Director Perry Ogden has spent the last year going to festivals with his acclaimed film, Pavee Lackeen, as these diary extracts describe
Thursday, July 7th, 2005
Drive from Dublin to Galway for the Galway Film Festival where my first film, Pavee Lackeen, about a Traveller girl, will be screening tomorrow night for the first time.
Friday, July 8th
Winnie, the 12-year-old star of Pavee, her sister Rosie (13) and their mother Rosie (known as Rosie mum), along with two of their friends, arrive on the train from Dublin with my assistant, Mary. This is the first time they will see the film with an audience and the girls are already fighting over who is going to wear what. During the screening they run in and out of the cinema, laughing and shouting, doors banging. The film ends and there's a crescendo of applause. Mark (Venner, my co-writer) and I are called to the stage and say a few words. Rosie mum, Winnie and Rosie are presented with bouquets. It's all too much and, as questions are posed by the audience, they clam up.
Saturday, July 9th
Back at the hotel, Rosie mum is sitting outside in the sun enjoying her new-found celebrity with a few pints and sending the girls off to buy chips. Winnie, Rosie and their friends have been up all night dancing. Later, I hear that they were serenading Matt Dillon till the early hours.
Monday, July 11th
Read on the internet that Pavee has won the prize at Galway for best film!
Wednesday, August 31st
Arrive back in Dublin from a New York Times photo-shoot in Sri Lanka. Quick repack and then back to the airport with Violet (my daughter) for flight to Venice. A magical boat ride at dusk across the lagoon, then along various canals to the Piazza San Marco area, and south to the San Clemente Palace Hotel. At one time a prison for wayward priests, it sits alone on a 17-acre island. Late dinner with Martina (Niland, my co-producer) on the terrace. The prices are steep but it's the Venice Film Festival - we'll treat ourselves!
Thursday, September 1st
Familiar faces around the hotel - Spike Lee and Emir Kusturica are here as directors of All the Invisible Children, the Unicef portmanteau film about children at risk in various parts of the world. Violet and I go to pick up Winnie and Rosie mum from the airport, but they don't arrive on their scheduled flight. I call Mary in Dublin to see what has happened. She definitely put them on the flight, but it's possible they missed their connection in Paris. Mary Kate (another of Winnie's older sisters) rings from Dublin. She's sobbing and sounds traumatised. Some Travellers have smashed all the windows of their trailer. I try to calm her and reassure her that I will get her mother to ring as soon as she arrives.
Winnie and her mum finally arrive around 11.30pm. I don't really want to tell Rosie mum about the trailer. It's been a long trip and she's never been this far away from home. I decide to wait and choose my moment. But as we are sitting on the hotel terrace having a drink Mary Kate calls again. Rosie is amazingly calm, as if she knew this would happen once she went away.
Friday, September 2nd
Large crowds and paparazzi gathered at the Lido, probably waiting for the stars of Casanova, which is screening later. As we walk through the security gates two girls shout out: "There's Winnie! Look, Winnie. Hi Winnie, you're great in the film!"
Winnie is chuffed. The after-screening Q&A seems to go well, but I'm nervous. We are taken to a reception on the terrace of the Excelsior Hotel and served champagne. I'm told that the Italian television station, Rai Sat, wants to do an interview. The host is incredibly enthusiastic about the film.
Saturday, September 3rd
Talk to a group from the human rights summer school and then return to the hotel. As I step off the water taxi I see Rosie sitting at a table on the terrace with a pot of tea.
"Very dear country this, Perry," she calls out to me. "€8 for a cup of tea!"
Sunday, September 4th
Our last day. I didn't get a chance to catch any of the films I wanted to see, and missed the Lucian Freud exhibition. By the time we reach the airport I realise that I've spent €1,000 on water taxis.
Wednesday, September 14th
Flight from Dublin to Toronto, reading The Ongoing Moment by Geoff Dyer. There is a quote from photographer Dorothea Lange that echoes my own approach: "To know ahead of time what you are looking for means you're only photographing your own preconceptions, which is very limiting."
Thursday, September 15th
An excellent review of Pavee by Geoff Brown in the festival daily paper, under the heading "Made in Britain, Admired in Toronto". Lunch with Loic Magneron, my sales agent from Paris. He's concerned that a lot of the distributors, especially the Americans, have left already. The first screening of Pavee is packed and most of the audience stay for the Q&A, which is always a good sign.
Saturday, September 17th
I go to see L'Enfant. which won the Palm D'Or at Cannes. The directors, Luc and Jean Pierre Dardenne, introduce the film. The opening shots - of a young girl carrying a baby up a flight of stairs - send shivers up my spine.
Sunday, September 18th
The Toronto Daily Star publishes a picture of Winnie as one of the "Fresh Faces" of the festival - young actors who have left a lasting impression. "Winnie emerges as perhaps the most appealing waif the screen has known since Lilian Gish in the silent era," the article says.
Wednesday, October 26th
Dublin to Los Angeles. Pavee has been invited to screen at the Directors Guild of America as part of the Finders series. This is to help independent films find a distributor in the States and is the first time it has presented a non-US film in the series.
