The White Nightgown
- Feb 19, 2025
- 16 min read
Updated: May 11, 2025
We had our first online group meeting on Thursday, 13th February, to discuss changes and questions I had about the first draft (see the first post). After walking through the script, we started our Padlet and pitch presentation, giving us time to work on it before our next in-person meeting on Thursday, 20th February.
Useful links:
Pitch deck -(Intentions)
Second Meeting Notes:
Pitch Proposal/Director Statement:
Always eager to work on a new project with plenty of room for creativity, I found myself visualising ways lines of the script could be powerfully conveyed through film. The exploration of a hurt but fiercely resilient character standing up for herself against male greed and society in 1679 carries messages that are still relevant in the modern day.
I really want The White Nightgown to encapsulate the emotional consequences of injustice and betrayal that stem from patriarchal control. Encapsulating the suffocating toll, physically and mentally, through the sense of place. The sound design, set design and cinematography will work in conjunction to reveal the isolating and muted surroundings, mirroring Elspeth’s inner psyche.
At its core, we’re exploring power, survival and the consequences of women's silence. Upon researching the real inspiration behind our protagonist, we discovered that Christian Nimmo had a reputation for being beautiful but was known for her violent and impulsive nature. When in prison awaiting trial on the Royal Mile, she was described as physically filthy and broken but still graceful and courageous in the face of death. Some characters that came to mind include Katherine in Lady Macbeth and Rhiannon Lewis from the series SweetPea. Ella Purnell’s captivating performance is what I’m planning to draw out in our film, presenting the perfect medium of delirium and sensitivity due to her environment.
In summary, we plan on respectfully exploring the state of mind and reasoning behind the actions of Elspeth and, moving forward, plan on organising casting and location to help solidify our vision.
Amberlit!
-After a very long day of pitches, I felt like the energy in the room was very low. Despite this, we tried our best to sell our idea as quickly as possible.
Our Feedback was as follows:
'The team is still missing some vital crew members and this is something that should be addressed moving forward. The projection would benefit greatly from having a designated producer, there also needs to be a sound hod and also a production designer attached. There is potential for Aimme Hayhurst to contribute to the production design role so I would advise reaching out to see if that might be a good fit. I would also suggest with this being a period piece it would be good to have more than one person in the art department.
Additionally, I have some concerns about how you make this a visually engaging piece when we are only ever in the one room. So, it would be great to talk through how you might elevate the film visually, so we avoid the potential for it to feel like a stageplay.'
We spent the weekend eliminating these issues:
-We found a producer, Tomas, who is happy to co-produce with Lea. This allowed me to step down from doing more producer-based jobs, allowing me to focus more on the story and its portrayal and leaving the logistics and organisation to those with better knowledge.
-I followed up on Ailsa Khan's HoD role after she approached us post-pitch, interested in helping with sound design. Due to other project commitments, she asked if someone else could be brought on for the post-production dialogue edit. (In the end, no-one was needed) Luckily, because we changed our shoot dates to be earlier than other groups, she is happy to record on set. We have since found another two people who can boom each day.
Third draft:
Google Drive:
Crowdfunder:
We later began putting everything from the Padlet onto the Google Drive so it is accessible outside of Napier for Charmaine Stewart, an extra helping hand for the art department, providing her industry knowledge.https://www.charmainestewart.com/
I emailed her as she originally got in contact, interested in helping with Screamsaver after seeing its casting call.
Location booked:
21st-24th March.
-Friday 21st (set-up day)
-Shoot 22-23rd
-Monday 24th (de-set)
Location Recce:
Booked for the following Thursday, 6th March.
Promotional Instagram Page: https://www.instagram.com/thewhitenightgown/
I created and began running the Instagram page with the intention of using it to promote our film and encourage donations towards our expensive location. Using behind-the-scenes footage recorded by Tomas on our recce, Rebecca edited some short reel-style videos and created some posters to put up when promoting our project around Costorphine. Our original goal for the funder was £750, but to our surprise, this was reached pretty quickly. To cover the rest of our costs, I set a stretched target which we ended up surpassing by the end!
