What motivated you to become a writer?

It’s probably a cliche for writers of my age, but it was seeing Star Wars, and even more importantly, a documentary on the making of the first three films. I didn’t know how to make spaceships fly or lasers shoot on a movie screen, but I had a lightbulb moment when I realised that everything on screen started with words on a page, and that was something I could do. Growing up in Northern Ireland, though, Hollywood and the movie business seemed an impossible distance away, so I started writing novels – at least there was some track record of Irish novel writers. So I began knocking out a novel per year, and frequently got told I had a very cinematic style of writing! Some of my books were even optioned for movie deals, but it’s a fickle business and for one reason or another, they never happened. Still, that had teased my interest again and by this time the Internet was really taking off, and those Hollywood producers didn’t seem as far away any more.

Starting on a blank page is not easy- where does your creativity come from?

I spend a lot of time thinking before I open a new document. So by the time I see that flashing cursor on an empty page, I know, at least, how my story starts and how it ends. With the novels that’s usually enough – I fill the rest in en route, but when I started to write screenplays I realised they were a totally different animal. There are numerous books about screenplay writing, and I’ve read most of them, and they’ve all got at least some good points to make. Over the years I’ve cobbled together my own structure plan, based on what I think works best out of all the other books I’ve read. I’d probably get sued if I made it public, but as a resource, just for myself, it’s invaluable.

Do you write projects knowing that so many other factors need to happen to get it to screen and does that come into your project creation?

It used to. Not as much now. For years I tried to crack my home market, but Northern Ireland has a very small film industry, with dozens of film makers all chasing the same pot of funding gold. I looked at what was getting made and realised a small budget was what they all had in common, so for years I wrote scripts with that in mind. It didn’t help get any of them made, and it probably just stifled my creativity. It was only after watching the DVD extras on Shaun of the Dead, where Edgar Wright talks about how, in the script, the expensive Jaguar car was supposed to get blown up and the producer said, ‘No, we can’t afford that’. So in the final movie they just abandon it. That’s when I realised, my job is to write whatever my imagination comes up with, it’s someone else’s job to worry about the cost.

What is your dream for this project and what other ancillary revenue do you think it could generate?

So many people have praised my PARACUSIS script, calling it Hitchcockian and all sorts of other complimentary things, but it’s a genre script and that sort of stuff rarely gets made in NI. Low budget films with potential for high returns get made all the time in the US, so I don’t need to get in contact with James Cameron’s producers, I could make this with Ed Wood’s contacts! I grew up on American TV and movies; that’s where my passion lies and that’s why most of my novels and screenplays are much more suited to a US producer. I’ve been asked more than once if my directing is a deal-breaker. I’ve always had the same answer: if you can find someone who can do it better than me, I’ll gladly give up the reins. I’ve made a lot of shorts and no budget films in the last decade, so I think I could direct it, but at the end of the day, the better the film is, the more chance I have of getting another script made. I always had it in the back of my mind that if someone else did take over directing duties, I’d write the novel alongside production so it would be ready to go at the same time as the movie.

How has your experience been with screenwriting contests for this project so far?

This is actually the first competition I’ve submitted it to! I’ve submitted for other opportunities that I see pop up on social media from time to time. I think it’s been misunderstood a lot. A few people who have read it called it a horror film, so I submitted it to companies looking for horror films and it got quickly rejected. To me, it isn’t a horror film unless there’s a supernatural element to it and my script doesn’t have that. Is Hitchcock’s Psycho a horror? Some people will say yes, others will say it’s a suspense thriller, and I think that’s what PARACUSIS is, but you don’t see too many script calls asking for that.

If you could stand in a room full of investor partners looking at many projects what would you like them to know about you and this project?

This is probably where I’d fall down because pitching really isn’t ‘a thing’ in the UK and Ireland. We don’t do it. Your film does or doesn’t get made on the strength or your script. I suppose I’d just try to convince them that I can make this for a small budget and still hook the audience, make them care about the characters and have them rooting for them to come out on top. I’ve read a lot on Hitchcock, and manipulating the audience was something he spent a lot of time thinking about, so it’s something I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about too.

Do you have any website links for your writing, credits, background, etc that you would like to share?

My website is a one-stop-shop for all my creative endeavours. At www.philiphenry.com there are links to my novels, my short films, and even my music! You can also see my list of my film credits on IMDb at: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm5301575/