Profile on Tracey Lavigne
By Brenda Malley
You do not have to spend a lot of time with award-winning filmmaker Tracey Lavigne of Fredericton, New Brunswick, to know that she is the real deal in the film world. She is intense, thoughtful, focused, humble, and determined to make her mark in this form of storytelling.
Tracey, who considers herself an emerging filmmaker, expresses great affection and appreciation to the New Brunswick Film Co-op as well as the wider film community in Atlantic Canada and beyond. She reveals that she has been afforded immense generosity, support, and mentorship over the years, particularly from talented female filmmakers.
Since 2014 when she joined the NB Film Co-op, Tracey committed herself to pursue courses offered through the Co-op and elsewhere, networking with creatives and working on other people’s films in a variety of capacities, all to help her become a successful filmmaker in her own right.
Tracey writes, directs, and produces deeply personal short films. As someone who struggles with social anxiety and self-esteem, she often feels like an outsider. As a result, she tends to gravitate to themes of social isolation and characters struggling with vulnerability and connection. Her three short films, Glitter (2017), made possible through the Jane Leblanc Filmmakers award, Mnemosyne (2018), and Picture Yourself (2021), are variations of these themes.
Production of Tracey’s fourth short screenplay, Travel Log, which she successfully pitched at WIFT Atlantic’s Women Making Waves conference in March 2020, had to be postponed due to the Covid 19 pandemic. It is now scheduled for later this summer.
Tracey is excited to be producing New Brunswick native Ryan O’Toole’s feature film, Further Than the Eye Can See, which was selected for the Telefilm Canada Talent to Watch program in 2019. A fantasy tale about our collective fears for the future in the face of environmental destruction, Further Than The Eye Can See will be going to production in June. Tracey is also writing her first feature screenplay, Glitter, a queer coming-of-age story she developed at the PEI Screenwriters’ Bootcamp and the FIN Script Development Progam.
She considers herself extremely fortunate for her recent mentorship opportunities with writer/director Deanne Foley. She was matched with Foley through WIFT Atlantic’s Mentor Match Program last year, and screenwriter and story consultant Nikki Saltz.
Production of Tracey’s fourth short screenplay, Travelog, which she successfully pitched at WIFT Atlantic’s Women Making Waves conference in March 2020, is scheduled for production this fall.