Inside Netflix Director Lucy Gaffy’s Journey from Film School to Sundance
Posted on: May 20, 2025
Lucy Gaffy has spent the past decade carving out a dynamic career behind the camera, from award-winning shorts to acclaimed TV dramas. Her credits include The Unlisted (ABC/Netflix), Irreverent (Netflix), Doctor Doctor (Nine Network) and Amazing Grace (Nine Network). Gaffy was also the set-up director for Totally Completely Fine (Sundance/Stan), the opening story director of AACTA-nominated feature Here Out West, and has just wrapped production on the Australian/Irish miniseries, Mixtape, for BINGE.
If that weren‘t impressive enough, Gaffy‘s journey has been marked by several accolades, including an AACTA Award for her short Dream Baby, four Australian Directors Guild nominations, and a coveted spot at the Berlinale Talent Campus.
Key Takeaways:
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Film school is more than technical training—it’s where lifelong creative partnerships are formed.
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Directing today demands emotional intelligence and a commitment to psychological safety on set.
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Short films remain essential calling cards in an industry where real-world opportunities are increasingly rare.
Here we speak to Gaffy about the value of film school, being a human-centered director and much more.
You studied at AFTRS—a dream for many aspiring filmmakers. Looking back, what were the most valuable lessons you took from your years there?
I feel very lucky that I trained at the national film school and that I received formal training before that. I did my undergraduate degree in film and television at QUT [Queensland University of Technology], where I met my first tribe. I think that’s the importance of film school—you meet your tribe. You meet the people who love what you love, who are at your level, and who are building work. You become a little collective, and you start building together. I still work in a director’s collective called Goono with two people I met at QUT: Will Goodfellow and Tom Noakes. We have been working together for over 20 years now since that initial film school connection.
As to what I learned? So much. I’m the biggest film dork. I love film history, I love film theory, I love writing theory, I love color theory… All of those technical things, I was all about, and it was wonderful to learn in that kind of environment where it’s a hothouse, and you can play and experiment, and you have the guidance of wonderful teachers in an institution that has created some of the best filmmakers in our country and, therefore, in the world.
The other thing, particularly for those in leadership positions, whether directors like myself, producers, or even DOPs or designers working with large teams, film schools are a really great place for you to feel what it’s like to be out in the world, in complex environments like working with broadcasters or screen agencies—what I call “the politics.”
At film school, sometimes people are like, “Why are [the teachers] being so difficult?” Well, they’re kind of mimicking the same types of safety or union rules you’re going to encounter when you work at Netflix or on a Screen Australia project. Learning how to negotiate or maneuver around those requirements is a great muscle memory for when you’re spat out into the real world and the stakes are higher. You’re ready to answer those questions, fill out those types of forms, and understand the different things being asked of you at the level of excellence that is the base level in the Australian film industry. So, doing both undergraduate and postgraduate study not only enabled me to expand my technical background and meet my peers but also prepared me to be the best “politician” I could be.
Critically, I also want to say there’s a movement at some film schools away from making short films, and I think this is a mistake. Some film schools feel that that enterprise is too expensive and that they’ll just do small exercises. Then, outside in the world, their filmmakers can make short films. My experience is that opportunities to make short films in the world are reducing rapidly.
But you have to have a short film. You have to have a short film that has played in an international or given domestic festival for you to even be allowed to apply for mid-level support, both federally and on a state level. And when people are emerging from film schools with very large debts but not a complete short film, it does them a disservice.
As somebody who tries to hire emergent practitioners a lot on my sets—I have attachments in almost every department, I will always have a director’s attachment, and I will sometimes have a shadow director as well—I’m looking at their short films to make the decision about who gets those roles. You’ve got to have a really good short.
Directing, done well, requires just as much emotional intelligence as it does creative and technical intelligence. How do you approach cultivating psychological safety on set?
For me, making films is a collective exercise. It’s not a singular exercise. For a really long time, directors were seen as sort of military captains—they were almost allowed to be brutal in their pursuit of a singular vision. That is counter to my entire philosophy about how to be a good leader. I think we are moving into a phase where there is a different vision and a different understanding of what good leadership looks like.
Good leadership is raising those around you. Good leadership is creating an environment where your collaborators can do their best work because that elevates the whole work. Good leadership is creating safe sets where people can speak up if they have good ideas and also if they’re feeling uncomfortable. Now, there still needs to be leadership. You still have to be the captain of the ship. But you can hear these ideas, take on some, and express that perhaps others aren’t something we’re able to work with that day.
