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A weekly podcast interviewing women behind-the-scenes and below-the-line of the British film industry.
Episodes
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…
Friday Jul 29, 2022
Friday Jul 29, 2022
I’ve got a Friday treat for you in the form of this bonus minisode with documentary filmmaker and producer Sara Dosa, whose latest project FIRE OF LOVE is in UK cinemas today.
This explosive and intimate and eccentric documentary tells the story of Katia and Maurice Krafft, French volcanologists who were also a married couple. For two decades they roamed the planet, chasing eruptions and documenting their discoveries and in doing so, left behind a legacy that enhanced our knowledge of the natural world. Sara and the filmmaking team have crafted a lyrical and curious celebration of the intrepid scientists’ spirit of adventure, drawing from the Kraffts’ spectacular archive and imbuing their story with a freshness and ferocity that sizzles on the screen.
Sara has also directed an Emmy-nominated episode of the Netflix music docuseries REMASTERED about Johnny Cash's 1970 concert for Richard Nixon; and premiered her third feature as a director THE SEER & THE UNSEEN at the 2019 San Francisco International Film Festival.
As a documentary producer, she recently produced the Peabody and Emmy nominated SURVIVORS about Ebola in Sierra Leone (2018 IDFA / POV); co-produced AN INCONVENIENT SEQUEL: TRUTH TO POWER (2017 Sundance / Paramount) and THE EDGE OF DEMOCRACY (2019 Sundance / Netflix); and, produced Peabody award-winning AUDRIE & DAISY (2016 Sundance / Netflix Originals).
We talk about how she got her start in filmmaking, alongside studying anthropology and how her interest in human behaviour continues to inform her practice, as well as what led to her to directing FIRE OF LOVE, how she came to involve Miranda July and why Agnes Varda was a key inspiration.
Tuesday Jul 26, 2022
Tuesday Jul 26, 2022
My guest this week is Make-up and Hair Designer Claire Anne Williams.
Claire left a career as a legal secretary to train at the Delamar Academy before being accepted onto a ScreenSkills traineeship where she worked on big-budget productions such as Solo: A Star Wars Story and Maleficent: Mistress Of Evil.
After working on shorts, commercials and music promos, Claire received her first head of department credit working on Neil Maskell’s Klokkenluider and recently worked as Make-Up and Hair Crowd Supervisor on The Kitchen, co-written and produced by Daniel Kaluuya.
In 2021 Claire was recognised as a ScreenDaily Star of Tomorrow and she is represented by Lucy Price at Loop Talent.
We talk about quitting a satisfying career to pursue her dreams, the hardships of being a trainee later in life, the benefits of having an agent, how she creates a sanctuary for actors, as well as going into the craft of creating things like sweat and wounds and keeping spray tan consistent across weeks of shooting.
Claire was a really fun interviewee and it was great to expand my own understanding of how myriad make-up designing can be. It’s not just about eyeliner and lipstick.
This episode 114 of Best Girl Grip.
Tuesday Jul 19, 2022
Tuesday Jul 19, 2022
I am thrilled to say that my guest this week is Jessica Kiang.
Jessica is an International Critic for Variety, covering all the major European and Asian festivals. She also writes for Sight & Sound, BBC Culture, The New York Times and The Playlist, where she also spent five years as Features Editor. She also regularly features on the Film Comment podcast, which if you like film and discussion and why would you be here otherwise, I highly recommend.
Jessica mentions some of the pieces of writing of which she is proudest in the interview, including her New York Times review of Christopher Nolan’s Tenet and her essay for the Criterion release of David Cronenberg’s Crash, which I urge to you to check out but there are very few and perhaps none of her reviews where I haven’t marvelled at her perceptiveness and agility. There is a line towards the end of her Sight & Sound review of The Worst Person in the World where I actually stopped and clapped when I read it.
Which is all to say this was rather a joyous occasion, to be able to sit down with Jessica and probe her writing process and how she configures her reviews and what she keeps in mind she writing them.
We talk about how she transitioned from a career in advertising to writing about film full-time, her tips for aspiring film critics, managing relationships with editors and other writers the she looks to for inspiration.
I was really honoured to have Jessica as a guest and I don’t think our conversation disappoints.
This episode 113 of Best Girl Grip.
Tuesday Jul 12, 2022
Tuesday Jul 12, 2022
This week my guest is Sheena Patel, an assistant director for Film and TV. Her credits as a 1st AD include Casualty and Dominic Savage’s upcoming series I Am Ruth. She has also 3rd Assistant Directed on feature films such as Boxing Day and Pirates, as well as series like I Hate Suzie and Apple Tree House, and she is represented by Sara Putt Associates.
Sheena is also an author and a co-founding member of the poetry collective 4 Brown Girls Who Write and part of the reason I invited her on for this season is that she has just published her debut novel, I’m A Fan, of which many people are. It’s getting rave reviews and Sheena was listed in The Observer’s 10 Best Debut Novelists of 2022. I’m A Fan is published by Rough Trade Books and uses the voice of a single speaker to explore an unfaithful relationship and the power struggle within that, as well as how this connects with the wider world and our cultural obsession with status. Desiree Akhavan has called it hilarious, heartbreaking and sickening and you can get a copy via the Rough Trade website.
