In Women Laughing, longtime New Yorker cartoonist Liza Donnelly sets out to explore her lifelong passion for humor and cartooning by speaking, laughing, and drawing with a diverse group of remarkable women who create cartoons for the iconic magazine. Inspired by her acclaimed book Very Funny Ladies and Liza’s own biography, the film will also look back at the fascinating history and evolution of single panel cartoons- from the 1920s, to the present- and reveal how far women have come in a field that has historically been dominated by men.

Women Laughing will include intimate conversations with some of the most celebrated and groundbreaking cartoonists at The New Yorker including Roz Chast, Amy Hwang (the magazine’s first Asian woman cartoonist), Sarah Akinterinwa, Emily Flake, Liana Finck, and Bishakh Som (the magazine’s first trans woman cartoonist). Together, they’ll reflect on the essential work of women cartoonists, and debate the many challenges that lie ahead. The film will also journey back in time to the earliest days of The New Yorker and look at the lives of some of the pioneering women cartoonists whose remarkable and dramatic stories have long been overlooked.

A hundred years since its founding, the cartoons of The New Yorker remain the benchmark of the form and beloved around the world, and the magazine has seen tremendous progress. Today half of the cartoonists identify as female or non-binary, and many more people of color are joining the community, bringing cartoons to a whole new audience. Women Laughing will ultimately be a joyful celebration of women, art, and the creative spirit. It will offer a unique insider’s look at the state of women’s humor over the last century, through the perspectives of the pioneering cartoonists, then and now, who have wrestled with some of the central social issues of our time.