Winner of the 2022 Aer Lingus Discovery Award, which champions new and emerging talent in front of and behind the camera, Rioghnach Ní Ghrioghair brings a wealth of experience in film and TV development as she pursues her own darkly creative ambitions.
As a development executive with Dublin-based production companies Blinder Films and Samson Films, Ní Ghrioghair worked first hand with “really great filmmakers across Ireland and Europe”, including Klaus Haro, Christine Molloy, Joe Lawlor, Emer Reynolds and Jamie Hannigan. “Seeing how the sausage is made, how sales agents talk about your projects, was really invaluable knowledge to know fully what you were up against and how difficult the industry actually is,” says Ní Ghrioghair, who currently divides her time between Ireland and Germany.
Following the success of her shorts Break Us, which played at more than 30 festivals including Fantasia in Montreal, and Neon, both of which were funded by Screen Ireland, Ní Ghrioghair last year completed Don’t Go Where I Can’t Find You, which was selected for South by Southwest.
“Making short after short is the real test of endurance for any filmmaker,” she explains. “You want to make that one short that gets noticed and is a calling card for you and your voice. For me, that was Don’t Go Where I Can’t Find You. It felt like it’s time to start building momentum towards the feature.”
A job writing and directing on forthcoming Irish TV comedy The Lido, set in a Dublin chip shop in the 1980s, helped her make the leap to full-time creative, while she also wrote and directed Balor Hall, a 30-minute murder mystery whodunnit for RTÉ.
Ní Ghrioghair has a particular interest in stories about murder, female empowerment and sexuality, and has several projects in development including the feature The Hive about a heist in a tech company that goes wrong.
“I’m compelled by the darker sides of our psyches,” she reflects. “I’d love to tell more stories of female psychopaths and about killers and cults, the darker experiences of human life. All things murder, true crime, fictitious crime, that’s all of my wheelhouse.”
Contact: Rioghnach Ní Ghrioghair
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