Alphabet Lane Q&A with Cast and Crew

Alphabet Lane is the debut feature from writer/director James Litchfield.

In the film we meet Anna and Jack. They’re in their early 30s, partners (not married), they’re from Sydney and they’ve made the decision to move to country area for Jack’s work. Anna is a doctor and she’s working night shifts in emergency at the small local hospital. 

They’re both lonely, they’re both trying to make friends and failing. They had hopes about the friendliness of small town people but those hopes haven’t come to fruition. One evening, over dinner, Jack invents an imaginary friend named Joe and tells Anna all about him. This imaginary friend takes on a life of his own, and inside the relationship between Anna and Jack. Then they start telling locals about their friend Joe which leads to confusion and more. This is a gem of a film, about isolation, about the things people utilize to keep a relationship alive, about the myths we tell ourselves about small country towns and friendly locals, about where we want to live our lives and what will make us happy.

The tone is mysterious and dark but also full of humour and poignancy. I was lucky enough to run a Q&A at a Sydney screening of the film where I was in conversation with actors Tilda Cobham-Hervey (Anna), Henry Nixon (Cory, a not too friendly local sheep farmer), Will Johnston (Ziz, a mate of Anna and Jack’s who comes to visit from Sydney), Lucinda Reynolds (Producer) and James Litchfield (writer/director).