The Writers Lab UK & Ireland announces participants and honourees for 2022 lab
Date Posted: August 15, 2022
The Writers Lab UK & Ireland has announced its selection of mentors, participants and honourable mentions for its Lab that supports women and non-binary writers over 40.
In its second year in the UK and Ireland, this screenwriters lab is a unique opportunity to discover exciting writers from across Scotland, England, Ireland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and to nurture talent with leading film and TV industry mentors. The final selection represents a thoughtfully curated and intersectional range of voices to ensure diverse narratives by writers who will go on to shape the future of the film and TV industry.
The Writers Lab UK & Ireland is produced by Untamed Stories’ Julia Berg and Ruth Spencer and TWL co-founders Elizabeth Kaiden and Nitza Wilon. It is presented with support from Dirty Films, the multi-vertical independent production company headed by Cate Blanchett, Andrew Upton, Coco Francini and Georgie Pym. The Writers Lab UK & Ireland is in association with Birds’ Eye View, Dancing Ledge Productions, Curzon CM Development Fund, Maisie Williams´production company Rapt, London-based Film & TV Agency Dench Arnold, Screen Scotland, Fís Éireann/Screen Ireland, Northern Ireland Screen, Ffilm Cymru Wales & BFI NETWORK with funding from the National Lottery.
The programme will run September 2022 to February 2023, with leading screenwriters, commissioners, directors and producers including Cheryl Dunye (THE WATERMELON WOMAN), Romola Garai (AMULET), Elizabeth Karlsen (CAROL) and Tilusha Ghelani (Commissioning Editor, Sky Comedy). Submissions covered a wide range of genres and subject matter, in both feature and pilot formats (both 1-hour and ½-hour), reflecting stories and perspectives from all over the UK and Ireland. The Writers Lab UK & Ireland is dedicated to matching talent with industry veterans to elevate the work of women screenwriters in their prime through mentorship, advocacy and exposure.
The 13 participants of The Writers Lab UK & Ireland 2022 are:
BIG SHOES, N’kiru. Njoku (1-Hour Comedy, England)
Bola – a turbulent teenager believed to be the reincarnation of a wise ancestor – gets carte blanche over her wealthy grandma’s estate, much to the shock of her chaotic Nigerian family who must now impress her if they want an inheritance.
BLACK OTHER, Stephanie Pearce-Power (½-Hour Drama, England)
Brought up by white parents in suburban England, Vanessa decides to search for her birth family, whilst trying to handle adultery, her afro and woke daughter, Maya.
DISCONNECTED, Esosa Ighodaro (½-Hour Comedy, Ireland)
After she is jilted, a Nigerian tech whizz tries to regain control of her life by living in the natural surrounds of the West of Ireland.
GADFLIES AND MISCHIEVOUS LITTLE GIRLS, Lisa Baker & Anne-Marie Margerison (Feature Action, Wales)
96 nuclear weapons are headed to Britain and our plucky heroines, armed with only tenacity, wit and sensible shoes, are determined to stop them.
HIDDEN, Rosalind De Aragues (1-Hour Thriller, England)
A bold, erudite Somali woman is recruited as a private concierge into London’s most exclusive lifestyle management agency, where she uncovers a global money laundering web with links to her own family’s hidden past.
LONE WOMAN, Lisa Keogh (Feature Thriller, Northern Ireland)
A solo female traveller is stalked while camping along the Irish Coast, but she’s not the helpless target her predator anticipated.
MARIE’S WEDDING, Claire Duffy (Feature Drama, Scotland)
A star-struck dreamer desperate not to succumb to deprivation sets out to avenge her brother’s gangland murder. She climbs the ranks to become the most feared woman in 1960s Glasgow, but when her family is massacred on her wedding day she must face the true horror that motivates her before she destroys the city that made her — and herself.
NORTHERN LIGHTS ON AN OLD ROAD, Nicola Baldwin (Feature Sci-Fi, England)
When Angela Cartwright awakes in her car on the Yorkshire moors one day in 1990 with no memory of the last few hours, reporter Charlie suggests alien abduction. Locals, bandmates, farmers, rival biker-gangs and Look North TV are drawn into the ensuing media circus as Angela questions – for the first time – her place in the Universe.
PLANET RISING, Tamsin Larby (1-Hour Drama, England)
When a lawyer’s son is framed for eco-terrorism after an explosion at an oil refinery, she takes on the corrupt and dangerous world of the fossil fuel industry to exonerate him.
SABRINA HEALEY, Samara MacLaren (1-Hour Drama, Scotland)
When Sabrina is selected to stand as an MSP in her home seat, it represents the culmination of years of work campaigning. Running against an unpopular government minister, she is convinced it is a winnable seat. But while her star is rising, is her family falling apart?
SAVIOURS, Rosie Toner (Feature Horror, Scotland)
SAVIOURS is a suburban horror that captures the suffocating relationship between two teenage girls and the power that corrupts, as a Teenage Messiah leads a cult group of vulnerable teenagers to a dangerous end.
SMASHERS, Bernadette Rowe (½-Hour Comedy, Ireland)
A hopeless rural badminton team’s dreams of winning the championship dramatically improve when a dynamite new player arrives, but she comes with an explosive secret.
WINGS, Julie Moggan (Feature Coming-of-Age, England)
A lonely teenager takes a job in the local chicken factory, to save to get away; little imagining that in this unlikeliest of shitholes she will finally find her wings.
The 12 Honourable Mentions of The Writers Lab UK & Ireland 2022 are:
AND FOR YOUR INFORMATION, Denise Deegan (Feature Drama, Ireland)
BOY, Amber Trentham (Feature Drama, England)
DE-BRA, Heather Brown (½-Hour Comedy, Northern Ireland)
DONOR 1070, Bethan Marlow (1-Hour Comedy, Wales)
THE EIGHTH WONDER, Denise Devoy (1-Hour Sci-fi, England)
INFLUENCE, Olivia Hannah (1-Hour Comedy, England)
THE LIFT, Lorien Haynes (Feature Sci-fi, England)
MARGARET’S WARDROBE, Ita Fitzgerald (Feature Comedy, England)
ME AND JIMMY ROGERS, Leia Vogelle (Feature Drama, England)
OVER THE RAINBOW, Joanne Dunphy (Feature Comedy, England)
SCATTERED, Karen Martinez (Feature Comedy, England)
WILD ATLANTIC, Ruth Earley (Feature Drama, England)
The Writers Lab UK & Ireland 2022 mentors and guest speakers include:
Farhana Bhula, Senior Commissioning Executive, Film4
Cheryl Dunye, Writer/Director THE WATERMELON WOMAN
Romola Garai, Writer/Director THE AMULET
Ana Garanito, Head of Scripted, Greendoor Pictures
Tilusha Ghelani, Commissioning Editor, Sky Comedy
Yvonne Isimeme Ibazebo, Producer TOP BOY
Elizabeth Karlsen, Producer CAROL
Emily Mortimer, Writer/Director/Producer THE PURSUIT OF LOVE
Alice Seabright, Writer/Director/Producer CHLOE
Claire Wilson, Writer ROCKS
To find out more information visit http://thewriterslab.nyc/uk-lab/.
