Frances-Anne Solomon (born 28 June 1966) is a British-Caribbean-Canadian filmmaker, writer, producer, and distributor. She has lived in Britain, Trinidad & Tobago, and Toronto, Canada.

Biography

Born in England of

Trinidad Trinidad is the larger, more populous island of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, the country. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is the southernmost island in ...

ian parents, who had gone to Britain in 1958, Frances-Anne Solomon began her professional life at the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

in England, where she built a successful career as a producer, first with

BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927. The service provides national radio stations cove ...

then with

BBC television drama BBC television dramas have been produced and broadcast since even before the public service company had an officially established television broadcasting network in the United Kingdom. As with any major broadcast network, drama forms an importa ...

. She also produced and directed independent films through her company

Leda Serene Films Leda Serene Films is a film, television, and theatre production company based in Toronto, Canada, owned by filmmaker and producer Frances-Anne Solomon. The company has produced award-winning cross-platform projects from feature films, and creativ ...

. In 1999, she moved her company to

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

, where she continued to write, direct, and produce films, television programs, theatre plays, and new media projects. In 2001, she founded the CaribbeanTales Media Group, a charitable organisation producing, exhibiting and distributing educational multi-media projects based on Caribbean-heritage stories. The

CaribbeanTales International Film Festival The CaribbeanTales International Film Festival is an annual film festival, staged in Toronto, Ontario. The festival programs a lineup of films from Caribbean countries, as well as films from the Caribbean diaspora in Canada. The festival was launch ...

, founded in 2006 and based in Toronto, includes an annual festival, community screening series, and youth-focused film challenges. The CaribbeanTales Incubator Program develops original content for the regional and international market, CTFF also holds workshops and festivals in other territories, including to date New York, Barbados, Belize, South Africa, and Cuba. In 2010, Solomon founded CaribbeanTales Worldwide Distribution Inc, the first film distribution company in the English-speaking Caribbean dedicated to the marketing and sales of Caribbean-themed films. In 2014 she launched CaribbeanTales-TV, a video-on-demand platform. Solomon is a Director member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Early life

Solomon is the granddaughter of

Trinidad and Tobago Trinidad and Tobago, officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean, comprising the main islands of Trinidad and Tobago, along with several List of islands of Trinidad and Tobago, smaller i ...

independence politician Dr.

Patrick Solomon Patrick may refer to: *Patrick (given name), list of people and fictional characters with this name *Patrick (surname), list of people with this name People *Saint Patrick (c. 385–c. 461), Christian saint *Gilla Pátraic (died 1084), Patrick or ...

. When her grandfather left politics and took a role as a diplomat, the family lived in different countries including Canada, the United States, Europe and

Venezuela Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many Federal Dependencies of Venezuela, islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It com ...

. She moved back to Trinidad at nine years old, and attended the girls' "prestige" school, Bishop Anstey High School. At the age of 18 she moved to Canada to live with her mother, and discovered a love of the arts, studying theatre at the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university whose main campus is located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded by ...

's U.C. Playhouse, and poetry with

Jay Macpherson Jean Jay Macpherson (June 13, 1931 – March 21, 2012) was a Canadian lyric poet and scholar. '' The Encyclopædia Britannica'' calls her "a member of 'the mythopoeic school of poetry,' who expressed serious religious and philosophical themes in s ...

. In 1986, she moved to England, to work for the

Career

She trained in television production through the two-year BBC Production Training Program and worked with ''Ebony'', the corporation's first Black magazine programme, before being hired as a Radio Drama producer in London. While there she was responsible for helping to introduce a number of initiatives aimed at diversifying the talent pool in BBC Radio Drama. Many great talents got their first entry to Radio Drama in this way, including actors

Adjoa Andoh Adjoa Aiboom Helen Andoh MBE (; born 14 January 1963) is a British actress. She is best known for her role as Lady Danbury in the Netflix Regency romance series ''Bridgerton'', since 2020. Other roles on television include appearances in two s ...

and Clarence Smith to the BBC Drama Repertory Company, producers Pam Fraser Solomon and Nandita Ghose, composer Dominique Le Gendre and writers

Parv Bancil Parv Bancil (7 February 1967 – 1 April 2017) was a British-Asian playwright and actor. Life and career Parveen Singh Bancil was born in Moshi, Tanzania, in 1967 into an Indian Sikh family, the son of Sohan Singh Bancil and Amrit (Arjan) Kau ...

Maya Chowdhry Maya Chowdhry (born 1964) is a British playwright, poet and transmedia interactive artist. Life Maya Chowdhry was born in Edinburgh in 1964. She began writing as an adolescent: Chowdhry worked for Sheffield Film Co-op in the 1980s, and wrote the ...

