The Director

Andy Nicholls is the writer, producer and director of Straight Out.  Born in London and now living in Brighton Andy has a long background in film, video and TV production and is currently a freelance Steadicam Operator.

I had wanted to make a good gay genre film for many years and had worked on many different script ideas but none of them were quite right or would have been very difficult to film.  When I came up with the idea for Straight Out and started to discuss it with people I could soon see we had something special and the more people that became involved, both gay and straight, the more it just got better and better. 

I really have been quite humbled by the number of extremely talented people who got involved and helped to make this film, the enthusiasm was amazing and everybody gave it 110% even though not one of them got paid a penny.  We had no funding for the film and every penny spent has come Straight Out of my pocket.

People said I was mad to try and make a 20 minute short, on zero budget with over 30 crew, 18 actors, 50 extras, 7 dogs, a 5 piece band, with 22 scenes shot across 17 locations including 2 purpose built studio sets, they were probably right but we did it in 9 days.  Much of the thanks must go to Gavin O’Mally-Richardson who just made it all happen on the day and certainly managed to keep any problems or disasters from reaching me, I know he had his work cut out but from from my perspective everything just ran like clockwork and that is down to the sheer professionalism of the cast and crew for which I am extremely grateful.

I did like to throw the odd curve ball at Gavin, like adding the extra party scene 2 days before we started shooting.  The story just seemed to need it and when Tim, the main script editor, said he felt it needed something else in there too, which I had been thinking for some while, I came up with the party idea.  Gavin arranged it all as if I was just asking for a cup of tea. The standing joke is that he did let me down on the pink fire truck though.

I hope you all enjoy the film, gay or straight, it was a lot of fun to make and I hope it makes people think a little about attitudes, sterotypes and prejudice, none of which I encountered at all in Brighton along the journey of making this film I am very pleased to say.

Andy Nicholls