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A weekly podcast interviewing women behind-the-scenes and below-the-line of the British film industry.
Episodes
Friday Oct 21, 2022
Friday Oct 21, 2022
This week my guest is the wonderful Eve Gabereau.
Eve is someone whose work and ingenuity I became aware of quite early on in my own career and she is someone I have wanted on the podcast for a good while.
Eve is the Founder and Managing Director of Modern Films, a London-based, female-led, social issues-driven production, distribution and event cinema company. It was founded in 2017 and since gone onto to release buzzy titles such as BORDER, MURINA, HAPPY AS LAZZARO, WHITE RIOT, WHEEL OF FORTUNE AND FANTASY and Oscar-winner DRIVE MY CAR.
Two of their upcoming releases were part of this year’s LFF programme - Emily Atef’s MORE THAN EVER and Kristoffer Borgli’s SICK OF MYSELF, which both speak well to the kind of provocative, spellbinding and whip-smart cinema that Modern Films have made their trademark.
Prior to that Eve was the MD of Soda Pictures for 15 years, where she released such indie hits as TONI ERDMANN, ONLY LOVERS LEFT ALIVE, PATERSON and MY LIFE AS A COURGETTE. She also executive produced Rungano Nyoni’s directorial debut I AM NOT A WITCH.
She is a regular feature on panels and training schemes throughout the industry, and was also featured in Geoffrey Macnab’s 2021 book ‘The British Film Industry in 25 Careers: The Mavericks, Visionaries and Outsiders Who Shaped British Cinema’, so it’s fair to say I approached this interview with high expectations for the wisdom and insight it might contain and Eve definitely didn’t disappoint and it’s truly a privilege to count her among Best Girl Grip’s guests.
Tuesday Oct 11, 2022
Tuesday Oct 11, 2022
This week my guest is producer Jeanie Igoe.
Jeanie’s big break came when she landed a role at A24, where her credits as a production executive include Barry Jenkins’ MOONLIGHT, Trey Edwards Shults’, IT COMES AT NIGHT, Bo Burnham’s EIGHTH GRADE and Robert Eggers’ THE LIGHTHOUSE. She also served as a producer on their TV series RAMY, and a co-producer on David Lowery’s THE GREEN KNIGHT.
She then launched herself as an independent producer, with her first project MISS JUNETEENTH, the directorial debut from Channing Godfrey Peoples going on to premiere at Sundance and receive a nomination for the Grand Jury Prize.
Most recently, Jeanie co-produced CONVERSATIONS WITH FRIENDS alongside Catherine Magee and the team at Element Pictures, including former podcast guest Emma Norton and Development Producer Chelsea Morgan Hoffman who developed Sally Rooney’s novel into the series script, alongside the writers.
We talk about moving to New York, getting a job at A24 in its fledging years as a company and then being witness to their exponential growth, making the decision to start producing independently, moving back to Ireland, maintaining a work-life balance, how Jeanie creates an atmosphere of collaboration and care on set and adapts her role to the needs of the project and the filmmaker.
I hope you enjoy listening to our conversation as much as I did having it.
Tuesday Oct 04, 2022
Tuesday Oct 04, 2022
This week I’m thrilled to be chatting with film critic, broadcaster, podcaster and now author Hanna Flint, about her path into the film and media industry, as well as how her new book STRONG FEMALE CHARACTER was born.
Having started out in various journalism and media roles for the likes of MailOnline, Metro and OK! Magazine, Hanna has since become a prolific film critic and features writer, with bylines at a wealth of outlets, including Variety, Empire Magazine, Sight & Sound, Time Out, The Guardian, Esquire, Dazed, British GQ and Stylist, and has also appeared as a critic and commentator on the likes of BBC Radio 4, Sky News, BBC Radio 5 Live and TALKRadio.
She is also a host for MTV Movies and the co-host of the Fade to Black podcast alongside Amon Warmann and former Best Girl Grip guest Clarisse Loughrey.
