What do you think are the main barriers for people from working class backgrounds who want to get into filmmaking?
The first one would be finance. From my experience of being in film school, you did need some sort of financial support, whether that was to have the equipment to practise on or having decent computers so that you can edit. When I was at film school, for example, we were given budgets to work on our projects, but then you'd have more wealthy students whose family members would just contribute to their budgets. Then, when you're starting in the industry, you're not going to get paid very well. You might just be volunteering or you might be a runner, just to get experience to get your showreel going. The only people who can generally afford to be able to do that unpaid work are people who've got financial support and, a lot of the time, those are middle class families and usually from Caucasian backgrounds.
The other thing to look at is how our communities of colour look at filmmaking and the arts. Their family members might be discouraging them from even studying it because of exactly what I've just said. It's gonna take you a while to get to that point where you're going to be earning decent money from it, and so that puts them off. That's one of the reasons why we do our projects, where we predominantly work with young people of colour. They build a showreel and then, through that showreel, we hope that they can then get into the industry.
And it has worked. We've been doing this for 20 years and we've got a lot of students from these backgrounds who are in the industry at the moment doing great work.
At the Rainbow Collective Animation Club, our students have been together for seven to eight years. We've watched them grow up together as artists, as filmmakers. They've got films that they made from seven years old, and the first award that they won was for the first film that they made. Sadiq Khan highlighted their project and gave them an award through Into Film (you can watch the winning film below). Stuff like this is really important to me and Richard because, when you're an artist, you're doing a lot of your work in isolation. The pay-off is when you start putting your film out there, and they get to watch it with an audience.
Could you talk a little bit about how the idea for the Animation Club first came about and how you went about finding the young people who are now a part of it?
We've always done training since we started our business 20 years ago and the thing that we've always wanted to do was have a consistent training programme where you have a community of young people growing up together as filmmakers and artists. The first project we did was in Bangladesh, where we worked with a group of children at a daycare centre for garment workers. We got them to make a stop-frame animation looking at the importance of having a birth certificate in Bangladesh because, without a birth certificate, you can't go to school or get hospital treatment. They made this animation and it was really successful so, basically, we wanted to do that here in England.
The perfect place to do it was where I was living at the time, which was an estate in Peckham. We contacted our local community centre and talked to them about doing some youth projects. A lot of why this has been successful is because of the relationship that we built with their parents and caregivers. Once the parents knew what we were trying to do, once they could see the animations that they were making and the prize from Sadiq Khan, they were really keen to keep supporting it.
Over the years, it's built a reputation, especially in Peckham and Southwark, because each of the films the young people were making was about a social issue. That comes from our documentary filmmaking background, that if you make something you've got to have something to say, even if you're seven or eight years old. You've still got something to say and you've got an important voice. We value your voice, and we want to make sure other people value your voice because your voice isn't being heard by the general public. In reality, how many seven or eight year olds are you talking to about gentrification or food banks or the environment?
Once they realise that their voice is important, that's when they can start talking about big issues. During Covid, they were making loads of films on everything from Black Lives Matter to the importance of looking after your mental health to the NHS heroes and other heroes during Covid. During those Covid years, the children were making pretty much one film a month because we were doing the classes over Zoom and the families thought it was really important that they have those regular classes with us. Members of the public via social media were becoming aware of the Animation Club and the films that they were doing. One of our biggest supporters was [actor and comedian] Rob Delaney, who would always share the films. He really loved the club and what they were doing. We had psychologists and teachers in America saying they wanted to use the films, which is a huge impact for these young people.
Have you and Richard noticed any changes, either positive or negative, in working class representation in filmmaking over the last 20 years?
The reason me and Richard do Rainbow Collective is because there weren't many people like myself in the industry. You had big filmmakers like Asif Kapadia, who’s a big fan of the animation club by the way, and Hanif Kureishi, but I wasn’t seeing that many. That's why we set up our own production company because we were more comfortable just working with ourselves and I could be a director. The thing I see that’s different now is that more young people are going to universities and film schools, realising how important their voices are.
But also, technology made a huge difference. When we started our careers, we had to invest in cameras that were costing about £3,000, whereas now you can get a second-hand DSLR for around £700-£800. So all of a sudden, that technological shift made a difference. They were able to create films themselves, but also gain that experience from using their own equipment. But if you were in a position where the camera was costing four grand, you'd never get it – just a certain type of person could afford it. That's the shift that people might not realise has made it possible for more young people from working class communities and communities of colour to be able to come into the industry.
I think the thing that disappoints me is that the industry could do more. That’s the bottom line. We've had the Black Lives Matter movement and what you've seen in the Golden Globes, Oscars, Baftas and stuff. But there definitely needs to be more, and not just in the big roles. I'm talking about cinematography and sound design and things like this, crew roles. There's definitely things they can be doing to reach out to those communities. What we're trying to do is create those filmmakers at an early age, and then they go into the industry. Our job isn't, once they're in the industry, to get them those roles, because we haven't got the capacity to do that. But what we can do is prep them, give them the experience which will come through doing the workshops, give them the films to build their showreel. And then it's the industry that they need to then take over.
