{{short description|Australian film director (1961–2022)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2019}} {{Use Australian English|date=April 2014}} {{Infobox person | post-nominals = | image = | name = Shirley Barrett | birth_date = {{birth date text|1961}} | birth_place = Melbourne, Australia | death_date = {{death date and given age|2022|8|3|61|df=yes}} | death_place = Sydney, Australia | occupation = Film director, screenwriter, novelist | yearsactive = 1988–2021 | spouse = Chris Norris | children = 2 }} '''Shirley Barrett''' (1961 – 3 August 2022) was an Australian film director, screenwriter, and novelist. Initially Barrett was a singer in the band Fruit Pastilles from 1981-83. After ending her time in the band, Barrett went on to write for films. Her first film ''Love Serenade'' won the Caméra d'Or at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival.<ref name="festival-cannes.com">{{cite web |url=http://www.festival-cannes.com/en/archives/ficheFilm/id/4719/year/1996.html |title=Festival de Cannes: Love Serenade |access-date=20 September 2009|work=festival-cannes.com}}</ref> She wrote and directed two other feature films ''Walk the Talk'' (2000) and ''South Solitary'' (2010). Barrett's script for ''South Solitary'' was awarded multiple prizes, including the Queensland Premier's Prize and the West Australian Premier's Prize.<ref name="Curtis Brown">{{Cite web|title = Curtis Brown|url = http://curtisbrown.co.uk/client/shirley-barrett|website = curtisbrown.co.uk|access-date = 5 October 2015}}</ref> Her first novel ''Rush Oh!'' (2016) was shortlisted for the 2016 Indie Awards for Debut Fiction and the 2016 Nita May Dobbie Award, and long-listed for the 2016 Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction. Her second novel ''The Bus on Thursday'' was released in 2018.
==Early life and education== Barrett was born in Melbourne in 1961.<ref name="Elley">{{Cite web|title = Shirley Barrett|url = https://variety.com/1997/scene/vpage/shirley-barrett-1117793081/|access-date = 5 October 2015|first = Derek|last = Elley| date=15 January 1997 }}</ref> In 1985, she moved to Sydney, where she studied screenwriting at the Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS).<ref name="Elley"/> In 1988, during her final year at the AFTRS she made a short film entitled ''Cherith'' which won the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Short Fiction.<ref name="Engall 2002">{{Cite journal|last=Engall|first=Priscella|date=2002|title=Shirley Barrett Thinks Positive Thoughts About Delusion|url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f3h&AN=6803450&site=ehost-live|journal=Metro|access-date=20 September 2015}}</ref>
==Television== Barrett began her career in television “with production work on the ''Logies''.”<ref name="Engall 2002"/> After meeting Verity Lambert, she was given the opportunity to direct for a television series The ''Boys From the Bush.''<ref name="Elley"/> She continued working in television during the 1990s and 2000s, directing episodes for various television series including ''Love My Way, Wild Boys, Offspring'', and ''A Place to Call Home''.
==Film== === ''Love Serenade'' === Barrett's first feature ''Love Serenade (1996)'' was a film that explored, “how women can get completely the wrong idea about some men.”<ref name="Elley" /> It was shot almost entirely on location in Robinvale, Victoria. The story concerns two young sisters who develop a fierce and competitive crush on their neighbour, a brooding and self-centred radio personality. The film humorously incorporates "small town constrictions with visual flights of fancy".<ref name="Engall 2002" /> The sisters are played by Miranda Otto and Rebecca Frith and George Shevtsov stars as the washed up deejay.<ref name="Krauth 2010">{{Cite journal|last=Krauth|first=Kristen|date=2010|title=Meredith Had a Little Lamb|url=http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/52841648|journal=Metro|access-date=20 September 2015}}</ref> The film was generally well-received, with ''Variety'' describing it as “one of the most striking, fully formed and assured debuts in years.”<ref name="Elley" /> It won the Camera D'Or (Best First Feature) at Cannes film Festival 1996, and Barrett was awarded Best New Director at the Vallodolid International Film Festival in 1996.