Tutorials with Andrew and Mark [04/03/2025]
Art Department-wise:
-First, focus on what needs to be hidden/taken out of your location.
Remember:
Cover radiators.
The camera can't see ceiling lights; the lighting needs to feel period accurate, lots of faux candles.
Light from outside/ other rooms.
-The room/location is almost a character. It can be grand but cold and reflect the relationships between the characters.
-Play with reflections, even on wood!!
Play around with your rooms/ staircase
Production-wise:
All set in one room, make sure it doesn't feel like a play. Juxtapose the outside freedom with Elspeth's restriction. e.g. shots of birds being free outside vs. her through glass?
-Could bookend it to further heighten her lack of liberty.
-How can story beats be represented visually?
Remember, it's important to let actors know if a performance needs to be toned down!! Find a balance you can pull them back to without insulting anyone.
This is why rehearsals are vital: establish levels of emotion 1-5.
Casting Meeting:
Once all audition reels were sent in, we held a group meeting to watch and discuss our casting decisions. One girl stood out to all of us immediately (Gülin), having the exact performance we wanted, ranging her emotions perfectly; however, due to her accent, we had to regretfully go on the one last hunt for specifically Scottish actresses. A majority of our favourite applicants had English accents and needed travel and accommodation covered from quite far away if they were to help on the production. As favourable as some of them were, we thought it was more vital to honour the Scottish influence on a story closely inspired by it. Our first choice for John ended up falling through, meaning we contacted Malcolm, our second choice for John, a few days later. We approached Catherine (Elspeth) after finding out she was interested, but never got cast in a role for another film in our year, meaning she was eager to audition for ours. Though not our first choice, she brought an unexpected amount of beneficial suggestions and approaches to the role once she was settled in after rehearsals.
Applications- 1. Actors.xlsx
Notes During Selection Process
Character Development:
I began researching more into Christian Nimmo, aka, The White Lady of Costorphin and the inspiration behind Elspeth's character. Finding some websites, videos and books, I tied together my relevant findings into character profiles, which I forwarded to the actors before rehearsals so they had a better understanding of the intended mindset for the characters.
Storyboard, Shotlist and Movement Plan Meetings:
The week leading up to the production was non-stop. We were running a pretty tight schedule to make sure everything was prepared in time. Daisy (DoP) and I met up after having thought on our separate shotlists/storyboards to align our visions. When informing our producer of the estimated number of slates, he organised a follow-up meeting to see if we could reduce our shots while having enough coverage, as he was worried about the two days not being enough time to do everything by, especially considering we were working within daylight hours.
Shot List- https://docs.google.com/document/d/1h6FXt-fy201IfgcFcYpliIz8HmNMz-KOKL3eCHRQ1Yg/edit?usp=sharing
Movement Plan Animation-
Rehearsals:
In preparation for rehearsals, I annotated my script, trying to stick with a pink pen for Elspeth's emotions, purple for John's and blue for blocking and black for anything else. Writing numbers for the level of emotion I was imagining in each section, I also added specific feelings and important background information to consider at certain moments, which I mentioned if I felt the performances needed a change of tone. Blocking-wise, not having access to the location was a challenge during rehearsals; however, I used tables and chairs in our rehearsal space to best set up marks for important areas of the room so the talent could get an idea of the movement on the lines. This was also essential for the slap scene, as Tomas used his theatre experience to lead a crash course on safely carrying out the more violent choreography.
