Heather Taylor

Heather Taylor (born in Edmonton, Alberta) is a Canadian writer, and director. Taylor studied music, acting and writing in western Canada and London, England.[1]

Heather Taylor
Heather Taylor at the 2018 Bell Media Prime Time TV Program Showcase
Born
Edmonton, Alberta
NationalityCanadian
Other namesHeather Arness
CitizenshipCanadian
British
EducationMA creative writing
Alma materCity University
OccupationFilm director, writer
Years active2002–present
AwardsWandsworth Community Champion, 2011

Poetry and performance

In the UK, she was a featured performer at events/ venues including Spit Lit, the Victoria & Albert Museum,[2] Borders, Poetry Café,[3] Book Slam, RADA, Camberwell Arts Festival,[4] Harrow Festival, Runnymede International Literature Festival, Penned in the Margins,[5] and Glastonbury Festival.[6] She has also performed at the Arnolfini Gallery (Bristol) and The Guardian Newsroom as part of the Remember Ken Saro-Wiwa project[7] and has been a member of Apples and Snakes and Malika's Poetry Kitchen.[8]

From 2005 to 2007, Taylor toured the two-woman poetry and music show Accents on Words with Aoife Mannix. It was launched at the Poetry Café in London in November 2005 and was performed at a number of venues, including The British Library with BBC Radio London,[9] BAC with Apples and Snakes, The Aran Islands (Ireland) and India with the British Council for Mumbai Poetry Live. In December 2007, Heather Taylor took part in first Belgrade International Poetry festival "Beogradski Trg".

Past projects also include poetry and performance with the BlackFriars Settlement (girls aged 11–16) and the Women's Library.[10] She has two full poetry collections: Horizon & Back (Tall Lighthouse, UK, 2005) and Sick Day Afternoons (Treci Trg, Serbia, 2009).[11]

Theatre and radio

As a playwright, Taylor's work has been seen at the Tricycle Theatre, Soho Theatre, Greenwich Theatre, the Pleasance,[12] Etcetera Theatre[13] and Theatre503 in London as well as New Place in St. Albans, G12 in Glasgow as part of the NewWriting NewWorlds Festival.[14] She graduated with an MA with Distinction in Creative Writing from City University.[15] Her play Prisms was the Sunday Play on Resonance FM, 16 December 2010.

Film and Television

In 2008, Taylor co-wrote a Bengali western called The Last Thakur. It was a Channel 4 co-production with Artificial Eye as the distributor. The film was received well by critics and Sight & Sound magazine named The Last Thakur "one of the most confident British debut features since Asif Kapadia's The Warrior (2001)... with which it shares an Asian location and language and a welcome belief in the primacy of visual storytelling."[16]

The film premiered at the London Film Festival[17] and was shown at the Dubai International Film Festival, Mumbai International Film Festival, New York Film Festival,[18] and others and finally had its theatrical release in the United Kingdom on 29 June 2009.[16]

The short documentary, Wild West Dream, was produced and co-directed by Taylor through Red on Black Productions and was the official selection at the Atlantic Film Festival[19] and the Edmonton International Film Festival[20] in 2009.

In 2011, Taylor created the web series Raptured,[21] which is distributed by Koldcast.[22] In 2012, she released the food series Home Baked Stories.

Taylor wrote and directed the short horror film, Stitched, in 2016. It was named one of 20 cool things seen at 2016’s Brooklyn Horror Film Festival: "The final, perfect beat of Heather Taylor’s short, Stitched, and Deborah Green’s glowing performance that sells the whole thing." [23] She went on to write and direct Pay to Stay which premiered at the Queens World Film Festival in 2019.[24]

From 2018 to 2019, Taylor was a resident of the Bell Media Prime Time TV Program at the Canadian Film Centre, presented in association with ABC Signature Studios.[25]

PR, Marketing, and Strategy

Taylor was the Director of Creative Strategy at The Economist from 2015 to 2018.[26] She has held executive roles at Weber Shandwick and Ogilvy [27] and was the North American Editorial Director for Econsultancy.[28] She was the former Corporate Community Manager for the BBC,[29] social media and PR manager for Giffgaff[30] and the former editor and filmmaker for PayPal's Let's Talk social media and consumer advocacy website.[31] While in that role, in addition to PayPal related topics, she regularly produced video interviews with experts in mobile, finance, social media and web development.

In 2011, she was listed by Brand Republic[32] as one of the top 200 most influential bloggers.

Taylor organised the cleanup in Clapham Junction after the London Riots in August 2011[33] and led what is now referred to as the Broom Army.[34] She won a Wandsworth Community Champion award[35] for her efforts.

Filmography
Year Title Notes Credits
2008 The Last Thakur Feature film Writer
2009 Wild West Dream Short Doc Director/ Producer
Stay Safe Short Writer
2011 Raptured – season 1 Web series Writer/ Director/ Producer
Book of the Dead Short Writer
2012 Home Baked Stories Web series Director/ Producer
The Last Job Short Writer
2016 Stitched Short Director/ Writer
2019 Pay to Stay Short Director/ Writer

Poetry collections
  • Sick Day Afternoons (Popodnevna Bolovanja) (2009), ISBN 978-86-86337-27-6
  • Horizon and Back (2005), ISBN 1-904551-17-3
  • She Never Talks of Strangers (2003), a chapbook, ISBN 1-904551-07-6.

