Glitterbug

A 4K short film set in 90’s Dublin, two female DJ’s have their dreams of making it big in London crushed when one of them is diagnosed with HIV.

Featuring Tania Notaro, Irene Kelleher, Cora Fenton, Thommas Kane Byrne & Johnny Elliott.

Tania Notaro is an actor and multi-award-winning writer. Glitterbug is her directorial debut which she also wrote and performed in. This short was made under the Actor As Creator scheme awarded to Tania from Screen Ireland & Bow Street Academy and was produced by Ali Doyle and Trish Ryan of Mental Pictures.

On the 40th anniversary of the AIDS pandemic in Ireland, women are still left out of the conversation. Every week, 5000 young women become infected with HIV and nearly half of adults now living with HIV are women. There have been many valuable depictions across theatre, cinema and television about the effects of the virus on men and I wish to reframe that narrative and centre on women’s experiences. There is also a stigma around the type of people who are at risk, but in reality, we all are. Early stories of women living with HIV are stories of sex workers, drug abusers and low-income ethnic minority women. Because of this, HIV was problematically rendered “irrelevant,” and deemed a less pressing social issue and not much has changed today for many women. As an HIV activist, I have encountered many women’s stories about living with HIV in the ’90s; about being abandoned and left out of the narrative. Glitterbug is a homage to all those women who were forgotten, and for the men and women of today who are still fighting for change.

Graded with Resolve