“It’s offered a mirror to check how we’re doing,” Caspian Films on Investment Readiness and giving female auteurs a voice
//
Frolic Films CEO Camilla Wren already had an enviable career in the film and high-end TV sectors before she joined 2024’s Investment Readiness cohort. However, the indie production house she hopes to catalyse with the scheme’s intensive business support has been with her every step of the way, patiently waiting for its moment to step into the spotlight.
“I incorporated Frolic Films way back in 2009 when I was a Production Co-Ordinator,” she tells us, remembering her early days working at HETV company Left Bank Pictures. “I thought ‘I want to do this, maybe I’ll set up a production company’ and it remained dormant until recently. Frolic as a brand was always in the back of my mind and waiting until I had the experience to properly get it off the ground,” admits Wren. “I’ve always had a desire to create my own slate of projects with a clear and distinct voice.”
Those intervening years were eventful. Her time on drama productions sparked an interest in story and project development and soon after, Wren began working with Harry Potter filmmaker David Yates. The next five years were spent developing Yates’ future slate of post-Potter projects, a role that brought her face-to-face with an array of different screenplays and honed her tastes for the type of stories she wanted to see on screen.
After taking time out to start a family, Wren returned as a freelance script consultant, adding knowledge of the independent film market to her growing list of expertise. “I’d gathered this 360-degree view of filmmaking and TV so I’m a bit of an anomaly,” she smiles. “People find it quite unusual but I feel it’s given me this all-round view of the industry, which is incredibly useful for producing.” It was at this point where Frolic came back to the fore: “I picked a couple of passion projects and thought ‘let’s see if I can develop these myself.’ Now I have a slate of film and TV projects that I’m trying to move forward.”
When it comes to Frolic’s output, Wren is keen to showcase a side of the industry that, despite promising steps in the right direction, remains underserved. “Frolic has a strong remit of diversity. The content landscape is changing and you’re starting to see things like Bridgerton, which has diverse casting of a traditional period drama,” says Wren, referencing Netflix’s hit Shondaland series. “The projects I’m interested in are the stories we haven’t really seen on screen before. Previously, if you were seeing black or brown voices, they tended to be very niche indie films that do the festival circuit then disappear. I’m looking for projects that have a unique viewpoint and hoping to make them mainstream and commercial.”
Promoting projects with well-developed female characters helmed by female filmmakers is also a big part of the company’s game plan. “I’m developing a lesbian noir and a crime series for BBC and Netflix with a deaf female protagonist,” she reveals. “That’s the type of thing I want to try and change – and I feel there’s a real gap for these types of stories. It’s really the ethos of Frolic,” continues Wren, “having a diversity of viewpoints but making commercial content that’ll achieve as big of an audience as possible.”
By following this path she found herself on Creative UK’s Investment Readiness scheme, a support programme that prepares business owners for the investment arena. It’s something Wren was already focusing on with her own business consultant before a perfect storm of an economic crash, 2023’s Hollywood strikes and the bursting of the streaming bubble upended her industry. However, when the dust finally showed signs of settling, she was able to enter Investment Readiness with renewed energy when it came to achieving her goals.
“We had a series of industry setbacks that nobody could have foreseen so we put things on hold and picked them up again this year which was when Investment Readiness launched. It looked like a fantastic scheme to capitalise on my business consultant’s experience within TV but also to provide a broader view of venture capital investment and all of the things that surround raising money,” says Wren. “Let’s say you do secure money – how do you make sure your business is in perfect shape to succeed? It felt like it was providing all of the missing elements and skills that I needed to give going out for investment the best possible shot.”
By working closely with her Investment Readiness mentor Tim McSweeney, Wren has been able to complement her previous mentors’ production knowledge with fresh investor insight. “It’s been so key. Tim’s from the tech world so coming to business investment from that viewpoint has been an utter game changer because it’s made me think of things differently,” explains Wren. “Being able to future-proof myself for investor questions and find ways of using language that they understand has given me an edge.”
Armed with this new training, Wren hopes her production company will soon have its time to shine. “I’m hoping that all of the knowledge and contacts I’ve gained from the scheme will come to fruition and I’ll be able to go out for Enterprise Investment Scheme investment and supercharge the work I’m doing with Frolic,” she says, looking to the company’s future. “In five years, I hope to be a fully sustainable production company with at least one TV commission produced and released and a presence in the marketplace where people can say ‘That’s a Frolic show.’”
Words and Interview by Simon Bland https://www.simonbland.com/