Anthologies
  • A View from the Lighthouse (2009)
  • City Lighthouse (2009), ISBN 978-1-904551-58-4
  • Storm Between Fingers (2007), ISBN 1-905233-13-2
  • His Rib (2007), ISBN 0-9789695-2-9
  • This Poem Is Sponsored By... (2007), ISBN 0-9553431-1-9
  • Malika's Poetry Kitchen's Handmade Fire (2006), ISBN 1-905233-10-8
  • Future Welcome: The Moosehead Anthology X (2005), ISBN 1-897190-06-9
  • Dance the Guns to Silence : 100 poems for Ken Saro-Wiwa (2005), ISBN 1-905233-01-9
  • Audition Arsenal for Women in Their 20s: 101 Monologues by Type, 2 Minutes & Under (2005), ISBN 1-57525-396-8
  • Tall-lighthouse Poetry Review (2004), ISBN 1-904551-19-X
  • In the Criminal's Cabinet (2004), ISBN 0-9546268-1-8
  • Teen Angst: A Celebration of Really Bad Poetry (2005), ISBN 0-312-33474-5
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References
  1. Withey, Elizabeth (25 September 2009). "Hometown advantage". Edmonton Journal. Archived from the original on 11 January 2015.
  2. "Tilt events 2009".
  3. Meadows, Agnes. "Loose Muse, ANGEL POETRY AND 'TIME FOR SONG' LAUNCHES". Loose Muse.
  4. "Camberwell Arts Festival announcement". Penned in the Margins. Retrieved 9 October 2012.
  5. "Stand up for your Writes". Metro. 25 April 2006.
  6. "Poetry & Words Tent: Glastonbury Festival 2004". Retrieved 9 October 2012.
  7. "Remember Saro-Wiwa, an evening of poets and inspiration". Retrieved 9 October 2012.
  8. "2007 Programme for Malika's poetry Kitchen at Spit Lit".
  9. "Writers on Writing".
  10. "The Independent Ladies". The Women's Library. Retrieved 4 July 2007.
  11. "Treci Trg Book Catalogue 2011/2012" (PDF). Treci Trg.
  12. "Recent Directors Work". Young Vic. Retrieved 9 October 2012.
  13. "Hostage: Bleach: Burn – Etcetera Theatre". IndieLondon.
  14. "Programme for NewWriting New Worlds Festival". Retrieved 9 October 2012.
  15. "Creative Writing (Playwriting and Screenwriting) MA".
  16. Brooke, Michael (July 2009). "The Last Thakur". Sight and Sound.
  17. "Sadik Ahmed's Last Thakur to feature at this year's Times BFI London Film Festival".
  18. Mahmud, Jamil. "Western approach, Bangladeshi soul". The Daily Star.
  19. "Atlantic Film Festival official site". Archived from the original on 18 January 2013. Retrieved 9 October 2012.
  20. "Heather Taylor returns to E-Town for EIFF". The Gateway. Archived from the original on 15 January 2013.
  21. "Raptured Captured: the making of a web series (ft. Heather Taylor, writer-director Raptured TV)". Off the Wall Post.
  22. "Watch KoldCast for Dozens of Great Web Series". Roku Guide. 9 January 2012.
  23. Kurland, Daniel (October 2016). "Brooklyn Horror Film Fest: 20 Cool Things Seen at the 1st Annual Brooklyn Horror Film Festival". Bloody Disgusting.
  24. "Pay to Stay by Heather Taylor". Queens World Film Festival. 1 March 2019.
  25. "Introducting the 2018 CFC Bell Media Prime Time TV Writers". Canadian Film Centre. 20 September 2018.
  26. Goldman, Jeremy. "Is Groundtruthing the Term Brands Need to Watch in 2017?". Inc.
  27. Karol, Gabrielle (1 August 2013). "Vine Super-Users Earning a Living via Social Media". FOXBusiness.
  28. "Heather Taylor, Editorial Director at Econsultancy, on Social@Scale". Sprinklr. Archived from the original on 15 April 2013.
  29. "BBC volunteer leads Clapham clean up". Ariel. 10 August 2011.
  30. Bridge, Mark. "The positive cult of giffgaff". Fonecast.
  31. "About the editor". Archived from the original on 5 May 2013. Retrieved 9 October 2012.
  32. "The BR 200 July 2011: The web's most influential bloggers". Brand Republic. 21 July 2011. Archived from the original on 18 January 2013.
  33. Barford, Vanessa (9 August 2011). "Riot clean-up brings 400 volunteers to Clapham Junction". BBC.
  34. "Riots heroes celebrated at community awards ceremony". Wandsworth Guardian. 2 December 2011.
  35. Bryant, Amanda (1 December 2011). "Six of the best are honoured as riot champions". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 1 December 2011.
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