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BU TV Production graduate receives BAFTA nomination

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An MA TV Production graduate from Bournemouth University has had his short film nominated for a BAFTA.

Ben Mallaby, who completed the Master’s course at BU in 2006, directed Island Queen, which has been shortlisted in the Short Film category for the 2014 BAFTAs.

The film, written by and starring Nat Luurtsema, follows a young woman on a small island who decides to have a baby using a sperm bank – only to find out it came from her brother.

“It’s such a huge honour to have been nominated for the BAFTA, I still can’t believe it happened,” said Ben, 30, who lives in London.

“The film was shortlisted, I’m sure, down to Nat Luurtsema’s great script and performance.”

He added: “Island Queen came about after I read an article about how some countries have to import donations for their sperm banks because, due to having such a small population, they couldn’t guarantee that you weren’t getting a relative’s donation.

“So our story is about Nat’s character Mim deciding she wants a baby and to her horror discovering it was her brother’s sperm.”

Ben, who is now a lecturer in Digital Film Production at Ravensbourne College as well as a freelance film-maker, said his time at BU helped kickstart his career.

“The MA gave me the time and resources to make films for a year – you don’t get much chance when you’re starting out as a freelancer to work on your own passion projects,” he said.

He and Nat are now working on a new project, called Annie Has Body Issues, which goes into production in May.

“The BAFTA nomination has already helped open doors for us, said Ben. “It’s helped validate the project and I’m really hoping we can take the film further now.”

Ben also plans to attend the 2014 BAFTA awards ceremony, which takes place at London’s Royal Opera House on Sunday 16th February.

He said: “It’s very exciting to have been invited to the awards ceremony next month.

“It’s going to be weird to be surrounded by so many high profile filmmakers and actually have a film in competition.”

Watch the trailer for Island Queen

Find out more about Television Production at Bournemouth University

BU graduate goes write way to win BAFTA competition

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By Dean Eastmond

A Bournemouth University Master’s graduate has won a nationwide BAFTA competition to find Britain’s most promising comedy writers.

Christiana Brockbank impressed judges including comediennes Jennifer Saunders and Jessica Hynes to be named one of the winners in the BAFTA Rocliffe New Writing Forum competition.

Christiana, who completed an MA in Writing for the Media at BU in 2010, beat more than 500 entries to be named one of the five winners of the competition, which searched for the UK’s most promising upcoming comedy writers.

She said: “It’s been a bit surreal – you go from trying to get people to read your work to suddenly having lots of people asking you if they can read your script, and that makes every single rejection letter before that absolutely worth it.”

Christiana, 26, will now see her sitcom – Binwomen – performed in front of other comedians, writers and industry bosses at this year’s Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival.

The comedy follows compulsive hoarder Janet as she works on the bins, and the industry panel will include comedian John Bishop and Shane Allen, Controller of Comedy at the BBC.

Christiana will also receive one-to-one mentoring sessions with comedy commissioners and independent production companies and the chance to have a full script commission paid for by the BBC.

Christiana, who is from Bolton and now lives in Ealing, London, said her time at BU helped her develop her creativity.

“What I enjoyed most about the course was being in an environment where you were encouraged to collaborate and be creative. I made some lifelong friends there who I hope I’ll get to work with again,” said Christiana, who currently works in retail while writing in the evenings.

“After graduating from Bournemouth, I continued to keep writing short films, radio sketches and sitcoms before becoming a copywriter and living like a real adult for a while.

“In the end, I gave it up and decided to move to London with the hope of one day doing what felt most right – trying to write stuff that’s funny and maybe even getting paid for the privilege.”

The BAFTA Rocliffe Sitcom Showcase takes place at the Guardian Edinburgh International TV Festival on Thursday 22 August.

Find out more about the competition

Dean is a student at Budmouth College in Weymouth, who is working at Bournemouth University in the Press and PR Department. He joined BU on a Sir Samuel Mico Scholarship, which provides 10 students from his college with essential work experience for four weeks over the summer.