On Set:
Day 1: Preparation
The check-in time for our location was 3 pm, as there were guests staying the night before. Luckily, as we asked to be let in as early as possible in advance, we got there for around 2 pm. We got straight to work, setting up the kit, organising a coffee/food area in the lobby and taking photos of all furniture in its original place before rearranging stuff. We labelled the items that we brought to the living room from upstairs as we were shooting the bedroom and stairs scenes the following day. Whilst set design got to work, the camera department and I began marking the tripod placement for each shot with tape on the floor to ensure the following day would go as smoothly and efficiently as possible. Needing to leave later that evening, I asked to be sent photos of the remaining shots so I could give feedback and also joined for a quick video call about some last-minute rearrangement decisions. Unfortunately, I wasn't sent all the photos, meaning there was some confusion and blocking miscommunications the next day.
Day 2: Shoot Day 1
Up very early, we spent half an hour before the talent arrived preparing for the day. As soon as Catherine arrived, we rehearsed through the action of the day in the space for the first time. Thanks to our previous practice and Catherine's passion for her character, things went very smoothly. Unfortunately, as our hair and make-up artist was more than an hour late getting confused on her way to the set, we were slightly delayed getting Catherine into costume. Spending this extra time doing more rehearsals until Malcolm arrived, we decided to switch our plan around to make the most of time and do a joint run-through so Malcolm's personal one could be done as Catherine gets ready. Though not ideal, it still worked well rehearsal-wise. Malcom benefited from a bit more of a run-through, which we had time for due to everything taking longer than expected. After sending Malcolm to get into costume, Lea and Tomas informed me about the dire state of the extensions and that Anna was already sewing some hairties to try and salvage the situation by putting up her hair. Unfortunately, being pressed for time after that didn't work, we made the decision to use her natural bob and make it look messier and uneven. Lea ingeniously suggested a line should be added to give context for this inaccurate haircut. Looking back, this was one of my favourite resolutions to this issue, making it more believable as leaving the extensions in would've brought down the production value massively. The time felt like it flew by without a second for me to have a breather; there was always something needing to be done or checked. We progressed through the shots as quickly as possible, trying to make up for the lost time, but ultimately ran out of sunlight by the end of the day on the stairs scene. Though morale was quite low at the end due to these conundrums, Tomas did a great job at keeping everyone calm and on track, reworking the plan for tomorrow to reshoot some of that scene.
Continuity H&M photos:
(Unfortunately, no photo of the disastrous extensions that set us back two hours, but this was us testing to see if the colour matched in rehearsals.)
Day 3: Shoot Day 2
Being our last shoot day with so much coverage left to get, the stakes were high. We began the day quickly reshooting some of the staircase sections and agreed we would come back to get more at the end if there was time. Due to how rushed this process was, some of the compositions we realised in the edit didn't look as good as we had originally planned. This also affected our now-cut 'Bible throw' scene. Having issues with our monitor cable was very unhelpful when working in such a tight space. Having issues with the video cutting out at points, the day before, twisting and holding it at certain angles worked for the most part. Annoyingly, this was not the case the next day, and we were monitor-less for the rest of the shoot. Already worried about not being able to monitor the performance of this scene, as I wasn't able to see it (big red sheet in the way), my fears were proven true, as none of it worked in the edit. Crew members' hands were appearing in the background, and the overall performance was not what I hoped for, so I later helped find a way to structure the edit without this bit.
Before lunch, we moved on and began moving equipment to set up for all the downstairs coverage. During this, there may or may not have been a little accident with a small glass figure that got knocked over. Though not the worst issue in the world, it did set back some spirits on set, which cost us more shooting time. Our race against the clock when returning means we rarely got multiple takes of our coverage. Again, we were not able to realise this until post-production, which made it quite stressful to work with, as there were unwanted reflections in the mirror and out-of-focus sections which were hard to spot and focus on in the rush of the moment, especially on such a small camera screen. We did end up running out of daylight for a few of the shots, which worried Daisy. Thankfully, Guénolé, who was gaffing this day, was at the ready to set up his artificial sunlight. This was a lifesaver for getting the line coverage on the cross-shot scene. Despite not being able to make it as wide as we hoped, we were pleased with how it turned out. I had to fight my case to Tomas as to why I thought it was essential to spend time getting some extreme close-ups of their eye contact in the last scene, but due to the difference in lighting, they didn't make the final cut. There were moments when people mentioned to me they felt some of the crew would overstep. The whole process, I did establish that I was welcoming suggestions, especially when asking for other people's thoughts, but at times, I did feel slightly drowned out. With more experience, I plan to work on my confidence in situations like these. When we wrapped, I felt a huge sense of relief and pride. It was very emotional to hear that our actors were impressed and pleased with what we managed to pull off. I think I was even surprised by myself as I never would've expected to take such a guiding role in a production.
