5 Questions with India Donaldson ("Hannahs")

1) What have you been up to creatively since we last spoke in 2019 for "Medusa"?

I just finished a new short about a lonely girl who steals a dog. Hannahs is so dialogue driven, so I challenged myself to make something with almost no words. I collaborated with composer Celia Hollander, who I had also worked with on Hannahs, and she created a score that really drives it. Other than that I’ve been writing and trying to revisit some older unfinished scripts.

2) What was the initial idea for this project and how did it evolve from there?

I had the idea for a while to make a short about a well-meaning con artist.  I also wanted to write something about an encounter between two women who have bad boundaries that present in opposite ways. Amy’s character takes up space and brings a frenetic, claustrophobic intimacy to the dynamic, while Brenna’s feels an obligation to take care of and open her life to this wanderer. They are strangers, but fulfilling some kind of surrogate role for each other for one night - absent friend and absent sister.

I had seen Brenna in one of my favorite High Maintenance episodes - she’s so funny and authentic. And I had seen Amy do stand up and thought she’d play a great sensitive charmer. I started tweaking the script imagining them in these roles, and I’m so grateful they both agreed to do it. 

3) What was the biggest challenge in making this film? And the easiest part?

We shot on 16mm and had a limited amount we could shoot. Amy is a great improviser and so damn funny, it was hard to have some restraint and not encourage her to stray from the script to see where it would go. She always added some hilarious flourish when given the chance.  And Brenna is an incredible actor, and also so funny and layered with every choice she makes. She’d add some surprising nuance with every take, it was hard to not just keep going to see what would happen. I knew this would be tempting, so part of the challenge was allowing space for Amy and Brenna to be loose but within certain restraints. Finding that balance was tricky but fun. The DP Wilson Cameron and I had worked together before and had such a seamless way of communicating, and a shared understanding of what we were trying to do. This foundation allowed me to focus on the performances. 

4) What’s a film you’ve seen recently, new or old, that you really loved and why?

I just rewatched Maren Ade’s Everyone Else and Toni Erdmann this weekend. I love how she writes. Her protagonists appear nutty at first but by the end of her movies it’s the conventional world that is revealed to be crazy, not them. 

5) What’s next for you?

Looking forward to putting out my new short, and hoping to shoot a feature that was delayed by 2020! 

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IG: @indiaadonaldson