, Rukhsana Ahmad,

Tanika Gupta Tanika Gupta (born 1 December 1963) is a British playwright. Apart from her work for the theatre, she has also written scripts for television, film and radio plays. Early life Tanika Gupta was born in London to immigrant parents from Kolkata ...

and

Jackie Kay Jacqueline Margaret Kay (born 9 November 1961) is a Scottish poet, playwright, and novelist, known for her works ''Other Lovers'' (1993), ''Trumpet'' (1998) and ''Red Dust Road'' (2011). Kay has won many awards, including the Somerset Maugham A ...

among others. Solomon returned to television as a Script Editor for ScreenPlay, a strand of mostly studio-based TV dramas. Between 1992 and 1998 she worked as a script editor and then as a producer and executive producer for BBC Single Drama and Films under George S. J. Faber. For the BBC she produced and executive-produced feature films, including '' Speak Like a Child'', director

John Akomfrah Sir John Akomfrah (born 4 May 1957) is a Ghanaian-born British artist, writer, film director, screenwriter, theorist and curator of Ghanaian descent, whose "commitment to a radicalism both of politics and of cinematic form finds expression in ...

's narrative debut, and ''

Love Is The Devil ''Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon'' is a 1998 film produced by The British Film Institute and BBC Film. It was written and directed by John Maybury and stars Derek Jacobi, Daniel Craig and Tilda Swinton. A fictional b ...

'',

John Maybury John Maybury (born 25 March 1958) is an English filmmaker and artist. He first came to prominence as the director of the music video for the Pet Shop Boys 1984 single "West End Girls". In 2005 he was named as one of the 100 most influential gay ...

's award-winning first feature. She credits her time at the BBC as providing her with a grounding, and vision of the importance and creative power of public service broadcasting. In 1993, Solomon won a place on the prestigious BBC Drama Directors Course. While working as a Drama Producer for the

, she continued to run her own company

, where she developed, produced and directed films including ''

What My Mother Told Me What or WHAT may refer to: * What, an English interrogative word * "What?", one of the Five Ws used in journalism Film and television * ''What!'' (film), also known as ''The Whip and the Body'', a 1963 Italian film directed by Mario Bava * ...

'', a Trinidad-based autobiographical story of generational violence in the context of a middle-class family; and ''

Peggy Su! ''Peggy Su!'' is a 1998 film written by Anglo-Chinese playwright Kevin Wong, directed by Frances-Anne Solomon and starring Pamela Oei. His own experience and background being the son of Chinese immigrants working in the laundry business was use ...

'', produced by BBC Films. Set in a Chinese laundry in

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

in the 1960s, it remains one of the few British films to depict the lives of the Chinese in Britain. Ultimately she found the racism of the British film and television industry constraining, and like many of her peers, chose to emigrate. Returning to Canada in 2000, she founded the CaribbeanTales Media Group and continued to develop and produce television, feature films and new media projects. ''

Lord Have Mercy! ''Lord Have Mercy!'' is a Canadian television sitcom, produced by Leda Serene Films, first shown on Vision TV in 2003. It received further showings in Canada on Toronto One, APTN and Showcase later the same year. The series, one of the first ...

'', produced with

Claire Prieto Claire Prieto (born 1945) is a Canadian film director and producer, known as one of the first black filmmakers in Canada. Along with Roger McTair, Prieto was a partner in the Toronto-based production company, Prieto-McTair Productions, which oper ...

and Vanz Chapman, was Canada's first multicultural sitcom, and starred

Russell Peters Russell Dominic Peters (born 29 September 1970) is a Canadian stand-up comedian, actor, and producer. He began performing in Toronto in 1989 and won a Gemini Award in 2008. In 2013, he was number three on ''Forbes'' Forbes Celebrity 100, list o ...

alongside Caribbean stars

Leonie Forbes Leonie Evadne Forbes Order of Distinction, OD (14 June 1937 – 25 October 2022) was a Jamaican actress, broadcaster and producer who was active in theatre, radio and television. Forbes born and grew up in Kingston, Jamaica. She attended Kingst ...

and Dennis "Sprangalang" Hall. ''

A Winter Tale ''A Winter Tale'' is a 2007 Canadian drama film written, directed and produced by Frances-Anne Solomon, featuring Canadian actor Peter Williams and Caribbean stars Leonie Forbes and Dennis " Sprangalang" Hall. It premiered at the ReelWorld Film ...

'', CityTV, 2007, depicts a Caribbean-Canadian community plagued by gun violence in Toronto. Solomon is the director of ''HERO'', her third feature, inspired by the life and Times of Trinidad and Tobago war hero, judge and jurist Ulric Cross. Solomon was the recipient of the 2018 Visionary Award from the

ReelWorld Film Festival Reelworld Film Festival, founded in 2001 by Tonya Williams, is held annually in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The festival screens film and provides professional development for Canadian racially diverse and indigenous filmmakers and media artists. ...

