Women Behind the Scenes Spotlight: Alice Waddington

Alice Waddington

Irene Waddington was born in Spain, adopting Alice as her new first name (her stage name) at the age of 16 when she was assisting director of photography Quique Lopez. At 18, she studied advertising at the University of the Basque Country, which is where she got started capturing promotion stills and directing fashion films for the Spanish editions of Harper’s Bazaar, Neo2 and other publications.

At 20, and for the next 3 years, she worked as an advertising creative, a producer and an advertising video editor at the agencies of Leo Burnett Iberia and Social Noise, where she also specialized as a digital storyboard artist.

In 2014, with the help of Mexican executive producer Yadira Ávalos, Alice took a year off from her advertising agency work to write and direct Disco Inferno a short, narrative 11-minute film, which came out in 2015, earning her nominations in 63 international film festivals. She went on to win Best Director at Fantastic Fest, Best Short Film at Sitges Film Festival in Spain, Best Director at the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival, Best Cinematography at Monster Fest in Australia, Grand Jury Prize at Festival de Cine Fantastico Europeo de Murcia along several other wins at other international festivals.

In 2017, she began pre-production on her first full-length feature film: Paradise Hills. This film is a science-fiction thriller written by Brian DeLeeuw and Nacho Vigalondo, based on an idea from Alice. The film is set in the near future, imagining a world where young women are sent by their families to a high-class boarding school where they’re trained to be “perfect.” But behind all the “perfect,” something far more insidious is happening.

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The film came out in October of 2019, starring Emma Robert, Milla Jovovich, Eiza Gonzalez, Awkwafina, Jeremy Irvine and Danielle Macdonald.

You can see the trailer below:

Alice’s directing style is “defined by a contemporary approach to the golden era of large-scale-studio horror films, mixed with current surreal humor and (sometimes) musical cinema.”

Her second film, which will be distributed by Netflix, is called Scarlet from a script she co-wrote along with Kristen SaBerre. Alice has stated in interviews that she hopes to direct “biopics, socially metaphorical fantastic horror about minorities and terror stories that have taken place.” She is very proactive for progressive social change regarding female cooperation and sorority within the arts. In fact, she has been very vocal about the need for more female-led as well as more diversely cast films worldwide and she is passionate about motivating young women to enroll in film-making programs.

In an interview with Sci-Fi Wire (for Syfy), Alice shared, “We wanted to tell a parable with wide appeal that avoided preaching; we wanted a refreshing, tropical science fiction thriller; an homage to female friendships…mixed with the folk retro-futurism of our dreams.”

Paradise Hills is streaming on most digital and video on-demand outlets, including Amazon and Hulu (just remember there will be a fee for viewing). It’s also available via Showtime online and on-demand.

Alice can be followed on Twitter @alicewadd and can be followed on Instagram here.