Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Philip Irving. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Philip, thanks for joining us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

While I’ve spent several years developing my craft as a filmmaker, I still consider myself in a foundational stage of my career with much to learn and experience. This much was evident on a recent set for my latest feature film project. I was directing a scene about a religiously conservative father struggling to connect to his young adult son. This was a pivotal scene, not only for the story, but for marketing as well. I wrote the script for the film and frankly, I didn’t feel the scene was working. I spent days before the shoot trying to come up with a better idea. That idea never came. Time came to film the scene and I was honest with my actors about how I felt. I knew the direction I wanted to go, the emotion I wanted to hit, but I wasn’t quite sure how to get there. For the first time on a set, I asked my actors to improv most of the scene. It took several takes, but we eventually built our way towards something strong and added a layer to their relationship that I couldn’t have planned for. Initially a felt a bit ashamed to have not come to set with the answers. But, I came out with a new perspective that each project is an exploration and not just a practice of what you already know. I don’t need to know all the answers before arriving on set. I’ve learned that by trusting my instincts and the team around me, i filmmaking is about discovering the answers through the process.

Philip, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I grew up in the slowly declining suburbs or North St. Louis. Being a queer kid in a Black, religiously conservative household, even in the early 2000’s, meant undergoing a lot of repression and masking. Films, early on, became an escape and a symbol of unrestricted expression. However, my real peak in interest for filmmaking came through a high school English course. My high school at the time, had just began utilizing iPads for the students. For an assignment, my instructor tasked the class my making a short video project. I remember the rush I got from showing my iMovie to my first audience of 20 or so peers. But to this day, I’ll never forget the excitement of simply the process of developing a concept, writing a story, capturing it on camera, and assembling a narrative from the footage. Since then, filmmaking had been a vessel for me to express myself in ways I never thought possible.

My life is riddled with contradictions. I have the demeanor of an old person and the spirit of a child. I have been capable of spreading both kindness and hurt. I am queer, yet all my serious romantic relationships thus far have been heterosexual. I’m passionately pro Black, yet I am currently dating a White Hispanic. Out of all these seemingly stark contradictions, my work most prominently engages with my identity as a Black American, two things that have almost always been in conflict with one another. I’m particularly interested in exploring how this conflicting identity has informed familial relationships throughout generations. My work primarily involves narrative films that tackle these ideas through a blend of heightened film realism and a direct cinema, docu-style approach.

It’s still very early on in my career, so it’s hard to say what I’m most proud of so far. I can say, I’m proud of the work my team and I have been doing on my current feature film debut, entitled “Love Thy Neighbor”. I do not take for granted the honor and privilege it is for me to direct a feature length project at 24 years old.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The space to create and collaborate with other artists from all walks of life has been the most rewarding part of being a filmmaker. I simply enjoy the process of developing an idea into a tangible piece of work and all the steps along the way of doing so. The work itself is rewarding enough for me.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My goal as a creative is arguably as contradictory as the themes I explore in my work. I want to grow I to something purely expressive and unique to myself as possible. At the same time, I want my films to have mass appeal. The challenge of my career will be to balance the spectacle with the intimate. I want to remain as true to myself as possible while reaching a broad audience.

Contact Info:

• Website: Philgoodstories.com
• Instagram: @_philgood_
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/philip-i-57a700125
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@aphilgoodstory694?si=UX78XMLh-XQQ-_NI

Image Credits
Solo, personal photo by Carla Serrano