Her book STRONG FEMALE CHARACTER, is out now and weaves together personal memoir with cultural criticism as she reflects on how cinema has been formative to her own identity and the world we live in. The book is sprawling, funny and down-to-earth and manages to traverse topics such basketball, sexuality, sexual assault, colourism, her changing relationship to her Tunisian heritage, eating disorders, social media, family, first crushes and much much more.
Our conversation likewise covers lots of ground as we probe the pros and cons of doing an MA in journalism, how Hanna hustled her way into her career with hard work and persistence, how she established herself as a critic, how the idea for her book developed, the madness of writing it in just under three months and her relationship to it now as it makes its way into the world.
Tuesday Sep 27, 2022
Tuesday Sep 27, 2022
My guest this week is the incredibly talented and prolific sound designer and mixer Ines Adriana.
Ines studied for an MA in sound design at NFTS and has been credited on over 40 projects since 2020, including some incredible short films like Ruth Greenberg’s RUN, Molly Manning Walker’s, GOOD THANKS, YOU?, Theo James Krekis’ PRAM SNATCHER, Nia Childs’ HOME, as well as documentaries such as THE CATHEDRAL and SELF-PORTRAIT.
Ines’ work has screened at Sundance, SXSW, Cannes, BFI London Film Festival and Sheffield Doc/Fest. She is a Film London Lodestar 2022, a Berlinale Talent alumni and a member of the BFI NETWORK x BAFTA crew.
We talk about how she discovered a passion for sound, finding the confidence and the skills to call herself a sound designer, her ‘fever dream’ experience studying at NFTS, how her career picked up momentum and how sound design can facilitate and augment story.
I always enjoy the craft-centred episodes because I’m such a rookie in that space and it’s such a fun opportunity to learn about a completely different area of filmmaking, so I appreciate Ines’ time and I hope you get something from our conversation.
Tuesday Sep 13, 2022
Tuesday Sep 13, 2022
This week, my guest is music supervisor Lucy Bright.
Lucy started out at Mute Records working with artists such as Nick Cave and Depeche Mode, before moving to Warner Classics for six years and then leaving to manage composer Michael Nyman. She joined the film and TV department of publisher Music Sales (now Wise Music) in 2008 and worked there for a decade. In 2020 she launched her own music publishing company, Bright Notion Music, signing the composers like Anne Nikitin, Jed Kurzel and Tamar-kali Brown.
Lucy has supervised some of the most critically-acclaimed British films and TV shows in recent years including The Unloved, The Arbor, Slow West, Southcliffe, McMafia, This is England ‘90, Daphne, The Virtues, The Nest, Life After Life and BAFTA-winning short The Swimmer.
Most recently, she has worked on two forthcoming films: Charlotte Wells’ directorial debut AFTERSUN, which is showing at this year’s London Film Festival and then coming to UK cinemas via MUBI on 18th November, and I can testify it has a truly phenomenal soundtrack and Todd Field’s TÁR, set within the world of classical music in which Cate Blanchett plays the first female conductor of a German orchestra.It recently premiered to critical acclaim at the Venice Film Festival and is one of my most hotly anticipated films of the year.
We spoke about how Lucy got her start in the music industry and then gradually discovered the role of music supervision, getting her first credit as a music supervisor on Samantha Morton’s TV film THE UNLOVED, how she collaborates with directors and other HoDs to build a soundtrack, why certain songs cost more than others, how needle drops happen and what song she is particularly proud of clearing for use in a film…
Tuesday Sep 06, 2022
Tuesday Sep 06, 2022
Olive Nwosu is a Nigerian filmmaker, a BAFTA Pigott 2020 Scholar, an Alex Sichel Fellow at Columbia University School of the Arts, and one of four ‘African Promises’ directors selected by the Institut Français.
