Looking At Life Through Another's Eyes: Ira Storozhenko On Her Short "Juliet"
Director Ira Storozhenko started her career in film with a documentary when she was just 17 years old, which screened at the Moscow International Film Festival. Her narrative short, Masterpiece, also played at thirteen film festivals around the world, including the Oscar-qualifying Foyle Film Festival. Her latest effort Juliet focuses on a transgender teenager hoping to play Juliet in a Romeo & Juliet school play.
A transgender teenager battles prejudice and her own self-doubt to audition for the female lead in her high school’s play.
This powerful short was inspired by the director and producers' experiences with gender discrimination, and it has already screened at 7 film festivals, including the Oscar-qualifying AFI Fest 2020 and Indie Short Fest where it won the 2020 Best Student LGBTQ Short Award. We had the pleasure of chatting with Ira about her film, its origins, collaborating on the story, finding an immersive visual approach, and much much more!
How did the concept for Juliet originate?
The idea about the school theatre as a place full of intrigues and bullying came from my personal life experience. Growing up in Russia, I’ve experienced all kinds of bullying during my teenage years. As a result, there were moments when I could not even look at my reflection in the mirror; I hated myself so much. The concept of Juliet appeared about a few years ago when I met Jasmine Mosebar (actress and my dear friend), and she told me about her experience in theatre during her transition time. It felt so close to my own experience and also I was very moved by Jasmine’s story. I just had a feeling that I needed to make Juliet and share it with the rest of the world to inspire teenagers to believe in themselves.
Even though the film has personal roots, it was penned by someone other than yourself. Can you talk a bit about the collaborative process between you and screenwriter Wilandrea Blair, and how your experience branched out into the realm of fiction?
Wilandrea came on board almost immediately after I pitched her the concept of the story. I will never forget how she looked at me and just simply said: “Yes, I’m in.” Wilandrea has always been one of the screenwriters in our year I dreamt to work with. I was very happy when she joined the team as I knew the project would be in very good hands. Wilandrea is a dream to work with. She is extremely professional and incredibly supporting. We have had so many interesting conversations about the structure of the movie - it has gone through so many stages. The hardest question was always: how can we fit the story into one day of the teenager in the school?
Wilandrea has done an incredible work of breaking down the story beat by beat and showing me all possible options and ways of where it can go. I was so moved by her ability to always find time and meet with me, go through the development process again and again, start from scratch if needed, explain to me why certain things would or would not work. At the same time she would always take care of every emotional beat I was trying to bring in the story. I learned so much from Wilandrea, and I'm very thankful that she chose this project and joined the team.
The film features a strong lead performance from Reise Alexander. How did you discover this talented performer?
Reise is a big miracle of this project. Katherine D. May (the producer of the project) brought an amazing casting director Russel Boast. Russel has done such a big research — we had been looking through so many auditions for the role of Serena. About a month before our Principal Photography, Russel sent us Reise’s self-tape, and I immediately called Katherine.
It was challenging to bring Reise on board because we had a very limited budget, and it was difficult to bring an actress who is under 18 y.o. from another state to work in Los Angeles. At the same time, both Katherine and I were absolutely sure that Reise was the one who should be performing Serena. I had few conversations with Reise over Zoom where she kept saying how similar the story was to her life experience and what she would add on top of that. I was absolutely convinced that there is no other option but to bring Reise on board. Katherine did an amazing job to accommodate all the needs; she raised more money in the very short time period, remade the budget and corrected the schedule to make sure we can work with Reise. I am still blown away by Katherine’s ability to change everything on a very short notice to make sure we could work with Reise. When I finally met Reise in person, I knew it would be an amazing journey and I was very excited to begin working with her.
How did you and cinematographer Sarah Pierpont create the film’s aesthetic?
Sarah was another person in the AFI Conservatory I always wanted to work with. I couldn’t be more happy when she signed for the project. I knew that Sarah has had her own teenage theatrical experience which allowed her to connect with the story on a very deep level.
Developing visual language, we were thinking about the main character and how to create a very subjective story. In other words, how can we show the world from Serena’s point of view. Sarah came up with the very interesting concept of a camera representing literally what Serena sees. I was very excited to try an extremely subjective way of narrative and together we came up with all steadicam ideas of camera movements — trying to emphasize the idea of “here and now.”
Sarah also brought an idea of the finale — the moment when Serena is running away in the back of the stage and we can see Rosa performing at the same time through a transparent backdrop. I was so much in love with the idea of seeing Rosa’s success and Serena’s “all in loss” moment at the same time.
Sarah also decided to operate the camera by herself whenever it would be handheld. It brought such a unique style and approach into the project. I trust Sarah’s vision for hundred percent. I knew that her experience allows her to know exactly when to move the camera, when to let it “breathe” when to “freeze”: all movements were aligned with the character's feelings and it did feel very authentic watching every camera move.
What drew you to the visual arts? How did you get into directing?
As I mentioned before, my story begins in the school theatre. Despite the fact that my desire to be an actress died when I was 13 y.o., at the same time I changed schools and went into the gymnasium of arts where I began creating short stories with my peers and ended up making theatrical shows with my classmates on the school stage. I would never go on the stage to perform any of the roles but would always create a schedule for rehearsals, assign roles and help with stage directions. At the same time, in the last three years of high school I was very interested in studying fine arts and the idea of applying to film school came to my mind around that time. I felt like cinema has so many opportunities and seemed like the perfect combination of all sorts of art: storytelling, paintings, architecture, design music and performance.
What films or filmmakers have inspired you, your style, or your approach to telling a story?
I learn from every movie and TV series I watch. It would be a very big list to mention every director and every movie which inspires me as an artist. Lately, I was very moved by Toni Erdmann directed by Maren Ade; always enjoy rewatching Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet, and Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman (or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance). The last two movies were big references for Juliet
What do you hope audiences take away from the film?
It was always the goal to get as close to Serena as possible — to make a very emotional piece which will get the audience into Serena’s world and will allow people to look at events through her eyes. I wanted to inspire every teenager in the world to be brave and never let anyone influence or shut down their creative voice. I wanted to support every kid who feels misunderstood or misheard to gain power and self-belief.
Do you have any future projects in the works that you can share with us?
I Just finished principal photography of another short movie in the AFI Conservatory. It will be the story about an obsessively diligent ride-share driver Sam (Michael Nathanson), who notices his high rating start to go down for no reason. He then goes on an extreme journey to find out why people suddenly stopped liking him.
It has been an amazing experience to collaborate with Nik Sysuev (the writer and producer of the project - AFI Conservatory fellow and BAFTA newcomer). We are waiting for our post-production to begin, and I am very excited to see how this story will make it to the screen!
What do you think? We want to know. Share your thoughts and feelings in the comments section below, and as always, remember to viddy well!