Last March, Dove partnered with Shonda Rhimes — and the first film by the brand’s newly formed Dove Real Beauty Productions, with Rhimes at the helm as its creative director, has debuted. The three-minute film “Meet Cathleen,” is now live on YouTube – see it here. 

The Film

The film features Cathleen’s dance group, Fat Girls Dance– and how it is a body-positive modern dance movement. Cathleen says she learned to love and embrace her body by watching herself dance. The group has learned, performed and recorded one dance a week for a year.

The Mission

Dove and Rhimes intend to change how women and girls see themselves represented by the media. Dove research shows 71% of women and 67% of girls wish media did a better job of portraying women of diverse physical appearance – age, race, shape and size.

Rhimes says, “Dove and I have a shared passion in emphasizing what’s real. The characters that I write about come from the fact that I wanted to see real women on TV – the real and messy stuff that makes us human.” She continues, “In working with Dove and Real Beauty Productions, we get to talk to real women and hear their own beauty stories. The idea that Cathleen defines beauty as self-love is a very mind blowing concept. I don’t think a lot of us, me included, define beauty in terms of self-love. And, to me, that is so empowering.”