Festival Success Stories: Kate Herron
Kate Herron | Illustration: Frankie Stewart
Interviewed by Mark Brennan
Edited by Kate Stocker-Wright
If proof was ever needed that making and taking short films onto the festival circuit continues to be one of the most effective ways to launch a career, look no further than former Festival Formula client, Kate Herron.
Since working with us and her short film Five by Five, Kate has gone on to direct episodes of Sex Education on Netflix before taking the reins as series director of Loki on Disney+.
Everyone starts somewhere, as the saying goes. Before eventually being handed the keys to Marvel’s Loki television series, Kate Herron first directed short films and navigated the festival circuit like many other filmmakers. Festival Formula had the great pleasure of working with Kate on her short film Five by Five.
“Working with Festival Formula wasn’t my first run on the festival circuit but working with the team, it was immediately clear their incredible knowledge and resources meant we could use our budget effectively.”
The film would go on to have a run that would include selections at PalmSprings International Short Festival, Flickerfest, and Aesthetica, to name a few – but festival selections aside, what does Kate think constitutes a successful film festival run?
“I always think if you’re a step ahead from where you started. This doesn’t necessarily mean awards, it can be as simple as connecting with other filmmakers and building your network. Two of my favourite experiences were flying over for Cucalorus and winning Best Comedy at the Rhode Island Film Festival. The latter is an Oscar-qualifying festival, and this was massive for me and the team to have our work seen and recognised by a festival of this level. We were also nominated for the Oscar-qualifying Best Short prize here. I remember finding out we won Best Comedy while on the train home from my temp job and it gave me the enthusiasm and boost to keep going.”
The hard graft of pulling together a short film on set and in the edit suite versus finally being able to screen the finished article to audiences always seem like worlds apart – and the journey from one to the other always has bumps along the way.
“I think it’s the nature of the beast. Making a short is unique and emotionally exposing. You’re sending this snippet of how you see the world to people to judge and possibly reject. It’s impossible not to sometimes feel it is a reflection on yourself with the rejections.
“Honestly, I think my best remedy to this, having worked for festivals, is to know there are so many different reasons your film gets rejected, even just runtime. Our spreadsheet had just as much, if not more, red rejection highlights than acceptances but this is the same short that got nominated at big festivals and let us travel to cool niche ones. The run still helped us progress in our careers and make great contacts.”
With that said, how has her film festival experience helped to move her career forward?
“It completely helped me. Festival Formula helped me further build my reputation as a filmmaker and I was able to attend and connect with the people at a lot of festivals. Some of these were great for work contacts but honestly some were just fantastic life experiences. The British Council paid my way to attend Flickerfest in Sydney and getting to travel there and experience a country so far away was life changing.”
And for those filmmakers about to embark on their film festival journey for the first time, what advice would she offer?
“Be set on your budget and just to enjoy it, meet as many people as you can and keep an eye on the British Council travel list as there’s quite a few you could get financial support to attend.”
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