Close-Up Culture’s Senior Writer Genevieve Dammery sat down with Writer/director/actress Louisa Connolly-Burnham to discuss her latest short film The Intimacy Coordinator, her career, and what it is like to evolve a career from acting into filmmaking.
Genevieve: Could you tell me a little bit about the initial idea that became The Intimacy Coordinator, and if there was a particular conversation or experience or observation that sparked it?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: I really wanted to make something in the thriller horror space. The film that I’d made before, Sister Wives, was a very soft, beautiful, sapphic love story, which I loved. But I wanted to whiplash my audience a little bit and make something different, andmake something in London. [I wanted to] make something a bit sexy and sinister. I knew that I wanted a creative switch. I always want to make stuff that I think that people will click play on. I’m always thinking, “what’s getting people talking right now?” What’s getting people excited, and I had noticed that the role of The Intimacy Coordinator was being quite widely discussed. I love intimacy coordinators. I’ve only really had great experiences with them. I really value them as an actress, and I always make sure that they’re there if required as a director/producer.
But some people don’t feel that way. It seems to be a rather divisive role. It’s quite a new role…it’s only been around since 2017. So, I thought, oh, a film about an intimacy coordinator. I felt like people would be interested in that, and I love the contradiction that she’s an intimacy coordinator, that’s a sex addict. I think that that’s quite funny as an elevator pitch. I’m really interested in in sex addiction and in love addiction. I think that sex addicts are given so little grace in comparison to drug and alcohol addicts.
There seems to be a lot of shame still held around that affliction, and I think that’s quite sad. I really enjoyed movies like Shame and Nymphomaniac, and so, it was an amalgamation of lots of things. When I first started writing it, I wasn’t really sure whether I’d make it or not. It was like a bit of a writing exercise to see kind of where it would go. But audiences seem to be getting a kick out of it, so I’m glad that I’m glad that I’ve gone in this direction.
Genevieve: How do you go about portraying sex addiction without reducing Kate’s character to just her addiction?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: I think that sex addiction is probably rooted in a desire to connect. I’m not a sex addict, but I certainly have a desire to connect with people, whether that’s physically, emotionally, psychologically, or spiritually. I think that right now humans are quite starved of connection. I think there’s a real loneliness epidemic across the world. Really, some of that’s because of social media, dating apps, anything. But I feel for Kate because I think that what she is looking for is a true connection. So, I try and see it as more than just “Oh, she likes sex”. It’s deeper than that for me, and I have a few like backstories in my mind about Kate.
You know, sometimes when you’re doing a short film and you have so little time with a character, but you want to portray them in a fully fleshed out way. You have to think, okay, where has she come from? What’s happened to her? I think that Kate has probably experienced some sort of sexual abuse at some point in her life that has driven her to this desire to reclaim her sex, reclaim her body, and have some control over the situation.
But unfortunately, due to whatever way that she is wired, she just goes way too far in the other direction, and she loses control of it. That’s how I humanise her. I think that having that scene with the phone call with her mother, when her mother kind of misses the moment to bring her back, little moments like that, I think that we use those moments to keep the audience on side, if you will.
Genevieve: You’ve described previously being interested in the grey space that exists between good and bad. What was it in particular that you wanted audiences to understand about Kate without necessarily asking them to sympathise with her?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: I guess that I don’t want audiences coming away thinking that she’s a bad person. You do see moments of her trying to make the right decision, or you can see it in her face that she’s being torn between the two. I want them to give her grace, which is a lot to ask, particularly with how the movie ends. I hope that audiences see that she’s sick; she’s not very well. This is obviously a woman that’s experienced something that has driven her here, and I would hope that it would encourage audience members to go back to connecting in healthier ways, so that we don’t end up making crazy decisions and being driven mad by loneliness.
But there is something quite intoxicating about Kate. She’s quite fun to go on the ride with. I think that it helps that she looks quite unassuming. Another one of the reasons why I wanted to make this film is that I’m interested in abuse of power. I’m interested in gender dynamics, and I see stuff all the time where women are victims, and so little of the time are they perpetrators. But women can absolutely be perpetrators, and I think it’s so interesting watching somebody that looks like Kate being in that slightly more traditionally male perpetrator role, and it was really fun to play as well.
Genevieve: Sister Wives and The Intimacy Coordinator, on the surface, are very different, but at their core are both films that are centring women who are dealing with intimacy, power, complicated relationships with sex. Do you see the films as being connected yourself?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: I think there’s a thread throughout all of my work. It tends to be women with secrets that could destroy them. That seems to be in all ofmy work. It’s a lot of women giving into their most carnal desires. I definitely think that there is a thread between Sister Wives and The Intimacy Coordinator, though tonally they are so different, and they are in a different genre. But there’s definitely a thread there.