When I was preparing to talk to Sheena I figured that the conversation would be divided into two parts, but of course when someone’s passions co-exist in the way they do with Sheena, some overlap is to be expected and we sort of oscillate between the two and find some surprising comparisons between being an assistant director and being a writer or performer.
We talk about perseverance and how Sheena came to the television industry relatively late, how she establishes a sense of authority, collaboration and harmony on the floor and bluffing your way through imposter syndrome, as well as how and when she wrote her novel, what the process of finishing it and releasing it has been like and why she just wrote wherever her brain went.
It was a really fun and also chill chat. I think Sheena really embodies that sense of harmony and calm that maybe she presents when she’s AD’ing and yeah I came away from it thinking what a lovely way to have spent an hour of my Saturday morning. I think we’re lucky to have someone like Sheena in our film and TV industry and likewise, lucky to have her as a powerful and critical voice in and of our culture, so I feel very privileged to have had her on the podcast.
This is episode 112 of Best Girl Grip.
Tuesday Jul 05, 2022
Tuesday Jul 05, 2022
To kick off season six, I’m sharing a live edition that I recorded recently at Sundance London - an offshoot of the Sundance Film Festival that takes place every January in Utah - with the legend that is Tabitha Jackson, the outgoing Director of the Sundance Film Festival.
Tabitha was announced as the new Festival Director in January 2020, meaning that her first two festivals had to deal with the ramifications of Covid-19, as well as a reckoning around racial justice.
Her appointment came off the back of seven years as the Director of the Institute’s Documentary Film Program. Tabitha has over 20 years experience in the documentary and non-fiction field, having served as Commissioning Editor of Arts at Channel 4, as well as the Editor of More4 where she ran the day-to-day operations for the UK’s sixth largest digital channel including running the two key areas of original programming True Stories and More 4 Arts.
Of her commitment to the continuation of Sundance’s values, Tabitha has said “By fiercely holding space for independent perspectives and media created outside the mainstream market, we as a community can spark new narratives, protect bold critiques of power, and deepen our understanding of what is possible. It has never been more essential.”
Our conversation kicked off the 4-day industry programme and it was a really special moment, not just to share a stage with someone who I have greatly admired for a while now and who brings such grace and courage and clarity to her work, but to do something like this in association with Sundance London. Sundance is a festival I have LOVED for well over a decade. I have long combed their programme and made lists of all things I want to watch when they get a UK release and so it was a real privilege to get an insight into the ambitions and considerations behind that festival and that organisation via Tabitha. As ever, I hope you get something from this chat.
This is episode 111 of Best Girl Grip.
Monday Apr 04, 2022
Monday Apr 04, 2022
I lied and said that last week was the last episode for a while and then I got a very exciting email about interviewing this week’s guest and here we are.
That is guest is New York based cinematographer Ashley Connor, someone whose work I have been a big fan of for quite some time. She has lensed some of my favourite independent films, including Tramps, First Match and The Miseducation of Cameron Post, and is a regular collaborator with Josephine Decker, having shot Butter on the Latch, Thou Wast Mild and Lovely and Madeline’s Madeline.
Ashley has also shot music videos for Angel Olsen, Beach House and MGMT, plus worked on TV shows like Broad City, Ramy and High Maintenance, so I think it’s safe to say that Ashley is probably the coolest DP working today, and certainly someone whose work I am just always in awe of.
She came on the podcast to talk about her career thus far, but also shooting a new movie called True Things, directed by Harry Wootliff, who was on the podcast many, many episodes ago talking about her directorial debut Only You. True Things is her second feature and stars Ruth Wilson as a dissatisfied woman who gets into a passionate and slightly toxic relationship with Tom Burke and must sort of find her way back to herself. I think it’s a fearless and visceral and feverish piece of cinema about female sexuality and desire, and I think Harry is fast becoming one of our most exciting filmmakers in the UK and I think Ashley’s cinematography - which has always been very muscular and balletic and dynamic - is a perfect match for depicting this tempestuous relationship.
We also talk about how Ashley got her start in indie films, as well as the work she did to support herself, how she has developed this movement and emotion-based cinematography practice, shooting sex scenes and finding a new language for the depiction of women’s pleasure, working with and responding to actors, and why cinematography is often like being another actor in the room, working with Lena Dunham on her latest film, Sharp Stick, as well as power structures on film sets and how Ashley prioritises radical vulnerability to change that dynamic.
It was a really special conversation. I think Ashley is a very talented artist and filmmaker and proved also to be a very genuine and compassionate person and just someone I think we’re very lucky to have making movies and putting women’s feelings and desires at the forefront of cinema.
True Things is out in UK cinemas now. If you go to www.truethings.film you can find showings near you and I highly recommend that you do.
This is episode 110 of Best Girl Grip.