Women in Film and TV Podcast

In 2016, actor Seána Kerslake participated in WFT Ireland’s ’A Stronger Voice For Women' event at the Galway Film Fleadh. In this recording from our archives, she chats about her background in performance, her process and past roles.

WFT Ireland spoke with Seána just after she filmed the lead role of Aisling in the RTÉ drama series Can’t Cope, Won’t Cope directed by Cathy Brady and written by Stefanie Preissner. Her other projects that year included Darren Thornton’s forthcoming feature film, A Date for Mad Mary in which she plays the lead. Seána trained with the Screen Acting Programme at The Factory in Dublin (now Bow Street Academy) and has a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Music & English from NUI Maynooth.

In the latest WFT Podcast, we explore the opportunities available for members through the Irish language.

This panel features TG4 Commissioning & Acquisitions Editor, Laura Ní Cheallaigh; Director Rachael Moriarty; Filmmaker Martina Durac, and Emmy Award-winning Producer Siobhán Ní Ghadhra. The discussion was moderated by our chair, Dr Susan Liddy.

This event has been made possible with the support of the BAI.

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In the latest WFT Podcast, listen to Board Member, DOP Jaro Waldeck in conversation with fellow Board Member Liz Gill about her work and career to date. Liz Gill is an award-winning screenwriter, director and producer, perhaps best known for her 2003 hit feature, Goldfish Memory. Liz Gill has directed a wealth of shows, from Eastenders to the Hardy Bucks and is currently story producing on the Netflix series Valhalla.

About Liz Gill

Liz is a producer, feature film and TV drama director and screenwriter best known for her film Goldfish Memory (2003). Her first feature was Gold in the Streets (1996), starring James Belushi, Ian Hart, Jared Harris and Aiden Gillen, produced by Noel Pearson. For TV, Liz has directed RTE’s Raw, TV3’s Deception, the 6-part comedy series Hardy Bucks and the second units of Camelot (Starz Encore) and The Santa Incident (Hallmark). She has also directed EastEnders for the BBC and RTE’s The Clinic, Hide and Seek and The Big Bow Wow, and served as Consultant Director on Love is the Drug,winner of the IFTA for best television drama. As a documentary director, Liz directed A Story With Me In It, for which she was nominated for an IFTA award for best TV director (2012), as well as Consuming Passions (series 1 & 2), Written Off? (Series 1 & 2), Burma – The Generals’ Genocide (RTE) and Sport Matters (Setanta). She has also worked extensively as a First Assistant Director in TV and feature films for directors such as Barry Levinson and Todd Haynes, among others, culminating in her writing “Running the Show – the Essential Guide to Being a First Assistant Director,” published by Focal Press (US). Recently, Liz produced the last two seasons of Vikings, the MGM drama series and is currently Story Producer on the MGM/Netflix series Vikings Valhalla.

This event has been made possible with the support of the BAI.

Earlier this year, WFT held a panel discussion, featuring our members who had work screening as part of the Virgin Media Dublin International Film Festival. In a discussion led by WFT Board Member Fiona Kinsella, we spoke with Paddy Director Roisin Kearney, Hum Director Maureen O’Connell, Imprints Director Cathy Dunne, The Fear Producer Dawn Mac Allister and Guard Up Performer Laura O’Shea. Talking about everything from managing careers to what makes a short great, listen to these talented women in our latest podcast here.

This event has been made possible with the support of the BAI.

Read more about these projects here https://wft.ie/panel-chat-celebrating-wft-members-at-vmdiff/

An audio mix can make or break a film, but what does it really take to forge a career in sound in this industry? As part of our Crew Talks series, Irish Sound Engineer Aoife McHale spoke with Academy Award-Winning Sound Engineer Lora Hirschberg about her career to date and the artistry behind what makes a sound mix great.

This event has been made possible with the support of Screen Skills Ireland.

Lora Hirschberg - Academy Award-winning Re-Recording Mixer (Inception) Lora Hirschberg has worked on more than 150 feature films and documentaries including Black Widow for Marvel Studio and Welcome to Chechnya for HBO. Lora mixes, supervises, and edits sound and has been nominated for another award in the same category!

Aoife McHale - Aoife graduated as a sound engineer in 2013 and has been working in the sound industry ever since. She has been employed for the past few years in television production as a sound recordist and boom operator. Before that, she spent five years freelancing as a sound editor and foley artist mostly in film.

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What makes a great film? It all starts with the script. It’s the blueprint of your story, a well-mixed cocktail of theme, structure and character. In this panel discussion, which took place this summer, WFT is showcasing the work and careers of three professional screenwriters working across a range of platforms - from soap, to feature writing, to comedy series. Hosted by WFT Chair Dr. Susan Liddy, Jennifer Davidson, Catherine Maher and Jenny Roche get chatting about all things writing.

