There’s a reason filmmakers say “Action!”

Angela Tucker: Emmy nominated producer, writer, director, and founder of TuckerGurl production company (Photo provided from her website)

For many decades, being a filmmaker wasn’t just about making films. There was budgeting, funding, running payroll, and remembering to eat, if one could. Just ask New Orleans-based filmmaker Angela Tucker, an Emmy nominated producer, writer, director, founder of TuckerGurl Inc., and all-around constant creative worker. Now with the COVID-19 pandemic, there’s even more to worry about. 

On top of the stress of finding funding, Tucker now has to worry about the logistics for how filming will actually  work down the line. Thankfully, her peers are in the same place, and it’s somewhat of a group effort. Working with her fellow filmmakers/actors/directors is quite literally what keeps her going – not creatively – but technically. She relies on them for their services and vice versa. “Your network is everything,” she says with emphasis. 

The nodes in Tucker’s network aren’t suits and faceless colleagues – they’re friends. Tucker isn’t much for industry schmoozing, and she makes that clear. “I just try to find people who are working similarly to me or have similar interests, so that these relationships are organic,” she explains. That sense of authenticity comes through not only in her professional life and works but also in her personal endeavors. “Life is too short” is her mantra, and she is making the most of it. 

In one instance, Tucker recalls a job offer she got precisely because she’d been tapped by someone in her filmmaker-friend-network. “She [her friend] follows me on Instagram and I do [film] reviews on my Instagram. Because I had been doing all these reviews, when this job came up, she put my name in for it and was like, ‘this is the perfect person to have this job.’”  

It’s that kind of creative community that nurtures Tucker and that she will continue to nurture — whether that be from her laptop or on set when the COVID pandemic is over. And in case you were wondering, no, she doesn’t think a COVID movie would be a good idea. 

This piece is part of the on-going series “Creative Labor Through the Crisis,” which is part of a Creative Labor course at Tulane University taught by Dr. Vicki Mayer and Kelley Crawford. Interviews were conducted by Dr. Vicki Mayer and Kelley Crawford.