Help with doco.

Tracey Taylor (filmday(AT)wr.com.au)
Fri, 9 Jan 1998 11:02:23 -0800

Hi,
My name is Tracey Taylor, a few of you may remember speaking to me in the
past. I was diagnosed with TM is 1994, and as you would know, have been
trying to deal with it ever since. I work as a professional film maker,
producing dramas and television commercials. I have also produced the
occassional commissioned documentary. Now I want to make my own doco on TM.
I find it fascinating that so few people, including doctors and health
professionals have ever heard of TM. Now, I live in Sydney Australia, and
things may be different in other countries, but here there is no awareness
of TM. However, I don't want to make a dry, clincial documentary on the
scientific theories of the causes of TM, etc. I would like to focus on the
sufferers of TM, in all their different forms and explore the whole idea of
disability. I would like to challenge peoples perceptions of people with
disabilities. People like me and alot of you who function quite normally
day to day, although dealing with a hundred symptoms that make just living
a challenge. I would like to demistify things like self-catheterising,
using canes or wheelchairs. I would like to present us as a group of people
who have challenges in their lives, but get on with them anyway. I hope it
will be an inspiring documentary, as well as interesting to watch, with
humour and pathos to boot.

I need help. To get funding from the Australian Film body or a television
station, I need to present them with a synopsis as well as some footage.
What I need is to cut together a five minute doco to show them the sort of
thing I have in mind. I can shoot what I can in Australia, but I need other
sufferers and their stories.

Please, if any of you can get your hands on any sort of video recorder,
please just turn it on and speak to the camera. I would like three minutes
of your story (briefly) and then your thoughts and feelings about how life
has been since your experience. I know this is alot to ask, but I will pay
for the postage of the tapes to me. If I get the funding for the film, I
will then be able to travel around personally and meet with some of you and
hopefully put your stories down on film. I hope that the film can be used
in various ways, from training health professionals, to being viewed by the
general public, hopefully in more than just Australia.

Please write back and tell me your thoughts. If you can send me a tape (or
even just an audio cassette),
send it to: Tracey Taylor
8 Salerno Street
Forestville
NSW 2087
Australia.
Ask for it to be paid at my end, I'm not sure what it's called, but the
post office should know.

Thanks for reading my letter, hope you can help,
Tracey Taylor