Finding Chris.

[CHRIS (LEAD)] 60 to 80 years old, all ethnicities female. Chris is possessed of an abiding confidence bordering on arrogance. Distant and aloof, she is nauseous every morning and exhausted at night. She has traded a garden in the yard for a mushroom bed in the basement. She has seen everything and is unafraid. It is her house the young man unwittingly breaks into.

That was the casting breakdown we released for the character. Both Joseph and I hold a lot of ideas about this character. For me, she is the embodiment of all the qualities I hope to acquire throughout my life. She is the epitome of a non-judgmental figure. She is quiet and peaceful. She is unafraid. She possesses qualities most humans cannot afford and for all of those reasons, she became a high stakes role to fill. 

Enter Deirdre Madigan. 

Deirdre is an actor who we have the good fortunate of being very close with. She had been aware of “Strange Kindness” since its inception and had read the script, watched the short and spoken to Joseph and I both about the story at length at different points along the road. She has heard both of us say over and over again, “We have to make this film” and was there to listen to us again one day when we dropped in on her and her husband as we were making our way out of the city after a visit. 

We sat there telling her about where we were at in our process which was close to casting. We told her how we had no money yet, no team attached really, no locations. Basically we had nothing. But we had a good script. And we knew we had to begin somewhere and that somewhere was sending out a casting call. 

After Joseph and I spoke over each other in rising volume for a long time, she finally said that she would love to read for Chris. And I don’t know if my jaw fell open or not but I felt lighter all of the sudden. Then Joseph and I stumbled over our words a bit, said we would love for her to audition and had to get back on the road. 

Maybe a month later, she was auditioning for Chris. We asked her to read with some of the actors we had auditioning for THE YOUNG MAN. It was a fully virtual ZOOM audition which didn’t matter in hindsight because performances radiated through the screen, but we knew it was a lot to ask of the people auditioning. As an actor, speaking for myself, you always want to be in the room with people. 

Joseph and I talked about Deirdre’s audition for what felt like weeks. Even before she had auditioned we felt like she understood CHRIS in a way that was essential. Then, seeing her audition, and seeing her begin to make choices as CHRIS, seeing her adjust things, seeing her interpret things, CHRIS became a real person. 

And then we asked Deirdre if she would play CHRIS. I don’t know what that moment felt like for Deirdre, but for us, I think it felt a little bit like handing over the most fragile, precious object we owned and asking someone to take care of it. 

And she took care of it, has taken care of it, and now owns it. She became CHRIS. Her performance was brilliant and we are so excited for other people to see it. Her chemistry with Michal (THE YOUNG MAN) was something we gambled on, and we won big, because the two of them together on screen is quite something to watch. 

I fantasied about working alongside my family for as long as I can remember. As a little girl, surrounded by actors and movie makers and artists, I always wanted to be among them. And I was able to make that opportunity for myself in making “Strange Kindness” when I got to play alongside my Aunt Deirdre. Lucky me. 

Sign up to recieve notifications on when new articles are posted. We also have some exciting offerings that will be announced in the New Year which is another great reason to sign up and join our mailing list.