Incidental Characters
Feature, 2020
107 mins | 12A
Watch on Apple TV
Starring Sophia Capasso, Isabella Marshall, Howard Perret and Steve Watts
Incidental Characters is an ensemble comedy-drama about four people trying to work out where they belong.
Josie is an artist whose confidence has stalled. Alf finds other people difficult to read. Alison is caught in patterns she cannot escape, while Tony’s need for approval prevents him from being honest about what he wants.
As their lives overlap, each becomes an incidental character in each other’s story without knowing the impact they have on another person’s life.
Director's Statement
Incidental Characters began with the chance encounters that can change the course of a life. Its four protagonists are lonely in different ways, each absorbed in a personal struggle, not knowing how to reach beyond it.
The film explores how a throwaway remark, an awkward kindness or a brief connection can matter more than the person responsible will ever know.
Set in Lewes, the town’s lanes, independent shops, chalk cliffs and creative eccentricity provide a specific sense of place. Amelia Rowcroft’s production design - puppets, cardboard spaceships and handmade objects - gave the film a playful, home-made look and feel.
Making it was a bolshy decision. We had no conventional backing and no established route into feature production. We were a small team with conviction and shot the feature in ten days and released it in UK cinemas.
We learned more than we earned. The film gave us the opportunity to sustain a story over a feature-length duration, completing a cinema-ready post-production process and putting work in front of a paying audience. It also revealed where instinct was not yet enough and what we needed to focus on next.
More than anything this film gave us the confidence to begin. It was Toffee Hammer's first feature, and it remains the film that taught us not to confuse a lack of permission with a reason not to make something.