She has directed two award-winning short films: TROUBLEMAKER and EGÚNGÚN (MASQUERADE), both set in Nigeria and which have screened in numerous film festivals, including Sundance, the BFI London Film Festival, TIFF and the Aspen Shortsfest. The latter was also nominated for Best British Short Film at the BIFAs in 2021.
Earlier this year, Olive took part in an online edition of the Sundance Screenwriting Lab and she is currently developing her first feature film with Film4.
We talk about initially studying engineering and how she discovered, and decided to pursue, filmmaking, some of the difficulties Olive has experienced in sustaining a practice and what that practice looks like. We also talking quite in-depth about Olive’s short film EGÚNGÚN (MASQUERADE) and how that film came to be, what she wanted to explore, how she crafted its visual language and finding the right collaborators.
I saw that film and Olive speak on a panel at Sundance London and was immediately beguiled both by her cinematic voice and by how she spoke about the film on stage and I knew straight away I would love to have her on the podcast and the conversation we had didn’t disappoint. I think Olive is a really special filmmaker and I was incredibly privileged to share this space and this moment in time with her.
Tuesday Aug 30, 2022
Tuesday Aug 30, 2022
My guest this week is Carmen Thompson a film programmer, curator and creative producer based in Scotland, who predominantly works with Black film and cinema from the African continent and the diaspora, especially at their intersections with non-fiction storytelling.
She currently works as cultural curator and programmer for award-winning exhibitors We Are Parable and as producer for international sales & distribution company Aya Films, where in recent years she has worked on the UK releases of acclaimed Kenyan film Rafiki (Wanuri Kahiu, 2018), Jamaican drama Sprinter (Storm Saulter, 2018) and Sundance award-winning This Is Not a Burial, It's a Resurrection (Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese, 2019). Aya Films also work across media education and in 2021 developed the app ‘Curate-It’: an interactive course designed to help democratise film programming and increase access to curatorial learning, supported by Screen Scotland.
Carmen has over 8 years’ experience in film exhibition and distribution and has worked for a range of organisations including Sheffield Doc/Fest, Africa in Motion (AiM) Film Festival, Everyman Cinemas, New Black Film Collective and Film Hub Scotland. She also serves on the board of Document Human Rights Film Festival, Glasgow Film and the British Independent Film Awards (BIFA).
We talk about her fairly circuitous route to programming and the responsibilities or considerations that come with that role, how she approaches contextualising or reframing African cinema, finding audiences who have been historically underserved when it comes to programming, leaving behind a PhD, wading into the world of freelance work and the interrogation at the heart of her programming.
As always these interviews are recorded over Zoom so quality can vary. But I hope you enjoy our conversation.
SHOW NOTES
Tuesday Aug 23, 2022
Tuesday Aug 23, 2022
I spoke to Adelaide Waldrop a certified Intimacy Director with Intimacy for Stage and Screen (ISS), where she trained with Lizzy Talbot and Yarit Dor (she began training in this work in 2017 with various practitioners in the UK and US). She also serves as the Secretary of the Intimacy Coordinators’s Branch of BECTU and teaches Intimacy for Performance at LAMDA.
Speaking of which, Adelaide graduated from LAMDA’s MA in Directing programme in 2017. She has directed productions in the UK and America and is the co-founder and co-Artistic Director of devised theatre company Maude.
Her credits as an intimacy co-ordinator include the upcoming Netflix erotic thriller DAMAGE and upcoming ITV queer period drama THE CONFESSIONS OF FRANNIE LANGTON. Past credits include Jack Rooke’s TV series BIG BOYS, Charlotte Wells’ directorial debut AFTERSUN, BBC drama THEN BARBARA MET ALAN written by Jack Thorne and Genevieve Barr. She is currently working on the HBO/Channel 4 series GET MILLIE BLACK by Marlon James.
