Speaking About Mother's Tongue at the WA Made Film Festival

This was the short speech I gave on stage at the WA Made Film Festival 2026 after the screening of Mother’s Tongue:

I am the writer and director of Mother’s Tongue. Thank you for coming out. My cheer squad is up there, my three kids, and I really appreciate everyone being here.

This is the magical moment when you are a filmmaker; getting your film on a big screen and having an audience reaction.

I really appreciated your reactions during Mother’s Tongue.

There are a couple of crew members and cast members here as well, so if you hang around afterwards make sure you say hi.

Mother’s Tongue was born from my own artist journey and from looking back at a little bit of trauma from my childhood. It also came from thinking about those people who tell you not to be an artist. Maybe they were a teacher, a mentor, or someone in the industry you rub up against who says you should not be doing what you are doing.

I got this idea downloaded into my brain of an artist struggling with her mother, and from there I developed the story. So it is quite a personal film and I really loved working on it.

Unfortunately both of my actors could not be here tonight, but both of those women were just fabulous to work with. The actor who plays the Mother could be incredibly nasty when we called action, and then the moment we called cut she would return to being her lovely self. It was this strange mix where I was smiling and also slightly fearful all at once.

I am really happy with how it all turned out, and thank you for coming along and enjoying it.

This was the short speech I gave on stage at the WA Made Film Festival 2026 after the screening of Mother’s Tongue.

You can also watch the moment here on my YouTube Shorts channel.