Day 4: Reset
Having stayed overnight at the location to look after the equipment with Rebecca. We carefully set back most of the furniture the previous night, so there was less hassle the next morning. Despite the owners allowing us to film at the location, they didn't seem to expect the scale of the production, sounding worried about all the changes we made when I briefly spoke to James (an owner on site), offering to give the lobby, which had become slightly messy, a hoover. Understanding their worry, we made sure everything was meticulous back to order, leaving as quickly as possible and giving him a thank-you gift by the end. He was pleasantly surprised when doing the last checks before signing the location agreement form, which was a great note to end on.
Feedback on my directorial approach:
Wanting to learn as much as possible from this experience, I followed up with Malcom and Catherine to follow up on how they found the experience.
Malcom
I was eager to hear Malcolm's feedback, knowing he would be brutally honest about his experience. I was very grateful and did not expect him to go into so much detail.
Nonetheless, I made notes for my future experiences and aim to better my approaches next time.
Additionally, a few days later, he thoughtfully got in contact to recommend a podcast with directing advice. :)
Catherine
Having no feedback to return to either of them, I was glad the at times stressful few days didn't impact everyone's outlooks.
Post-Production
Edit Process:
Rebecca, with whom I was co-editing Broadcast Curse, began structuring everything together. After letting her have a play around with the footage, I came in to check up on how it was going. Though taking longer than expected to finish doing all the scenes, I noticed a few shots that I wanted in the final piece were not used, so I suggested adding them in. As an editor myself, I realised some shots might not work for various continuity reasons, but I had not reviewed the footage as much in the edit suite to know for sure. I left Rebecca with some feedback to work through and some lines that could possibly be cut out, and came to review her progress every following day. While some suggestions worked, some also unexpectedly didn't. I could tell Rebecca was getting quite frustrated when sections didn't work and had to keep getting adapted. I tried to remain optimistic, conscious of how much effort had been put into getting to this stage, I didn't want to give up and lock something that didn't quite work. Unfortunately, on the day it was hoped to lock it, it still needed work. Susan agreed with this and recommended another day would be beneficial. I always anticipate edits to take longer than the 4 days allocated, but regrettably, Rebecca had to cancel her other plans of helping out on the set of Hannah Are You Still There, to dedicate more time to completing the edit. I spent the whole next day accompanying the edit, trying to speed up the process, but sadly, there was just not enough time in the day. I was quite anxious as I knew the edit wouldn't be complete by lunchtime the following day (Wednesday), which is when Rebecca was expecting to be done by to help on the second shoot day. Already sensing her very low mood, I didn't feel it was my place to ask her to cancel helping on the set a second day in a row, but at the same time, I didn't want to regret handing over a sequence that I knew wasn't at its best potential yet. Despite other plans in my schedule, I let Rebecca know that there were still adjustments that needed to be made, and I could take over if she was unable to in the next few days.