We talk about drama school, how directing a production of Spring Awakening at 19 provided a first taste of co-ordinating intimacy, how establishing the necessity of having an intimacy co-ordinator on certain sets was at times difficult, choreographing non-sexual intimacy such as the father-daughter relationship between Paul Mescal and Frankie Corio in upcoming MUBI release and Cannes darling AFTERSUN, the kind of persona Adelaide embodies in order to do her job well, how she holds space for actors to admit discomfort and pushing the industry forward to be more representative and inclusive in its depictions of sex.
The fact that there are still actors who denounce the need for safe-guarding and choreography when it comes to sex scenes or any scene of an intimate nature, I think underscores the need for these kinds of conversations and I am beyond thankful to Adelaide for having this one with me.
Tuesday Aug 09, 2022
Tuesday Aug 09, 2022
My guest this week is Reetu Kabra, a London-based publicist with over 15 years’ experience working in house for renowned media and entertainment companies including the BBC and BBC Studios, UKTV, Discovery Networks and Penguin Random House.
During her time at BBC Worldwide she handled global publicity for the internationally acclaimed Doctor Who and Sherlock as well as other major BBC dramas including War & Peace, Luther and Wolf Hall. In 2017, she managed the Cannes Film Festival publicity campaign for Jane Campion’s Top of the Lake: China Girl.
Shortly thereafter Reetu founded her own company: RKPR, where she manages personal publicity for a number of actors and writers, as well as consulting for clients including Amazon Prime, Netflix and Apple TV+ among others. She recently worked as a unit publicist for The Essex Serpent starring Claire Danes and Tom Hiddleston (AppleTV+/See-Saw Films) and the adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman (Netflix).
We discuss many things, including how Reetu wound up working in the entertainment industry, where you begin with creating a publicity campaign and defining your audience, what exactly unit publicity is, what goes into creating behind-the-scenes featurettes such as this one for The Essex Serpent and what sets RKPR apart.
Reetu was an incredibly intelligent and incisive guest and for me, this conversation served as a reminder that there really is a strategy behind publicity and how shows or even people get promoted, it’s not just about putting a trailer up on YouTube and hoping for the best. There is real creativity and specificity and ambition when it comes to finding an audience for a film or TV series.
Tuesday Aug 02, 2022
Tuesday Aug 02, 2022
My guest this week is Aoife McArdle, a filmmaker from Northern Ireland who you may know from her recent stint as a co-director and producer on Apple TV's Emmy-nominated series Severance.
Severance depicts a world in which people can choose to surgically divide their work and personal lives, so neither selves have any idea who they are outside of those realms. It stars Adam Scott, Patricia Arquette, John Turturro and Christopher Walken and it recently secured 14 Emmy Award nominations, including the first Outstanding Drama Series for Apple TV. It’s truly an exceptional show, so inventive and cohesive and the storytelling is just chef’s kiss. The final episode, which I won’t spoil, is on another level.
And so I was thrilled to speak to Aoife on the basis of that alone, but then I discovered her extensive background in directing music videos for artists like Bloc Party, Jon Hopkins, James Vincent McMorrow, Anna Calvi and U2. Her direction is consistently gorgeous and her eye for visuals outstanding.
In 2017 Aoife directed her first feature Kissing Candice, about a 17-year-old girl who desperately wants to escape her small seaside town and finds solace in her imagination. More recently she directed a short film starring Cillian Murphy called All This Unreal Time, an immersive sort-of performance piece written by Max Porter - a preternaturally gifted writer - that explores themes of repentance, masculinity and environmentalism. Description of any sort won’t do it justice, so I urge you to click the link in the show notes and give it a watch.
We talk about how Aoife discovered filmmaking was a career and how she began to pave her way into it, her creative process when directing music videos, the learning curve that was her directorial debut, adapting to the environments you’re shooting in and working with what’s available, and of course, her experience on Severance, working with a very talented ensemble cast and in tandem with Ben Stiller and what she’s working on now…