by Dov Kornits
“I was always really creative as a kid in high school,” Ally Burnham starts when we ask her how a girl that grew up in Murwillumbah in a family of farmers ended up writing Unsound, a film about a transitioning young deaf man and the love that develops with a gay man. “I gravitated towards music first, playing the saxophone from when I was 10 years old. My parents encouraged it because they weren’t really sure where it came from, but they thought it was a fun novelty, so they let me do whatever. I was doing a lot of drama and writing, my own stuff in high school. I came at the other end of school, applied to film school in Brisbane first, got into that. I did three years that was all about film production and learning all the ins and outs and different facets of film, and I came out the other side, still gravitating towards writing. I applied to NIDA’s Masters course, writing for performance with Stephen Sewell. It was very exciting to get that, drop everything, move from Brisbane to Sydney. That was the course that gave me the confidence to be like, ‘time to chase this dream seriously’. I was lucky enough to meet Tsu Shan [Chambers], who was the producer on Unsound not long after leaving NIDA.”
Tsu Shan and Ally discussed the types of projects that they wanted to work on. Tsu Shan was working with the deaf community at the time and Ally wanted to tell a queer story. “There was a bit of an ‘aha’ moment for me when, through these discussions, I learned the plasticine way pronouns are used in Auslan. I felt that was really beautiful, and thematically, that was the moment I could see how all the pieces might come together.
“We wanted to tell intersectional stories and give characters a space, like the people in my life who weren’t often represented on screen,” Ally continues. “But along with that desire came the responsibility to do the due diligence involved in the scripting process, the authentic voices beyond my own personal experience. So early on, there were members of the trans and deaf community who were involved as consultants. Initially, it started off as informal consulting, so it was just discussions I was having with people I knew who were generously sharing their anecdotes and experiences with me, and then as the project got more serious and into the development and drafting stages, people were coming on as formal consultants.
“I like to say Unsound came together a bit like a patchwork quilt, just with all these stories that were shared with me were what built the story and I was just lucky enough to be the person at the loom, as it were, stitching all these wonderful experiences together.”
Writing the initial screenplay was only part of the journey for Ally Burnham, especially when the initial director attached to the project dropped out, and TV veteran Ian Watson stepped in. “The early scripts were coming from a place of wanting to do something a bit edgier, something that would push the boundaries, something a bit sexier. But the more discussions we had with the community – and I’m really glad for the evolution that went on – the purpose of what we were doing changed and we wanted to create something more feel-good, something with a more positive message that people could really get behind. As we were learning that, Ian came on board and really facilitated that part of the script.
“It was a tunnel shift and I’m really glad for that, because then it felt like we were writing for a slightly younger audience too. It was all about characters who were learning and growing and figuring themselves out, and that resonated with me who was young at the time and learning and growing and figuring myself out, so I’m glad that the script found its voice through that process.”
And it seems that making Unsound has also allowed Ally Burnham to find her voice. “I’m very busy now,” she says about her upcoming work. “I’ve been very lucky that things have actually taken off. There’s another feature that’s feminist-focused that I’m developing now with a producer and director I’m very excited to work with. Otherwise, I’ve got two other TV developments that are a bit more genre and fun, which is also exactly where I love to work. I’ve got these three things on the boil, so even if one of them comes to fruition, that’ll be very exciting. So, I’m definitely very, very busy in the best way.”
Unsound is screening now in Melbourne, and opens in Sydney, Brisbane, Canberra and Perth on March 18, 2021
