[Watch the video interview on YouTube here]
Film Courage: What is pitching?
Tendayi Nyeke, Writer/Director/Producer: Pitching is selling something, selling an idea, selling a concept. It’s being able to communicate the essence of what you’re doing and what you want from whoever you’re having the conversation with.
Film Courage: And you’ve said previously that “You’ve got to know your why.” How does that factor into pitching?
Tendayi: When you know your why I think you can connect with other people’s why. I think sometimes having multiple why’s is helpful so you can connect with different stakeholders (I love that word so much).
Burns & Song [Tendayi’s film], my why is from my story why is to explore how secrets can hurt families. My genre why is to use a genre that most people can access and understand to a world that they might not have ever been in. If it’s horror/thriller people understand horror they’re going to be experiencing a world and a culture that they might not be familiar with. That’s why I’m doing psychological thriller/horror. It just helps you then connect with people.
-Story Why
-Genre Why
-Commercial Why
The commercial why is the more stories like this that are told, we then are able to prove that stories like this are commercially viable and we can make more. I think it allows on the creating side and executing the project side to connect with people that can help you do that. but also to know why an audience should even watch it.
The thing about how stories can destroy families I think audience members will understand what that is even if they don’t necessarily watch horror or know much about Zimbabwe, they understand that concept.
Film Courage: You just triggered a memory of last night we had a comment come in. Part of it reads:
I think one of the hardest things creatives have to deal with is an audience owes you nothing. You are entitled to “your creation” but that does not mean you’re entitled to people paying to see it. Developing a thick skin is important for life in general.
[I] thought that was interesting, we’re talking about the audience. We know our why but do we think our audience, they may not get our why. How do you feel about that?…(Watch the video interview on Youtube here).
About:
Writer/Director/Producer Tendayi Nyeke’s multi-genre creative work has been awarded internationally. A former broadcast executive who helmed several award-winning shows, Tendayi has also written, produced, and directed television programs across global platforms. Most recently, she Executive Produced the Annie Award-winning Disney+ science fiction Anthology Kizazi Moto (2023) with Oscar-winning director Peter Ramsey of Spiderverse acclaim.
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