I feel very lucky and it feels very surreal that I get to share this news. My short film with
@bbcfilmofficial will be premiering
@berlinale 2026. I started to write this film in lockdown. All these kind of existential thoughts had gotten more intense during that time. I thought a lot about my family - the unspoken conversations, things you just don’t say or share but feel deeply. I thought about my beautiful blonde haired mum, how she was often asked if the kids that hugged her legs whilst she paid at cash desk were hers. I thought about my Jamaican dad doing my hair for school - only he knew how, the baby lotion he’d rub energetically into my skin making sure there wasn’t an ounce of opportunity for a hint of ashiness to appear. I thought about how he filled a space with his presence - all his emotions so deeply buried in his conviction to move forward in life - because “where we are now is far better” than before. Whatever “before” was? I thought about my brother - my guide, bit of a hero. A proud owner of his ethnicity, his unique genes in the small town we grew up in, in the midlands, set him apart, with his Rap Gods poster and his obsession with
@therealkano & The Game. I remember wondering how to stand/walk/talk/dress as Fenn Grace O’Meally, I could never be quite as honestly “gangsta” as my brother, but I could never be quite as effortless as my mom. I’d put on her skin coloured tights sometimes for school on colder days and watch her do her make up and comb through her hair in awe. Then the next moment I’d be in my brothers room, listening to 50 Cent talk about “selling dope for a four figure ring” which would likely be turned off as soon as dad’s car pulled up to the drive - Dad wasn’t a fan of the words that came from the faces of those on the Rap Gods poster.
This film is about family, with its different ethnicities and hair textures, complexities and expressions of self. Families are awkward and odd, wonderful and wounded - this is a love letter to mine ❤️
@_lucachapman @elizabethdoonan @lil_silva Arseni,
@tobyheard Duval
@fran_mottola @thedavidgyasi @lu_phelpsactor @anaya___rose @boodzino @matt__hannigan @deshamiltoncasting @susejones 
