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FILM & TV DIRECTOR
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RITA OSEI
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"A rising talent" Mark Kermode
Rita was born in North London England to Ghanaian parents, and first found
herself on a set at the Montessori style state school she attended in East London. She graduated from Camberwell College of Arts, where she made her first films,
with a Joint Honours BA in Visual Arts. ​Her debut feature film, Bliss! a rites-of-passage adventure, had its World Premiere at Edinburgh International Film Festival.
Rita is a member of Directors UK, WGGB, Film Fatales, Cinesisters and is a full voting BAFTA member. She directed 2nd Unit on the closing 2 episodes of SISTER, HBO, Sky series The Baby, and is developing long form work for Film and TV.
Short film directing credits include the award winning Aurora
now available worldwide on SVOD, and where:
"A perimenopausal vampire is on a quest to kill a habit that won't die".
Winner Best Director, Best Cinematography, Best Actress In a Drama,
Best Supporting Actress In a Drama - Haunted House FearFest, NYC.
Nominated Best Director Short Film and Best Actress Short Film -
Unrestricted View Horror Film Festival, London.
The score for Aurora was composed by Oleta Haffner through the inaugural Jonas Gwangwa Music Composition initiative from Mercury Studios, Globe and Decca Records and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
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Rita has directed 2 theatre productions. Her Screen South part funded short film
The Curry Club stars Cleo Sylvestre MBE, Ruth Sheen, Claire-Louise Cordwell and Olivier Award Winner Kenneth Cranham CBE. Rita served as Jury Chair for
BAFTA's 75th, 76th & 77th British Short Film Award. Since 2018 she has been promoting female excellence in film direction through her short film festival:
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She served as a juror for BAFTA 's 2024 TV Drama: Writer award, a project assessor for The Uncertain Kingdom’s short film fund, and a juror for the inaugural
Chopard x Breaking Through The Lens Action Grant.
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BACKGROUND: Rita produced Threesome, a Telluride premiering short film
starring Lesley Vickerage, Stuart Laing and Hugh Quarshie. Threesome
screened at the British Pavilion (Cannes), Raindance, Clermont Ferrand,
Newport Rhode Island and numerous additional film festivals, and
was distributed on TV by SKY Movies and Canal +.
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She began her career assisting producer Nick de Grunwald, developing films and documentaries including the long running series Classic Albums for the BBC. Rita went on to produce multi award winning animation for the Turner brands Cartoon Network and Boomerang across Europe. A Founder of Turner Europe’s Diversity Council, she arranged deaf awareness training for the U.K creative team after hiring the first animator at the European division of the company who was deaf.
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