Drama series, THIRTY, tells the story of four diverse women from Sydney, in their early thirties, trying to get their lives on track.
Childhood friends, Dalia, Charlie, Anna and Bianca try to navigate through the ups and downs of love, work, family, sex and friendship together.
Nominated for Best Australian Drama Series, we chat to Tricia-Lyn Morosin, writer, producer & actor (Dalia), of THIRTY.
What inspired your web series?
I wrote THIRTY while balancing work with mummying and studying acting, because I needed a little bit of ‘me time’. And, as an acting student in my thirties, I was also really inspired by the distinct lack of roles for women like me (over 30, ethnically diverse and larger than a size 8!). I had a couple of teachers suggest I head to the States after graduation and audition for Latina roles but I thought, why should I have to do that? There should be roles for women like me here in Australia. So I started to write about my life and the people around me.
Why did you choose web series as your format?
That was actually an idea from my (now) Director, Leah Pellinkhof. I’d never heard of the medium before and initially had written a long-form show. Leah suggested I re-structure it as a web series and I started researching short-form content. I guess the driver was really making it more manageable to produce and so I transformed my script into a web series.
How long did it take to produce and shoot the series?
If you include initial script workshops, it’s probably just over 12 months, but pre-production really got serious in September 2016 and we’re launching on 23 May 2017, so eight months. From our very first script til now has been two years. Woah. Did not think it would take that long!!
As the series centres on four women and their lives, the cast is quite a large one, what was your experience like with such a large cast?
I loved having a large cast. I think it kept things interesting and we were so lucky – everyone was wonderful to work with. Every day on set was like working with a big family, between our large cast and crew – and I’m a wog, so I’m used to big families. There were challenges in terms of coordinating (and feeding) all the actors, but I think the benefits far out-weighed the challenges.
The series features many different locations, from houses to offices, which location was the hardest to film in?
The most difficult location to film in was the moving car in episode 1. I was determined that the girls would be talking to each other, with the car moving as they drove to our main character’s house. I didn’t think the tension or pace of the episode would work if the car wasn’t moving. So we set up a green screen in my garage. It was such a risk and now I look at those scenes – as you watch them drive through the sunlit suburbs – you’d never guess it was actually shot in the middle of the night, in my garage, during a thunderstorm. Well done to our VFX expert, Sam Foster, for pulling off that minor miracle.
What are the challenges you came across when making your series?
Obviously funding was a big challenge and it just so happened that the only time we could run our crowdfunding campaign was during filming. That was hectic, but actually it worked in our favour because every day we had great BTS content to use to help us promote the series. The other challenge, for me personally, was composition. I was so used to hearing the episodes without music that I would initially hate everything I heard. I overcame that by leaning more on my other Producer, Sarah, who has a good ear and hadn’t been as involved in the editing process. Actually there were endless challenges, but somehow things always worked out…
Do you have any future plans for this series?
I’d love to make a second season. We end on a bit of a cliff-hanger and everyone who has watched it so far is asking for more, because they feel invested in these women’s lives and want to know what happens to them. It was also just a really fun project to shoot, so to be able to do that all again (hopefully bigger and even better) would be amazing!
What advice would you give to emerging creators?
I’m a perfectionist and could’ve fiddled with every stage of the production process – re-writing the script, tweaking the edit, the music etc. But at some point you do have to accept what you have in front of you and say ‘this is more than good enough, let’s push on’, otherwise you’ll never have an end product. Also, a good web series is made by a team of great people, so relationship management is key. Make sure everyone feels part of the journey, passionate about the project and, most importantly, appreciated.
THIRTY ON SOCIAL