Nitza Wilon and Elizabeth Kaiden founded The Writers Lab to support women and non-binary writers over forty.

In this episode, we dive deep into the systemic barriers these storytellers face. We talk about the industry’s bias toward younger, male voices, the resistance to internal, nuanced storytelling, and the persistent structures that determine who gets heard (and what gets funded and produced).

Nitza and Elizabeth share their journey to creating this model: a safe space for these voices to be seen and amplified. Through mentorship, workshops, and retreats, writers can refine their craft, find support, and step into the light with confidence — raising the volume on stories that have long waited to be told.

In this conversation, we explore:

1. How an enormous well of unrecognized stories reveals systemic exclusion, not individual struggle
2. Stark realities from 2025: out of 511 feature films made with 740 writers, 79% of writers were male, 20.68% were women, and only 12.1% were women over 40.
3. What happens when a community rallies around writers
4. The persistent dominance of conquest-driven, lone-hero narratives, and why stories rooted in relationships and nuance are essential
5. “Courage culture”: how risk, visibility, and voice differ depending on gender, race, and power
6. The impact of life interruptions — parenthood, care, and economic precarity — on creative careers, and how writers reclaim their ambition later in life
7. How to dismantle myths about age and relevance in storytelling
8. Gatekeepers, power, and the stories that get valued — and how to shift the culture of who decides

Through this discussion, Nitza and Elizabeth illuminate the importance of returning to your voice, writing with authority, and creating stories that carry across a lifetime. It turns out age means nothing. So many are not being nearly done.

Resources & Links:

1. Submit to The Writer’s Lab 2026: TWLStories.org