=== ''Walk the Talk'' === Her second feature ''Walk the Talk'' (2000) was also inspired by the location in which the film is set.<ref name="Engall 2002" /> ''Walk the Talk'' in this case is set on the Gold Coast of Queensland. "Shirley had met Carter Edwards, a variety circuit veteran who appears in the film as Marty".<ref name="Engall 2002" /> This encounter "came in handy when ''Walk the Talk'' started to develop as a script".<ref name="Engall 2002" /> The film is "about dreamers and schemers, isolation and redemption, populated with iconic places and people",<ref name="Engall 2002" /> and stars Salvatore Coco as Joey, a desperately ambitious young man and Sacha Horler as his girlfriend Bonita.<ref>{{Cite journal|url = http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/6803450|title = Shirley Barrett|last = Engall|first = Priscella|date = 2002|journal = Metro|access-date = 20 September 2015}}</ref> After winning a large settlement from an accident that leaves Bonita paraplegic, Joey starts a talent agency hoping to "make his mark on the world".<ref name="Engall 2002" /> Joey encounters Nikki Raye (Nikki Bennett), “a variety club singer”<ref name="Engall 2002" /> and decides to represent her as an agent in attempts to thrust her, and himself into the limelight. The characters that Shirley Barrett created in ''Walk the Talk'' are "relegated to the fringes of a hero's journey".<ref name="Engall 2002" /> The comedic effect of the film emerges through the "desperation of these people living on the margins".<ref name="Engall 2002" /> Variety described it as "a bitingly funny, hard-hitting and yet compassionate examination of a bunch of losers on the fringe of showbiz."<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://variety.com/2000/film/reviews/walk-the-talk-1200463717/|title=Walk the Talk|last=Stratton|first=David|date=21 August 2000|work=Variety|access-date=27 November 2018|language=en-US}}</ref>
=== ''South Solitary'' === Barrett's third feature ''South Solitary'' (2010) is "another tale of outcasts".<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> The film stars Miranda Otto (who starred in ''Love Serenade'') as Meredith a lonely young woman. This time around, she situates the actress "on an island in 1927, tending to a lighthouse so isolated that the only way of communicating with the mainland is via carrier pigeon".<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> In the film, Meredith and “her uncle George (Barry Otto), a lighthouse keeper who has come to replace the previous one.”<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> They arrive on the desolate island and meet the island's inhabitants, a family consisting of the mother Alma (Essie Davis), her husband Stanley (Rohan Nichol), and their daughter Nettie (Annie Martin).<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> Similar to her character's romantic perils in ''Love Serenade'', "Meredith is desperate for some kind of connection with men",<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> which drives her to have an affair with Stanley. As the film continues, "the population of the island dwindles to two",<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> leaving Meredith in the company of Fleet (Marton Csokas), "a returned First World War soldier recovering form shell shock".<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> Meredith is searching and longing for companionship while Fleet "shies away from the confusion and misunderstandings of human contact".<ref name="Krauth 2010" /> Despite this tension between the characters, they develop affections for one another.
== Novels == === ''Rush Oh!'' === Barrett's first novel ''Rush Oh!'' (2015) is set in Eden, New South Wales:in 1908. It tells the story of a family of whalers and their unusual relationship with a pod of killer whales. It is based on a true story.
=== ''The Bus on Thursday'' === Barrett's second novel ''The Bus on Thursday'' (2018) tells the story of a young woman recently recovering from breast cancer who takes a job as teacher in a tiny school in a remote country town, where she finds herself set upon by demons.