Thursday, October 28th
I've managed to track down the writer, Andrea Ashworth, who is living in LA, and invite her to the screening. Her book, Once in a House on Fire was an inspiration in the early days of researching Pavee. Andrea is deeply moved by the film and writes a note for Winnie and Rosie.
Friday, October 29th
My flight arrives late at Heathrow and there's no way I will make it to the National Film Theatre in time to introduce Pavee at the London Film Festival (LFF). I call Martina, who flew in from Dublin last night with Winnie and the two Rosies. She is still at the hotel, delayed because Rosie has vanished and they can't find her anywhere. Later I discover that they finally found Rosie in the gym of the hotel - on the rowing machine. She had been for a walk the day before, seen Prince William's house (Buckingham Palace) and, realising that it was nearby, thought there was a chance she might bump into him. So she had wanted to lose some weight and taken to a fitness regime of the rowing machine, the steam room, and back and forth to a tanning salon that she and Winnie had found nearby.
Friday, November 4th
Dublin. It's Winnie's 13th birthday and by chance BBC World are making a news item on the film in the family trailer. As they are filming, Colin Burch from Verve, our UK distributor, calls to say that we have won the Satyajit Ray Award for best first film at the LFF. It's given by the Satyajit Ray Foundation to the first film that "best expresses the humanity, compassion and artistry of Ray's vision".
Saturday, November 5th
The Irish Film and Television Awards (Iftas). In the morning I drive Winnie and Rosie to the Berkeley Court Hotel, where the Iftas have laid on hairdressers and make-up artists for the presenters, stars and guests. We arrive at the RDS and make our way into the drinks reception. Winnie is dressed in a beautiful red Mexican gypsy dress with a long train and black trim. She looks about 10 years older. James Nesbitt is hosting and the show is being transmitted live on RTÉ. Pavee has been nominated for four awards: best film, best director, best actress (Winnie) and best breakthrough performance. Terry George wins best director for Hotel Rwanda and then the final award of the evening, for best film, is presented by Sinead Cusack. "And the winner is . . . PaveeLackeen." Loud cheers as Martina, Winnie, Mark and I take to the stage.
Tuesday, November 8th
Pre-release screening at the Irish Film Institute. In the Q&A afterwards a man near the front, referring to Winnie and her family, says: "I wouldn't have any sympathy for them." I stupidly start trying to explain their situation and how we can't judge them by our own values, but realise later that what I should have said is: "They are not looking for your sympathy."
Monday, November 14th
I hear from the distributor that there was a problem at the multiplex cinema in the Liffey Valley Centre. It has rung to complain that it was inundated with Travellers over the weekend, who supposedly caused havoc, stealing sweets from the shop and robbing a walkie-talkie from a security guard. The cinema wants to take the film off as the new Harry Potter film is opening on Friday and it doesn't want any more trouble.
Tuesday, November 22nd
Fly overnight from New York to Dublin and arrive in time to meet Rosie mum, Winnie and Rosie to catch the 7.30am flight to Prague. We have to fly from Dublin to Thessaloniki (for the festival) via Prague and Athens. The plane is delayed and by the time we get to Prague we've missed the connection and are told there won't be another for several hours. I feel terrible subjecting Winnie and her family to the nightmare of modern travel. As we walk away from the flight connections desk, heads down, Rosie turns to me and says: "Too slow of a driver, Perry. He kept stopping. Did you see him, Perry, he was only an old fella. I saw him fiddling with the yokes when we were getting off the plane."
Many hours later we are put on a flight to Paris and from there to Athens, but by the time we get to Athens it's midnight and we have missed the connection to Thessaloniki.
Thursday, November 24th
I chose today to break in a pair of boots that I bought, at great expense, from the Margaret Howell shop in London. Bad decision. Something about the leather soles and wet pavements mean that I spend the whole day trying to stay upright. Finally crash over on to my back and almost smash my head on the pavement. I pull myself up and carry on walking, but I can hear Rosie mum walking behind me, talking to Mark, her eyes fixed on my boots, saying: "Them are very cheap shoes Perry's after buying, very cheap."
Friday, November 26th
In the evening I pick up an e-mail from Daniela Kotz at the Mannheim Festival: "Please contact me because of an award."
Saturday, November 27th
Fly from Thessaloniki to Frankfurt. A driver takes me on to Mannheim in time for the festival's closing ceremony, where I collect two prizes, the ecumenical jury prize and the Rainer Werner Fassbinder prize.
Thursday, November 31st
Slow train from Paris to Belfort. There's snow on the ground and it's freezing cold. After the screening we try to find something to eat, but everything is closed. At 1am I catch a train back to Paris and the first flight from there to Dublin.
Friday, December 2nd
Arrive in Dublin just in time to attend the Q&A for a special Traveller screening at the Irish Film Institute. Sadly there are two big Traveller funerals today and the cinema is not as full as it might have been. Saddest of all is the funeral of two young Traveller boys - Michael (almost three years old) and Joe McGinley (22 months) - who were burnt to death in their caravan a few days ago. It's not entirely clear as to exactly what happened but it appears that they were briefly left alone by their aunt, who had gone to fetch water, when an electrical fault (possibly because they had plugged into the mains supply) set the caravan alight.
Pavee Lackeen is out now on DVD