This event was organised with the support of Screen Skills Ireland.

The relationship between a director and a cinematographer (DOP) is one of the key creative forces in the process of making a film. For this online workshop, which took place online in 2020, WFT spoke with a working duo, Writer/Director Oonagh Kearney (Five Letters To The Stranger Who Will Dissect My Brain) and DOP Eleanor Bowman (The Girl with the Mechanical Maiden) about their creative process. Using their funded film as an example, this event shines an important light on the needs of a DOP when it comes to helping a director visualise the story and to underline the key stages of their collaboration.

This event was organised with the support of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland.

Do you know that female actors start to slide off our screens when they hit their 40s? Unless your name is Frances, Meryl or Judi chances are you won’t lead a film though you may have a better shot in television. You’ll have less dialogue and the parts you are offered will often be little more than clichés and stereotypes. Small, inconsequential roles. For 2021, WFT is spotlighting this issue. It’s time to call a halt to ageism in the industry. In this panel chat, our chair Dr Susan Liddy spoke with actor, Orla Brady, casting agent Maureen Hughes and author and researcher Dr Josephine Dolan, teasing out the issues and taking a cold hard look at the film and television industries.

This event was organised with the support of Screen Skills Ireland.

Screen Ireland’s POV Scheme was established to support women filmmakers, and in 2020 four live-action fiction titles were commissioned with a budget limit of €400,000. In this podcast, which was recorded last April, POV Writer/Directors Kate Dolan and Antonia Campbell-Hughes talk to us about working on their two films You Are Not My Mother and It Is In Us All respectively.

This event has been made possible with the support of the BAI.

About Kate Dolan

Kate graduated from the National Film School at IADT in 2012. There, she majored in Directing. After working at ad agency TBWA for a year and a half after graduation Kate then took the leap to work on her writing & directing full time. She started working on commercials and writing in her spare time. In 2014, she attended Berlinale Talents to develop a short entitled Little Doll at the Short Film Script Station. The short then had its premiere at Berlinale 2016. For her work with Little Doll, she was included in the British Council’s fiveFilms4freedom 2016 Global List – 33 inspiring people from around the world promoting freedom, equality and LGBT rights every day. In 2017, she made her Screen Ireland funded short, Catcalls, an irreverent horror about a sexual predator who gets what’s coming to him. The film won Best Short Film at the YDA Ireland in 2018. Kate was included in the Irish Times list “Top 50 to Watch in 2019.” Her POV film You Are Not My Mother is scheduled to screen at the 46th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).

Antonia Campbell-Hughes

Antonia is a highly acclaimed actress with a wealth of awards and nominations under her belt. After a breakout leading role in Rebecca Daly’s The Other Side of Sleep at Directors Fortnight/Cannes, she went on to receive the 2012 Screen International ‘Star of Tomorrow’ title, followed by the prestigious Berlinale Shooting Stars award. She has received international acclaim for her brave film work, namely 3096Days, shot by Michael Ballhaus who received the Golden Bear at Berlinale 2016. She had a BAFTA-winning performance as Kelly in Kelly+Victor. Antonia wrapped leading in Colum Eastwood’s thriller Black Medicine shot in Belfast. Antonia is among the main cast with Claes Bang and Brian Cox in TV Pilot for 8-part series, Little Room. 2018 saw Antonia complete Cordelia, playing the title role. QUEST FOR LOVE, Antonia’s debut short as writer/director starring Kerry Condon (Galway Film Fleadh ’18), received glowing praise. 2019 saw Antonia second short ACRE FALL BETWEEN feature as part of THE UNCERTAIN KINGDOM project (BFI/NI screen). Antonia's Screen Ireland POV/Catalyst feature It Is In Us All was shot on location in Ireland 2020, led by Cosmo Jarvis.

#WomenInFilm #WFTIreland #WIFTI #IrishFilm

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Ever wonder what it’s like to direct on a big-budget production? Last April our Vice Chair Jaro Waldeck was in conversation with international TV Director Hannah Quinn. We spoke with Hannah about her craft, how she got started and her progression from a trainee assistant director to a director on large scale – large ensemble TV series, and her advice when it comes to directing projects with budgets big and small.

Hannah Quinn is a film & TV director, currently directing Valhalla for Netflix /MGM. Previously directed, Fate – The Winx Saga (Netflix), The Stranger (Netflix), Intergalactic (Sky), Blood (VMTV) Eastenders (BBC1) Red Rock (TV3) and short films Smithy & Dickie and My Bonnie. Before directing, Hannah worked as an Assistant Director for over two decades.

This event has been made possible with the support of the BAI.