Meet our graduate Alethea Jones

Award-winning director, producer and actress Alethea Jones’s directing work includes the films Lemonade Stand (2012) and Fun Mom Dinner (2017), and the TV series Queen America (2018–19). Alethea graduated from Film and Television in 2007.

I live in Los Angeles now, even though I never meant to pursue a career there. My short-film Lemonade Stand won Tropfest in 2012 and part of the prize was a trip to LA, and the opportunity to meet with industry people. I visited for two years, back and forth, while I was directing commercials in Australia and teaching film at Swinburne and the VCA. Eventually my agent said, ‘You’re making great progress here, but we lose it all every time you go home.’ I made the move with my two dogs and, as soon as I did, booked my first episode of television with Amazon Studios.

I chose to study at the VCA for two reasons. I saw that Robert Luketic, who directed Legally Blonde, went there, and that Emma Freeman, who directed Lamb, went there too. Emma came in one time and told us she was the worst student in her class. I knew I was the worst in my class, too, so that gave me hope. The more mistakes you can make at film school, the better. I felt the same with Fun Mom Dinner. Watching it, I still cringe. It was an extraordinarily fast film to make and I had to compromise every step of the way. But now I know exactly what mistakes I don’t want to make and how determined I am to avoid that nauseous feeling again. And that’s exactly how it was at the VCA – I made really bad shorts but was able to course-correct with the three short-films I made out of film school.

Alethea Jones

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Recent alumni success

Our students and graduates receive outstanding industry and audience recognition on national and international stages as cinematographers, directors, editors, film and television producers and screenwriters, and include: Greta Nash, awarded first place at Tropfest 2018 for her film Two Piece (2018), produced by fellow alumna Gillian Crosby. Bentley Dean and his filmmaking partner Martin Butler, recipients of the Byron Kennedy Award at the 7th Annual AACTA Awards for Tanna (2017). The film received Australia’s first and only nomination for Best Foreign Language Film at the 89th Academy Awards. Qiu Yang, recipient of the prestigious Palme d’Or award and a Jury Special Mention at the Cannes Film Festival 2017.