BACK TO BACK THEATRE'S DEBUT FILM BOUND FOR SYDNEY FILM FEST PREMIERE

Australia’s acclaimed Back to Back Theatre, a professional theatre company with an ensemble of actors with disabilities at its core, will screen their debut feature Shadow at the 2022 Sydney Film Festival, where it will have its Australian Premiere on June 15. This follows the film's International Premiere at SXSW earlier this year, where it earned the Visions Audience Award.

Directed by Bruce Gladwin and produced by Alice Fleming and Meret Hassanen, Shadow was co-conceived and co-authored by Back to Back’s core group of performance artists -  Michael Chan, Mark Deans, Sarah Mainwaring, Scott Price, Simon Laherty and Sonia Teuben. The 56-minute story involves a trio of disability activists who hold a public meeting, desperate to save the world. As the meeting unravels, they discover the greatest threat to their future is already in the room.

“Shadow uses a combination of dramatic and documentary-style elements to tell the story of a group of activists who hold a public meeting only to discover their own prejudices are their biggest obstacles to saving the world,” says Bruce Gladwin (pictured, right), who has crafted globally recognised work with Back to Back for over two decades. “Thematically, we wanted to understand individual and collective responsibility and question how we come together to make decisions that are in the best interests of society.”

Created over two and a half years through conversation and improvisation with the performers, 95% of the people on screen are people with disabilities, and the majority of the crew roles are fulfilled by interns who identify as people with disabilities supported by professional mentors. Says Gladwin, “The narrative and the film’s philosophical approach to the process of creation are intrinsically linked. This is community filmmaking."

Filmed on location in Geelong in December 2020, Shadow ambitiously builds upon the success of the company’s debut short, Oddlands, creating a feature film that is provocative and challenging. It is based on the company’s theatrical production The Shadow Whose Prey The Hunter Becomes (2019), which was developed at the 2019 Sundance Theatre Lab and described by The New York Times as “an extraordinary play”. 

For co-producer Alice Fleming, the film’s SFF acceptance is indicative of broadening audience tastes. “It continues to provide evidence that audiences and programmers are looking for more inclusive storytelling teams,” she says. Actor and co-writer Scott Price (pictured, left) agrees, stating “The fact that it is premiering at festivals such as SXSW and now Sydney Film Festival shows that it is a beautiful piece of work, and the importance of telling stories from the perspective of people with disabilities.”

The Sydney Film Festival dates are:
Wednesday 15 June, 3:15pm at State Theatre | AUSTRALIAN PREMIERE
Friday 17 June, 6:00pm at Palace Central
Saturday 18 June, 4:30pm at Dendy Newtown

SHADOW is jointly funded by the Australian Government Department of Social Services, the City of Greater Geelong Arts & Culture Department’s Arts Industry Commissions Program and supported by Screen Australia through the COVID-19 Budget Support Fund Program. (Photo credits: Jeff Busby)