By Hannah-Rose Yee | June 26, 2022

Best on stage: the new class of Australian female directors to know

Gracie Otto

There is no part of filmmaking that Gracie Otto doesn’t love. “Being on set is my happy place,” she says, but she also craves the “solitude and calmness of being in the edit” and tears up when she watches the trucks leave at wrap. “It reminds me of being in my gumboots when I was young, running around looking for my dad on set,” Otto reflects–her father Barry is the legendary star of Strictly Ballroom–“or watching [my sister] Miranda filming The Lord of the Rings and looking over at the director and being like, ‘I want to do what he’s doing.’” Which is what she did: graduating from shorts to documentaries, television–Netflix’s Heartbreak High reboot–and now, feature films. Her debut Seriously Red, about a Dolly Parton obsessive, premieres at the Sydney Film Festival this month.

Favourite Australian film? “Strictly Ballroom–it’s a classic underdog story but so completely original. Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin have always been a big inspiration to me.

Shannon Murphy

What happens when your first film, the coming- of-age drama Babyteeth, becomes a global sensation? If you’re filmmaker Shannon Murphy, you spend the next few years searching for a new story that speaks to your soul. “I’m always looking for that rough diamond,” Murphy reflects. “Something unusual. I am genre- agnostic. It’s all about hearing a story in a voice I’ve never heard before.” (Secretly, she admits, she’d love to direct a musical.) Murphy started in theatre before moving to film and television, where she has worked on Killing Eve and forthcoming feminist dystopian series The Power. “It’s the largest scale work I’ve ever directed,” she says, “and it was an absolute thrill to have such big worlds to craft.”

Favourite Australian film? “Love Serenade. I think Shirley Barrett is a comedic genius!”

Shari Sebbens

Theatre direction is a very different discipline to cinema; on stage, anything can happen. It’s also a “collaborative process”, says Shari Sebbens, resident director at the Sydney Theatre Company–her productions this year include City of Gold and A Raisin In The Sun. Sebbens began her career as an actor, starring in films including The Sapphires. Though she still loves performing, working behind the scenes offers a new thrill. “What I love about directing is discovering the rhythm of an entire show, the way a play breathes as a whole instead of just being one little piece inside of it,” she shares.

Favourite Australian film? “Hercules Returns. To this day I go home to Darwin and my best friends and I will quote it to each other like we’re 13!”

Sophia Banks

At uni, Sophia Banks saw The Godfather for the first time and fell in love with cinema. She decided she wanted to be a director. The response? People “encouraged me to pick a more realistic career and maybe pursue something in more ‘female departments’,” Banks recalls. So she went into fashion–working as a stylist and costume designer for brands including Christian Siriano–before finding her way back to her first love. Mid-2020, Banks made her debut film, an action-packed thriller called Black Site, shot in just 26 days. Her dream project? “James Bond or a huge epic action film with lots of cars,” Banks says. “I love cars.”

Favourite Australian film? “Strictly Ballroom, Muriel’s Wedding and Mad Max.”

Kacie Anning

For director Kacie Anning, who has worked with The Office creator Greg Daniels on his new series Upload, nailing the perfect comedy set-up is a challenge. “When done well, it looks effortless. But it is an incredibly technical genre,” explains Anning, from workshopping jokes on the page to giving actors the space to deepen the humour while also figuring out how the camera can create room for laughter, too. “The craft of comedy is totally underrated, in my opinion.” Anning is currently channelling it all into her own comedic series: Prime Video’s Class of 07, about a school reunion gone disastrously awry.

Favourite Australian film? “The millennial in me can’t go past Looking for Alibrandi.”

Suzanne Kim

Choosing a Korean drama series to watch on a Sunday afternoon was a ritual for Suzanne Kim growing up, one that taught her the power of connection through screens. No wonder she went on to become a filmmaker herself, working her way up to producer and, now director. Soon, Kim will direct an episode of Night Bloomers, a Korean horror anthology, commissioned by SBS. “It’s an exciting time in filmmaking right now,” she reflects, “where there’s more of a deliberate and communal goal to make it an equitable industry, and people are finally paying attention.”

Favourite Australian film? “The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert and Jane Campion’s short film Peel.”

Sophie Hyde

The director of celebrated films including Animals and this year’s Emma Thompson-led Good Luck To You, Leo Grande–coming soon to cinemas–has a very specific approach to her craft. “I want the films to be satisfying the way a really good meal is–not fast and disposable, not pretentious and unreachable, but warm, well-made, nourishing and pushing us a bit beyond our comfort zone,” Hyde explains. “Joyful and enriching.” Leo Grande is that; an intimate portrait of female sexuality, filmed in England but fine-tuned by Hyde’s editor, cinematographer and partner Bryan Mason in their shed in Adelaide. (“With our dog and chickens, the garden, the sunshine ...”) Of the film, she shares: “I am proud of the collaboration with Emma and what we were able to get to because of the trust we built in each other.”

Favourite Australian film? “Too hard to choose just one. I love Head On, Flirting, The Year My Voice Broke, Romeo + Juliet, Samson & Delilah, Somersault, Snowtown, Proof and The King.”

8/8

Emma Thompson (left) and Sophie Hyde on the set of Good Luck to You, Leo Grande.

This story originally appeared in Vogue Australia's June issue, guest-edited by Baz Luhrmann. On sale June 6.

Vogue feature - Sophia Banks