Genevieve: Moving on a little bit, just to talk about your career more broadly. You started as an actor, but do you think of yourself now primarily as an actor, or do you see yourself as a director or a producer or just someone who does it all?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham I think I’m someone that does it all. I’d be reluctant to pigeonhole myself to any of the one roles. I think that the most exciting stuff happening right now is probably surrounding me as a writer/director, but I love acting. I’ve obviously acted in both The Intimacy Coordinator and Sister Wives and absolutely loved it. And I think that I will always act. The beautiful thing about acting is we’re never going to grow out of it. You never become too old to act because there’s always roles floating around, but the place where I feel most powerful at the moment is as a as a writer/director.
Genevieve: What have you discovered since moving behind the camera, and about working with the broader crew and production team, and your actors? Has that really shifted your perception of filmmaking?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: I grew up on film sets, so when I shifted into directing, it wasn’t like this like crazy new world because I really did know and understand film sets from being on so many as an actress for so many years. But as an actress, we are so naive as to what is going on around us, and how many plates the director and the producer and the crew is spinning.
As actors, we think that we are the most important, but actually, there is so much else going on. When I stepped into that role as director it was shocking to realise how many things there were to navigate. But to be honest, it was a role that I slipped into quite easily. I’ve always been quite a good multitasker. I think it might be an ADHD thing. It doesn’t overwhelm me to have lots of things going on, I can split my brain into 1000 directions. I know the things that I didn’t like as an actress, and so I’m very aware of that as a director moving forward.
I would like to think that actors enjoy working with me as a director because I think that I can work with actors well. I try and have non-hierarchical sets. I don’t think that you know number one on the call sheet should be being treated better than your boom-up or your spark, or the person making you a bacon bap in the morning in the catering van. I try and approach my sets kindly and holistically, and even when we’re dealing with really dark subject matter. I want it to be fun and silly and light and playful, and I’m happy to take an idea or a thought from anybody. We are all filmmakers. We’ve all got the film’s best interest at heart. I think that being a director that started as an actress has been really helpful, and I really want to empower actors to direct because I think that we’re actually pretty good.
Genevieve: You’ve spoken about wanting to champion women and underrepresented filmmakers previously. What do you think needs to change in the industry still to make that possible or to improve things as they currently stand?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: Well, female directors need to be financed. I don’t know what the statistics are, but they’re not great. It’s much harder to be financed as a woman, and even harder still to be financed as a queer woman or a woman of colour. We need to we need to empower ourselves as women to walk into those rooms with the same energy that the men do. Ask for what we want, say what we can deliver, demand better.
I love hiring women, I do pride myself on the fact that whenever I’ve managed to raise the money, get on a set, and shoot something, I’ve almost hired all women, and I think my films are pretty good. I literally want to put my money where my mouth is, not just talk about women in film. I give women every role that I possibly can, and try and make something beautiful with them, so I can literally show people what a group of women can do, and we smash it. I love female sets as well. I love the way that female sets are ran. I love making films with women.
I just love doing everything with women. I feel safe with women. And obviously, a lot of my films are about women, so it makes sense to be made by them as well, but I think that we need to get better at demanding things, asking for more, selling ourselves, and people with money need to be putting their money where their mouth is. Stop talking about women and actually give us your money, because unfortunately, money is what we need. That’s where I’d start. Hire women, hire female cinematographers, hire female sound designers, colourists, intimacy coordinators, ADs, ACs, gaffers, grips. They are out there. You just got to find them and give them a chance. They’re just as good, if not better.
Genevieve: You’ve acting since you’re a teenager and working for a long time now. If you could speak to the Louisa who was just starting out, what would you tell her?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: When I was a much younger actress, my mum used to always say to me, “You’re going to make it in your 30s”, which was quite frustrating as a teenager. When your mum keeps repeatedly saying to you, “It’s not going to be until your 30s”. But if it doesn’t happen for you in your teens, in your 20s, it doesn’t mean that it’s over. Stick with it. Find a way to survive outside of acting. Find a day job so you can pay your bills. Give it absolutely everything. Continue to nourish your soul creatively in other ways. Watch films. Go to the cinema. Go to the theatre. Read books, and keep your dream alive.
I always had a sense from when I was younger that I had something to offer, and I guess I’ve been quite lucky that I naturally had the personality that was belligerent, and I had a wonderful family around me that never told me to do anything else. So, I would just encourage her to keep saying yes, keep going, say yes to little things and big things. Keep putting yourself out there. Promote yourself well. Show up on time. Be good. Rehearse. Be prepared, and keep that fire going inside of you, and you’ll get there in your 30s.
Genevieve: So finally, what’s next for you? What can we expect to see from Louisa Connolly Burnham?
Louisa Connolly-Burnham: We have the Sister Wives feature that we are shooting next year. I’m currently writing The Intimacy Coordinator feature as well, which all goes to plan, we’re planning to shoot that next year as well.
Obviously, I would encourage people to try and catch The Intimacy Coordinator on the film festival circuit. I’ve got another short film on the film festival circuit, which is called Full Fat, which is a kind of queer comedy if you fancy something a little bit different. I’ve also got a TV pilot that I’ve written called Child Star, that’s just been optioned. So, keep an eye out for that as well!
Follow Louisa on Instagram: @Louisaconnollyburnham
Check out her work: https://www.louisaconnollyburnham.com/
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