== Personal life == Barrett was married to Chris Norris.<ref name="baum">Caroline Baum, "Shirley Barrett", ''The Age'', 19 September 2015, Spectrum, p. 24</ref> They had two daughters. She lived in Sydney.<ref name="Engall 2002" /> In March 2022, she wrote about her battle with terminal cancer.<ref>Shirley Barrett (2022) Notes on dying: ‘It occurred to me that this is my last lychee season’. [https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/mar/06/notes-on-dying-it-occurred-to-me-that-this-is-my-last-lychee-season ''The Guardian'', 5 March 2022.]</ref> She died in Sydney on 3 August 2022, aged 61.<ref>{{cite news|url = https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/aug/05/shirley-barrett-obituary-she-never-stopped-being-the-life-of-the-party|title = Shirley Barrett obituary: 'She never stopped being the life of the party'|last = Salusinszky|first = Irne|date = 5 August 2022|accessdate = 5 August 2022|newspaper = The Guardian}}</ref>
==Filmography==
===As writer=== * 1988 — ''Cherith'' (short) * 1996 — ''Love Serenade'' (screenplay) * 2000 — ''Walk the Talk'' * 2010 — ''South Solitary''
===As director=== * 1988 — ''Cherith'' * 1991 — ''Boys from the Bush'' (4 episodes) * 1992–1993 — ''A Country Practice'' * 1994 — ''Heartbreak High'' (7 episodes) * 1995 — ''Police Rescue'' (1 episode) * 1996 — ''Love Serenade'' * 2000 — ''Walk the Talk'' * 2006–2007 — ''Love My Way'' (5 episodes) * 2010 — ''South Solitary'' * 2011 — ''Packed to the Rafters'' (2 episodes) * 2010–2013 — ''Offspring'' (6 episodes) * 2011 — ''Wild Boys'' (2 episodes) * 2012 — ''House Husbands'' (2 episodes) * 2013 — ''Mr & Mrs Murder'' (2 episodes) * 2014 — ''Love Child'' (2 episodes) * 2015 — ''Winter'' (2 episodes) * 2015 — ''A Place to Call Home'' (2 episodes) * 2016 — ''A Place to Call Home'' (4 episodes) * 2017 — ''Offspring'' (2 episodes) * 2021 — ''Five Bedrooms'' (6 episodes)
==Other writings== * 2015 — ''Rush Oh!'' (novel) * 2018 — ''The Bus On Thursday'' (novel)
==Awards==
===Won=== * Australian Film Institute 1988: ** ''AFI Award'' for Best Short Fiction Film ''Cherith'' * Cannes Film Festival 1996:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0195031.html|title=1996 Cannes Film Festival|website=www.infoplease.com|access-date=10 December 2017}}</ref> ** ''Camera D'Or'' for ''Love Serenade'' * Valladolid International Film Festival 1996:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.filmaffinity.com/en/awards.php?award_id=seminci&year=1996|title=41th Valladolid International Film Festival — Seminci 1996 — FilmAffinity|website=FilmAffinity|access-date=10 December 2017}}</ref> ** ''Best New Director'' for ''Love Serenade'' * Queensland Premier Prize 2010:<ref name="Curtis Brown"/> ** Script for ''South Solitary'' * West Australian Premier's Literary Prize 2010:<ref name="Curtis Brown"/> ** Script for ''South Solitary'' * West Australian Premiers Prize 2010:<ref name="Curtis Brown"/> ** Script for ''South Solitary''
===Nominated=== * Australian Film Institute 2006: ** ''AFI Award'' for Best Direction in Television ''Love My Way''
==== Shortlisted ==== * 2016 Indie Awards for Debut Fiction ''Rush Oh!'' * 2016 Nita May Dobbie Literary Award ''Rush Oh!''
==== Long-listed ==== * 2016 Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction ''Rush Oh!''
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== *{{IMDb name|0057284|Shirley Barrett}} *http://www.shirleybarrett.com/
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Barrett, Shirley}} Category:1961 births Category:2022 deaths Category:21st-century Australian novelists Category:21st-century Australian women novelists Category:Australian women film directors Category:Australian women screenwriters Category:Deaths from cancer in New South Wales Category:Directors of Caméra d'Or winners Category:Film directors from Melbourne