Happy for me to take it off her hands, I asked Ailsa to come in and review the edit, sound-wise, on Wednesday to make sure everything would work well. She ended up sitting with me the majority of the day, bouncing off feedback with me for slight tweaks in the cuts. We mostly slowed down the pace in the opening, sped up a focus pull in the cross shot and edited around a very out-of-focus master in the scene leading up to the slap, increasing the cutting frequency between two not-so-great angles to build the tension for the peak of act 2. Her fresh mindset, not having seen the edit before, was very useful, and her co-operation allowed us to be picture locked the following morning. I made sure to update Rebecca on any changes we made and got her to come in and approve the final edit. Though at the time greenlighting the picture lock, when reviewing the edit at later stages, she seemed displeased with some of the cuts and dialogue, which came as a bit of a surprise to me. Upon reflection, I should've been stricter as post-production supervisor with Lea to make sure time was being utilised to its full extent, ensuring the edit could be done in time with space for a few reviews in between. I also find it quite challenging to work with your friends (in any job), as when you get on so well with people, the dynamic really changes when someone needs to be a bit more governing. Despite this, we are still on good terms and have discussed the frustration brought about by the project.
Sound:
After having discussed my ideas with Ailsa, who was also working on another project, I let her get to work, coming in as soon as she wanted me to have a check-up on how things were going. Checking up around 4 times over the designing process, some of my main suggestions are as follows:
-The bird noises at the start need tweaking (lessening), and the sound level needs to change when going from the outside to the inside shot.
-The door unlocking noise sounded a bit like a cannon; it needed to be changed or played around with.
-Footsteps throughout needed revisiting.
-Wind!! - After hearing a bit of that at the beginning, I thought it would work brilliantly, carried on throughout the whole film, especially with headphones on, it brought an impending sense of doom.
-Awquarness at the dinner table through some crows, wind that would rise and fall, squeak of chair.
Straitcase Scene: One of the more experimental sections to play around with. Originally, I imagined John's voice drowning out with viewers blending, into the tinnitus feeling of Elspeth's head as she processes hearing her fate. This had to be regulated, rising and falling to work to its full effect; however, when Zoe gave it a listen, her first question was what went wrong with the audio recording there..... not realising it was intentional. As disappointing and harsh as it was to hear our intentions didn't come across, we decided to remove the audio fading, replacing the tension with more of an emphasis on the wind, which I think works much better in the final film.
We both gave it a final review on speakers in a smaller sound suite, making a few final, picky adjustments before layback. Overall, I am so grateful and pleased about the sound design on this project. I found it so easy and fun to work with Alisa, especially being so passionate about the project; we worked together very well, and the final result really elevated the whole film.
Grade:
Having initially discussed the grainy and old feeling I wanted the overall look to have, Rebecca completed the grade, keeping in mind the cold feeling of the setting by utilising toned colours, giving it a b&w feel.
Summary of final thoughts:
As the director, I felt a lot more pressure leading up to others seeing the film. The knowledge of how much people donated to help produce this film lingered in the back of our minds, raising the stakes for everyone's reception. Personally, I felt a huge sense of relief after our feedback, with it going much better than I expected and anticipating a lot of the feedback we got. It's difficult to watch your own work from a fresh viewer's perspective without your biased memories focusing on what you remember being negative. Overall, it was very beneficial to hear other points of view, and I'm already missing the safe space
Upon reflection, I realised I also really valued other group members' final opinions of the film, not wanting to let them down. Sadly, it did feel like many were very critical of their contributions and not as satisfied as hoped with the final product, which was quite disheartening. I felt the overall result, even without our challenges in mind, was executed to a strong standard, but we definitely would have benefited from better communication from some of the crew members.
Critical reflection:
-We plan on taking on as much feedback as possible from the crit before submitting to festivals. Our primary changes are to vfx the modern handles, radiators and unwanted reflections out and improve the colour grade,
In an ideal world, we would return to the location to reshoot and get extra coverage; however, as it is not in our budget, we can only take on and learn from the advice, realising two minutes of film per shoot day is the safest minimum to ensure a decent variety of coverage.
Crit version of film: https://youtu.be/9JYkwhtmxbQ?si=kro_ESEutwzFDwMp
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