. On 1 July 2019 Solomon was one of 842 new members invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science. The 2019 class is 50 per cent women, 29 per cent people of color, and represents 59 countries.

CaribbeanTales

CaribbeanTales Inc

CaribbeanTales Inc a not-for-profit company was formed in 2001, originally as an internet platform for Caribbean-themed film and arts. Early projects include CaribbeanTales.ca, a multimedia e-newsletter, and ''Literature Alive'', a multi-faceted project including an educational website, audio books, and a documentary series, profiling Caribbean authors, many of whom are based in Canada. The non-profit company became a registered Canadian charity in 2014. In 2006, Solomon founded the

in Toronto as a platform for Caribbean and Caribbean diaspora films and filmmakers from the region. The CaribbeanTales Youth Film Festival, during

Black History Month Black History Month is an annually observed commemorative month originating in the United States, where it is also known as African-American History Month. It began as a way of remembering important people and events in the history of the Af ...

in Toronto, screens Africentric films in schools and communities. The Film Festival Group has also produced festivals and events in Barbados and New York.

CaribbeanTales Worldwide Distribution

While teaching film at

The University of the West Indies The University of the West Indies (UWI), originally University College of the West Indies, is a public university system established to serve the Tertiary education, higher education needs of the residents of 18 English-speaking Country, cou ...

in 2009, she consolidated her connections in the region. This led to the creation of CaribbeanTales Worldwide Distribution, a Barbados-based company, and the first film distribution company dedicated to international distribution of Caribbean-themed audio visual content. The company was co-founded with cultural industries specialist Dr. Keith Nurse, businessman Terrence Farrell, and filmmakers Lisa Wickham and Mary Wells, with the goal to tackle head-on problems of the monetisation of Caribbean-themed content and the development of the Caribbean Film Industry.

Creators of Colour Incubator

The Creators of Colour Incubator (formerly CaribbeanTales Incubator Program), also founded in 2010, an annual program that takes place during the Toronto International Film Festival, aims to train filmmakers in the creation and marketing of sustainable content, and has been committed to helping to develop an infrastructure and international profile for Caribbean films, in the region and the diaspora. The Program has evolved into a development and production hub for regional content. In 2015, CaribbeanTales won a five-year sponsorship and production deal with

Flow Flow may refer to: Science and technology * Fluid flow, the motion of a gas or liquid * Flow (geomorphology), a type of mass wasting or slope movement in geomorphology * Flow (mathematics), a group action of the real numbers on a set * Flow (psyc ...

, the brand name for Cable and Wireless Ltd, the largest telecommunications conglomerate in the Caribbean. The deal, brokered with Flow C.E.O John Reid, supports the production of at least three television series pilots a year from the CaribbeanTales Incubator Program. In 2016, the first of these projects were selected: ''Caribbean Girl NYC'' by Mariette Monpierre, ''Battledream Chronicle'' by Alain Bidard, and ''Heat'' by

Menelik Shabazz Menelik Shabazz (30 May 1954 – 28 June 2021) was a Barbados-born British film director, producer, educator, and writer, acknowledged as a pioneer in the development of independent Black British cinema, having been at the forefront of contempor ...

. Production is underway in New York, Martinique and Barbados respectively. In 2017 Flow and CaribbeanTales expanded their relationship to give Flow subscribers around the Caribbean access to CaribbeanTales vast catalogue of films through Television on demand.

CaribbeanTales-TV

CaribbeanTales established an online VOD platform CaribbeanTales-TV.

Works

Selected radio drama

Film and television

Community awards

References

External links

*
Frances-Anne Solomon
- Artist website
CaribbeanTales
- CaribbeanTales, Canada
CaribbeanTales Worldwide DistributionCaribbeanTales Film Festival Group"A Winter Tale
- Profile of Frances-Anne Solomon", ''Caribbean Beat''
"Interview with Frances-Anne Solomon"
''Eye to Eye''
Imaginations: An Interview with Frances-Anne Solomon by Hyacinth Simpson
{{DEFAULTSORT:Solomon, Frances Anne Film directors from Toronto Black Canadian filmmakers Canadian television directors Film producers from Toronto Canadian women television directors 20th-century Canadian screenwriters Black Canadian screenwriters English television directors Living people Canadian women screenwriters Canadian people of Trinidad and Tobago descent 1966 births Black Canadian women writers Canadian women film producers English people of Trinidad and Tobago descent English emigrants to Canada English women film directors Black British filmmakers English women screenwriters Television producers from London English women television producers 20th-century Canadian women writers 21st-century Canadian screenwriters 21st-century Canadian women writers Canadian women film directors