The Stage

Guy Hibbert challenges festivals to include more screenwriters

Published Thursday 26 August 2010 at 13:30 by Matthew Hemley

Five Minutes of Heaven and Omagh creator Guy Hibbert is spearheading a global campaign to stop screenwriters being excluded from film and television festivals where their work is shown.

The BAFTA-winning writer claims he and his counterparts are regularly shunned from such festivals, with the directors or actors being asked to appear instead. He argues this denies writers the credit they deserve and the chance to discuss their projects with senior figures in the industry.

In response, Hibbert has started a List of Excellence for film and TV festivals around the world, an initiative that will invite organisers to fill in a questionnaire about their relationship with screenwriters, with the results being used to compile a list of the best and worst.

Hibbert said there was no logical argument for a writer not being invited, adding: “I thought it would be a good idea if we challenged festivals to be inclusive to writers.”

Speaking to The Stage, he said the idea for the list stemmed from learning he had not been invited to a festival to sit on a panel discussing one of his dramas, with the director and two actors instead asked to speak about it.

Hibbert said many TV dramas are shown as films in Europe and the USA, often premiered at film festivals and being credited as he director’s work.

He highlighted the fact his own BBC drama, Five Minutes of Heaven, had won the best screenplay award at a festival in Italy earlier this year, to which he was not invited, with the award instead being presented to the drama’s director.

“It’s plainly ridiculous when a screenwriter award is given to a director. That’s the mentality we are trying to change - one where people don’t even think a screenwriter has a name. It is extraordinary.

“Hopefully that will allow us to be seen as adults, rather than people who are simply hired and should then be kept out of the way,” he said.

Hibbert put the idea of a List of Excellence to a World Conference of Screenwriters in Athens last year, following which the Federation of Screenwriters Europe composed a letter and questionnaire to go out to all festivals.

The letter has been signed by Hibbert on behalf of the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain, as well as by representatives from unions in the US and Europe, and reads: “In order to encourage film festivals to honour screenwriters’ contribution to the films they showcase, we are publishing a List of Excellence for film festivals around the globe based on how they profile screen-writers and their work in programmes, publications and events. The list will be updated annually and its logo will be awarded to festivals at the top of the list.”