The Script Factory relaunches
April 27, 2023
To celebrate the relaunch of the The Script Factory, award-winning actress, Kerry Fox (Shallow Grave, Little Fox), is narrating a special live performance of Sumo Girls written by The Script Factory’s late founder, Lucy Scher and Justine Hart. Scher died of cancer in 2018. Justine and Charlotte Macleod, two former directors of The Script Factory have decided that now is the time to re-open their script training and development company.
Sumo Girls is a comedy drama about Wales’s first accidental all-female wrestling team, which is currently in development as a feature film with Footprint Films (Escape from Pretoria).
Joining Fox in bringing Sumo Girls to life, in front of a live studio audience at London’s Soho Theatre, is a stellar cast including Lizzie Bea (Hairspray, Sister Act) and Gwyneth Keyworth (To Kill a Mocking Bird). The reading will be directed by the award-winning director Jane Gull (My Feral Heart). Her second feature, Love without Walls, recently scooped the Best UK Feature awards at the Manchester Film Festival and the London Independent Film Festival, and is due for cinema release in June. Gull is also attached to direct the Sumo Girls for the screen.
Charlotte Macleod, on the decision to relaunch, commented: “The Script Factory promises to inject some of its unique brand of enthusiasm, energy and generosity back into the development process. We never stopped receiving requests from writers and producers for our development services, so we decided to bring it back.”
Justine Hart said: “There is no greater joy than spending the working day talking about stories. And no greater privilege than helping a screenwriter shape a script to articulate what they uniquely want to say. At a time when the US industry is in flux due to the WGA strike, and indie producers are facing their own challenges with spiralling costs of energy and inflation stretching budgets –a helping hand with script development will create projects that persuade audiences to see films on the big screen.
Gull added: “Having a live audience respond to a reading of Sumo Girls, will fine-tune the character dynamics, reveals what engages and help fast track the project from script to screen. I took part in Script Factory training in 2010 with my short film Sunny Boy. The film went on to win many awards and was acquired by Channel 4, ARTE & Apple TV. The Script Factory training played a huge part in the film’s success.”
Commenting on the news, Geeticka Lizardi, writer on Netflix Shondaland’s Bridgerton, said: “I was fortunate enough to be part of a 9-month training program with The Script Factory early in my career. The training gave me just the foundation I needed to be a screenwriter, and the mentorship and encouragement were crucial to keeping me on the path at a time when I could have easily given up.”