In the work that you do in your youth projects, what are the biggest challenges that you guys have faced in making the situation we've just talked about better?
It's just funding, that's the bottom line, and that all comes from the state of the country to be honest. Council budgets are constantly being cut. Youth projects, where are they getting money from at the moment? Funding bodies aren't giving the funding to these community halls, youth clubs, councils, and those are the places where we would then get funding for our projects. The way we've been able to keep the Rainbow Collective Animation Club going is just doing it ourselves a lot of the time. The money's coming from our business. We're working on other projects and then we're funnelling the money through into our youth projects.
Recently, over the summer we got funding from Into Film, who are big fans of the film club. They've known us for many years now because they've given them so many awards, and they supported our young people to do a documentary about gentrification in their area, which is huge for them to do. Those pockets of funding do not come by that often. It's disheartening because we know the young people and their families want to do stuff. We have to be realistic and transparent with them because it's hard for us to do a long-running project when we haven't got the support. But we're always trying to make sure we keep this group of artists together.
And what's the future looking like for the club and for your work with young people?
I've been really pleased with how our project went over the summer. It's a really great progression for the young people to have been doing their stop-frame animations and, now that they're teenagers, they want to talk about bigger things. For this latest project, we had discussions about everything from what's happening with the cost of living crisis to the environment to what's been happening in the Middle East. But the thing they always seem to go back to is their community, and gentrification is having a huge impact on their community. They can visually see the landscape of their community in Peckham is changing, so they did a deep-dive into gentrification.
I'm editing it at the moment and the film has got animation segments in it as well, so it's going to be quite unique – a documentary with animation in it. It's such a mature documentary they've made and I've had to throw in loads of behind the scenes pictures so that an audience can realise that this is a group of 14-year-olds making such a mature documentary talking about gentrification. It's such a step up, and that's what we always wanted. We're gonna get them in through stop-frame animation cartoons and get them to make the things that they watch on TV, but then we always had the idea that they would then progress into making documentaries based on everything we've taught them about social issues. This was their first example of it and honestly I think it's going to be a hit. There's three screenings lined up.
One of the things that we do which probably doesn't happen that much with youth projects is we for many years have done media training with the young people. When you make a film, you then present yourself as well. People want to ask you questions, and we want you to be able to talk, with pride but also really eloquently, about the project that you've done and the issues that you're trying to talk about. Over the summer they did a presentation of their films with 70-80 people. The project isn't just about the films; it’s about how you shape an artist, a filmmaker, and how you shape them to how to present themselves in the world.
The other thing to add that's special about our group is it's mainly young people of colour who are girls, so it's trying to address two things that are wrong with the industry. The industry has got a problem with [not enough] women coming into those roles – not just as directors, but cinematography, sound design, editing. We're quite proud of that with our group. In this new documentary, when those pictures come up, they're gonna see a group of girls. How often are you seeing anything like that?
The Rainbow Collective Animation Club has just made its first live-action documentary.
(Credit: Rainbow Collective)
That's something that's come up a lot in the interviews I've done for this series. One of the struggles that working class people face when they get into an industry like this is knowing how to speak about your art in a room full of people who are not from the same background as you.
I bet a lot of these people that you're talking to are just like us – small groups, small organisations, individuals – and I'm pretty sure all of those people need support. A lot of the time they'll be doing stuff off their own back because they believe in what they're doing, and most importantly they believe in their young people just like we do. It really disheartened me during the last government when they were really cutting down on the arts and not valuing it, and I hope we see a change now because the arts really do need to be valued.
When you've got the government not valuing it, then the ripple effect is you'll have certain families and certain communities who will think this isn't the pathway because the government's not valuing it. There's not going to be funding. There's not going to be support for you if you do a degree in music or art or filmmaking. So then we're going to go backwards. We've taken quite a few strides forward, so we can't afford to do that.
As a final question, what advice would you give to any young working class people who want to get into filmmaking today?
When your phone started to film in HD and 4K, everything changed. You can just get your phone, turn it to landscape mode, get your settings right, and honestly go out and start filming stuff. The best way to be a filmmaker is just go out there and practise. You also have editing software, which is free on your phone. We're using these devices just for entertainment, but there's that little camera on there, which is a little portal to the world.
Now we have platforms like YouTube and Instagram where you can put something out and it could possibly be seen by thousands to millions of people. So now, all of a sudden, you've got a platform. The best advice is just go out there and do something. Use your phone and start putting stuff out there.
You can find out more about Rainbow Collective by visiting their website.
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