In Ali Cook’s The Pearl Comb, a doctor (Cook) is dispatched to visit a woman (Beatie Edney) who has allegedly cured someone of tuberculosis, doubting her claims and intellect but entirely unprepared for the much darker reality of the situation.
Awards Buzz spoke with Cook about how this seemingly normal story turned into something much more sinister than it initially seems:
“Yeah, the minute it suddenly cuts to a mermaid, that’s quite a bold plot twist. Really, it started with, I’d heard legends of mermaid stories from Cornwall when I was on holiday there. I was with my two daughters, and there’s a local storyteller there, and he was doing all these stories and he was taking us around. One of the tales were about the mermaids of Penzance, so that was the original legend. But then I also heard the true story of the Edinburgh Seven, who were the first seven female doctors in the UK. I don’t know how I did this, why it happened or what, I kind of ended up merging this sort of legend with this real story, and it had a similar structure to the film Interview with the Vampire, in a weird kind of a way. I don’t know what happened in my brain that day, but I came up with this tale combining the three together, and, and it led to The Pearl Comb.”
He shared about the experience of directing for the first time:
“I’ve written a lot. As well as being a magician, I’ve been a stand-up comedian for fifteen years, so I’m used to writing, although I think writing standup is even harder than writing scripts. So I’ve got that discipline of a writer, but I find it more relaxing. I used to write scripts because I find writing one-liners so hard that I needed a bit of a break, so writing a few sketches and scripts was a bit of a hobby for me, really.”
Watch the video above to hear more about how standup and magic are not the right indicators for this film’s tone but still contributed tremendously to Cook’s creative process.
The Pearl Comb is on the Oscar shortlist for Best Live Action Short.
