Filmmaker Profile: Chloe Simone Crawford
Chloe Simone Crawford
Chloe Simone Crawford is a New York born and based filmmaker, writer and actor. Most recently, she’s had roles in various independent films, short form content and projects for HBO and NBC. She began screenwriting as a means to investigate her relationship with womanhood, queerness, mental illness, race, death and motherhood. Her first feature screenplay, Colored Actress, has been highlighted by The Black List for several awards; most recently 2024 Michael Collyer Screenwriting Fellowship Finalist and 2023 $100,000 GM x The Black List Writer Driven Shorts Shortlist. She was a student of Vassar College and Waterwell Theater Company’s PPAS Drama Program. A Plague of Wasps is her first film, for which she received the Panavision New Filmmaker Grant.
This Q&A is part of the Bushwick Film Fest Filmmaker Q&A series.
What was a big challenge you faced while making this film?
The biggest challenge of making any film is making the film. I found it funny how while making a sympathetic movie about Satan, I was constantly left in awe of instances that I could only reason to be small acts of God. I am in no way a religious person but getting my actors and collaborators to agree to making this film with me, having our original location fall through after having paid for it only to then find the house we ended up shooting in a few hours later, and the owner having worked in film and being super supportive of the project, to getting every shot, to having my dog hit her marks and not biting my lead even though she’s never been in a film and isn’t fond of people, it made me think: the big guy upstairs must be a cinephile.
Tell us an anecdote about casting or working with your actors.
I had seen Zach in To Kill a Mockingbird on Broadway in 2022. A few months later, I was out for a walk spotted him with his groceries. I don’t know what came over me, but I proceeded to bravely, or psychotically, go up to him and gush about how much I enjoyed his performance. Thankfully he was incredibly gracious and indulged me in a conversation about acting, writing and trying to work and when we departed he said the thing that all kind actors say to young people with dreams: “write a part for me.” I assume it was a joke at the time, but I had been working on the script for this film, and from that point on I placed Zach on my vision board and wrote Chris with him in mind. I felt like it was a long shot andI never imagined he would actually be interested or remember our conversation, but when we began our process for casting, I got in contact with my college advisors who knew him and asked for her to connect us. A couple days later while I was on vacation I got an email in my inbox from Zach that simply said: “hey, tell me about this movie”…
What is something that all filmmakers should keep in mind in order to become better cinematic storytellers?
My main take away from this process is that, many people say you make three films: the film you plan to make, the film you shoot and the film you edit- I disagree. I believe the film stays the same, it’s the filmmaker that changes. I wrote my film at 23, shot it at 24 and finished it at 25. I’ve grown and changed, my references and interests and goals have shifted but I believe growth is the most beautiful thing in the world. To talk about growing as an artist is just to allow yourself to grow as a person and bring that into the art you make. Honoring that change and the differing opinions you may have in the present and the past. Allowing yourself to prove yourself wrong and embracing the mistakes you thought were good ideas.
Films are lasting artistic legacies; what do you want yours to say?
I gave this answer in an interview a few years ago and the person interviewing me was not impressed but I stand by it: while I respect a cohesiveness in an artist’s work, I hope that my films, projects I work on, or ideas I bring forth are not a monolith. Through filmmaking, I want to be able to metabolize my life as it grows with me: as I age, love people, lose people, make mistakes, live with regrets, become a mother, etc… Vainly, I do hope that the one uniform thing is that they’re all good, but even that is impossible of the most skilled maker. I just hope that what I do and make is seen as my investigation into the life I lead, the ideas I have, and the things I love and fear. Though I will admit, I hope they progressively get better.
How do you approach storytelling in your films? What’s your process for developing a script or concept?
My development of this script was somewhat different from my other films. It was the first short I had ever written and so my other screenwriting processes have been long and painstakingly tedious. In coming up with the idea for A Plague of Wasps, I had gone to see a show with my mom and was bored out of my skull. But while I sat in the dark for two hours, I was forced to try to entertain myself and began daydreaming about the plot of the film, its setting, characters, and tone. When I got home that night, because I had spent so much time with the idea, I was able to write the entire first draft in an hour. Thank God for boring theater and the notes app.
What’s the last film you watched?
Harvest by Athina Rachel Tsangari
What three things do you always have in your refrigerator?
Olives, baby carrots (for my dog), truffle pecorino
Chloe Simone Crawford’s Q&A is part of the Bushwick Film Fest Filmmaker Q&A series.
