Penny Woolcock is a writer and director with a background in radical theatre and the trade union movement. She has worked across film, television, radio, and live opera, and made both fiction films and documentaries. She is best known for the [...]
In 2010 when my son was a week old my friend Corinna McFarlane came to meet him. She also wanted to tell me that she was going away for a while, to write a script about her unknown ancestors in Scotland. [...]
Sometimes I feel like an Uber driver in Los Angeles. I’ve moved to a city where my skill is necessary and much valued, but comes with no job security. And definitely no tips. I’m a freelance Archive Producer, which involves footage [...]
This week we had our first informal Raising Films gathering, to discuss Shooting Away From Home. A room of parents gathered to share their experiences, or to find answers to questions that were worrying them. Some people were shooting away from [...]
The VFX industry, as I know it, is not a 9-5 existence, quite often we work late to meet deadlines, or to take calls from state side clients. Also, when on shoots, VFX related shots often get shunted to the end of [...]
I get home back to Edinburgh on Halloween. My children are out guising, and the house is empty and dark. I drag in my muddy welly boots and collapse. The doorbell rings and there are a group of children offering me [...]
Born in Dublin in 1969, and now living in Canada, Emma Donoghue is a screenwriter, novelist, playwright and literary historian. Most recently she was nominated for an Oscar, Golden Globe and Bafta for her screen adaptation of her novel ROOM. She [...]
Kate McLarnon's and Sky Neal's documentary Even When I Fall launches its crowdfunder for the final shoot and edit today, International Women's Day 2016. I found out I was pregnant the day before I set off for an ethnography shoot in New [...]
This is the first instalment in a series of diaries from Alice Lowe on the making of Prevenge. It's mid-December 2015 and I’ve got a month to work on the edit of Prevenge before I give birth. We shot a month [...]
The average wage in the creative industries is £16,575. The average cost of a full time nursery place in London is £14,750 (Creative Blueprint via PIPA) That's why Parents in Performing Arts (PIPA) are crowdfunding to hold public meetings and lobby theatres to [...]
Tomorrow we start our final week of principal photography which means this time in a week I’ll be home. I can’t pretend I’m not loving shooting this film, because honestly there’s not much in the world that I have loved doing [...]
My daughter was born four months ago, I've spent my maternity leave, as many people do, hanging out with other new mums in coffee shops and generally wondering where the time is going. I've got used to seeing other people's slight [...]
Clare Binns is Acquisitions & Programming Director for the Picturehouse Cinema Group. As well as acquiring titles for Picturehouse Entertainment, she is responsible for overall programming policies. Winner of the 2009 WFTV Award for Contribution to the Medium and 2015 Screen Awards Exhibition [...]
Esther May Campbell's debut feature LIGHT YEARS premieres at the London Film Festival on 14 October 2015. A self-taught writer and director, her short 'September' won the Best Short Film BAFTA 2009, and she has worked on the TV shows SKINS and [...]
Beeban Kidron, Baroness Kidron, OBE, is a filmmaker, activist and campaigner. Her early films, Carry Greenham Home and Oranges are Not the Only Fruit, are key texts of British and feminist cinema. She subsequently moved to Hollywood, making films including Used People, To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything, [...]
Hope Dickson Leach's The Levelling diaries continues... “Oh and the cat’s shitting blood and might need to be put down.” “What?” “They’re fighting - I’ve got to go.” And so ends the conversation with my husband around bedtime on day 9 [...]
Hattie Morahan is a stage and screen star. She was was awarded the Best Actress prize at the Critics' Circle Awards 2013 and won the Natasha Richardson Award for Best Actress at the Evening Standard Theatre Awards 2012 for her portrayal of Nora in Carrie Cracknell's A [...]
Becoming a father was the best thing that happened to me. I found my calling the moment I held my daughter in my arms. Becoming a father has also compounded some of the pre-existing perceptions and concerns I had about a [...]
Deborah Sathe is Head of Talent Development and Production at Film London. She oversees groundbreaking domestic and international projects which champion new talent and audiences. Last year she relaunched the award-winning feature film fund Film London Microwave, and through its initial round has [...]
Helene Klodawsky is a veteran independent filmmaker – a passionate storyteller committed to portraying political and social struggles, as well as to exploring the documentary art form. Helene is known for poignant, daring films. Painted Landscapes of the Times (1986), Shoot and Cry (1988), Motherland [...]