VIDEO Virtuoso Awards Group discussion

Some of the highlights from the Virtuosos night included:

Rosario Dawson, Executive Producer of OUR WORDS COLLIDE, World Premiering at SBIFF. Photo HERE.

Alana Haim - Watch HERE.

• On driving the stick shift truck in the film: “You do not want me to teach you how to drive stick…I was a terrible driver so I really do appreciate Bradley Cooper and Cooper Hoffman for letting me almost kill them…they lived to tell the tale.”
• On her parents playing her parents in LICORICE PIZZA: “My parents are in the audience tonight…my dad should honestly be getting this award tonight, he’s actually the star of LICORICE PIZZA, so give it up for my dad!”

Caitriona Balfe - Watch HERE.

• On bonding with her Belfast co-stars: “I think each of us in our own way, it touches us as a family in a deep and personal place… from that first day we all met each other with open hearts and a real eagerness to get to know each other.” 

Ciaran Hinds - Watch HERE.

• On working with Dame Judi Dench in Belfast: “She’s a hell of a rebel! That’s what makes her brilliant. ”
• On where BELFAST ranks in his 40+ years in film: “That’s a ridiculously hard question, thank you, Dave…I’ve had the great joy of working with extraordinary people like Steven Spielberg, Paul Thomas Anderson, Martin Scorcese, I don’t know how I ended up there, it’s like I walk in the door and there I was.”

Emilia Jones - Watch HERE.

• On fangirling over Will Smith: “Honestly, he’s the most well groomed man I have ever laid eyes on…All I could think was ‘you must smell amazing because you look so gorgeous!”
• On learning ASL: “The first time I met Troy he was telling me dirty stories in ASL, he was teaching me all the swear words! I think that just made us bond really quickly...I’m so glad that I could hang out with them to really learn the language.”

Saniyya Sidney - Watch HERE.

• On meeting Venus Williams while filming King Richard: “It was probably three weeks into shooting and I was  playing a nine-year-old Venus… she’s just full of life and she’s bubbly, and she just has this confidence to her that’s like when she walks in a room it just lights up the world. She’s literally Venus, she’s a goddess!”

Simon Rex - Watch HERE.

• On his unique experience shooting Red Rocket: “The movie was kind of chaos. Shooting during the pandemic, working with first time actors…the whole thing just almost didn’t even happen.The whole movie really happened as a happy accident…We didn’t have any permits, that’s why we weren’t eligible for SAG, it wasn’t a union film. It was just chaos but I think that worked to our advantage.”

Troy Kotsur - Watch HERE.

• On working with Marlee Matlin in CODA: “She was so fun to work with because we both had a mutual understanding of our art, our craft, honing our instrument, our language, and really we wanted to put our best performance in CODA, and we did.”
• On different accents in the deaf community and signing differently to play Frank than Troy would sign: “Believe it or not, hearing people in America have all different accents…and it’s just the same in sign language. We have regional accents in sign.”

Ariana Debose 

• On the need for more diversity in film: “Being a mixed chick…we don’t tell stories about being a mixed chick, especially mixed chicks from the south!”  - Watch HERE.
• On Steven Spielberg asking her to play Anita: “He asked me if I would be his Anita, which is a very important distinction to me. He invited me to be a part of the process as opposed to telling me what I’m gonna do, because I’m an Aquarius and I don’t like it when people tell me what to do!” Watch HERE.

Some of the highlights from the Writers Panel included:

Siân Heder on when she knew she’d become a writer: “Writing was always an outlet for me. I used to throw birthday parties as a kid where I would give everyone a character and they would have to come in character to the party…the fact that I was doing that at age 10, I was clearly on the path.”

Maggie on being afraid to take on a story with such a dark and complex look at motherhood: “I wrote the line where young Leda says ‘I hate talking to my kids on the phone’ on a plane and I kind of turned around and looked back to make sure nobody was watching me type that!”