When I was a junior burger coming up, I was on lots of sets where I saw things that were unsafe for cast and unsafe for crew—and both of these parties pretending that wasn’t happening because they were trying to be good soldiers. And it’s not about being controlling or super touchy-feely or any of that; it’s actually just being totally genuine about what we’re doing. We need to acknowledge and take ownership of what we’re making and how it may affect cast or crew at any given moment. Particularly in the drama space, there will naturally be some sort of apex, some sort of key, dramatic moment. It might be a violent argument, it might be an act of violence, it could be a moment of trauma.
To give an example of this, I’ve shot a stillbirth where a baby was being born. It was only going to be 20 or 30 seconds on screen, but we had to shoot it for over an hour. Everyone was being very professional—the actress was connecting to the emotional truth of that moment, and we had prepared very carefully in rehearsals to give her the space to do that.
This was something I directed as quite a young director. I was still learning how to do these sorts of trauma scenes, and I think my focus was very much on the player. About two days later, I found our stand-by makeup technician crying behind the makeup bus because she had had a stillbirth in the 80s.
On that particular shoot day, her job had to be to redress the blood on the thighs of the actress and dress the blood on the dead baby, over and over and over again for about three hours. She didn’t want to tell anybody; she hadn’t wanted to bother anybody. She said, “You know what, Lucy? I was fine on the day. It was driving home that I began to cry and it was in the shower that night and I really haven’t been able to stop.” That was such an enormous lesson to me as a young baby director—that I am responsible for not just what goes in the lens but the spirits of everybody. I’m responsible for that workplace and making that workplace safe for everyone.
Now we very much disclose the day we are doing traumatic content. We’re very clear about, “This day, we will be shooting a sexual assault,” “This day, we will be shooting the ideation of someone taking their life,” “This will be the time and date that this is happening. If you do not wish to attend that day, that’s completely fine. Let your head of department know, and we will get coverage for you that day. You will be paid.” We don’t ask questions; they don’t have to explain. I think we, as a new crop of directors, we’re still shooting these things—nobody’s saying let’s not do trauma scenes, they’re too difficult, they’re too hard, they’re too scary—we’re just doing it in a way that doesn’t damage our workmates.
Wow, that is huge—and, hopefully, an indication of best practices that become our new normal. To wrap things up, are there any films or series you find yourself returning to for inspiration?
When I’m in a project and get into a place of dreaming, I only really watch things in the world of that project—Australian things that look or feel like that work to make sure that I’m value-adding to the conversation and I’m not repeating anything. And, obviously, beautiful international works or historical works. It’s not like there’s a singular thing that I go to. It’s about submersion in tone and world and character and genre.
I’m a big reference girl. I build huge mood boards and reference docs. When we’re in production, our walls are covered with images and frames. When I do rehearsals with my actors, I always have photos of locations—actual locations. Otherwise, actors are dragged to set at 5:00 AM, and they’re like, “Oh my God, is this my bedroom? I didn’t realize there was so much Aerosmith”. They have no idea about character until you share all of that with them. That’s a huge part of the rehearsal process—sharing references from film or TV or art or sculpture or photography or anything that is making me dream.
Beyond that, I make a conscious effort to try to watch the pilot of every single new Australian show. I make a conscious effort, where I can, to go and see every new Australian film in a cinema. I live at the Sydney Film Festival and go to everything. I try and get down to MIFF [Melbourne International Film Festival] and watch as much as I can there.
Obviously, I’m always all over the Oscar films and the big, important international shows because if you’re a content creator, you’re going to sit in a meeting, and everyone is going to be throwing these references at you and it’s your job to have seen them. It’s the best homework in the entire world.
I also try and keep abreast of under the radar things. I find really interesting indie films have beautiful cinematography or are being more innovative with their scores or are doing some really funky things with sound, and that’s something we can play with in our own practice.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
Special thanks to Lucy Gaffy for her time. Be sure to follow Gaffy on Instagram to keep up to date with her latest releases and upcoming projects.
Tahlia Norrish is an Aussie-Brit actor, writer and current MPhil Candidate at the University of Queensland’s School of Sport Sciences. After graduating from both The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (Distinction, Acting & Musical Theatre) and Rose Bruford College (First Class Hons, Acting), Tahlia founded The Actor’s Dojo — a coaching program pioneering peak performance and holistic well-being for actors.
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