming through. She invested her own funds to secure a 9-camera mobile unit and the best Production team in Spain. Two global events including the Olympics made equipment and production teams scarce. Funding came through at the final hour for the Concert from the Government and Parisian investor.
Placido Domingo and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra with Zubin Mehta in the presence of Queen Sofia of Spain enthralled the world. This tribute to peace and co-existence was led by Nobel Peace Laureate, Eli Wiesel. This is everything she cared about. Years later she did a profoundly moving interview with him.
Right before the Reconciliation ceremony at the synagogue in Madrid, which had room for only 300 dignitaries who had vied for a place and came from around the world to attend, and as the doors were closing behind the King of Spain and the President of Israel being ushered in, the Chairman of the Synagogue held out his hand to Lili who was filming on the red carpet with her crew.
He said “Mrs. Fournier, won’t you join us”. Such a moment of respect for her immense efforts to help make the Universal Spiritual Gathering happen, she will never forget.
Expulsion & Memory
An award-winning documentary that pays tribute to the survival of the Jewish spirit and the meaning of Jewish identity.
It looks at the history of the conversos and the Expulsion of the Jews from Spain.
This film featured the King of Spain and the President of Israel, in a historic reconciliation Ceremony for the 500 -year commemoration of the Jews Expulsion from Spain. It was shot in five countries.
It was an absolute miracle how this film was made against the greatest tribulations and challenges.
