PRETTYBIRD UK Co-Founder Juliette Larthe Talks to Pitch Podcast for International Women’s Day

Mother, filmmaker, mentor, producer of the year, award-winning executive producer, MD and partner of production company PRETTYBIRD UK, Juliette Larthe is adept at juggling what many women do in their daily lives, taking on many roles and giving them her all. In the Pitch Podcast launching on IWD2020, she shares her personal and professional struggles and triumphs. 

Juliette Larthe is the co-founder and executive creative producer of PRETTYBIRD UK, a production company that thinks outside the box and works with a culturally and gender-diverse stable of ‘creators and collaborators’, challenging the stereotypes that have been embedded in the ad world and film industry for too long. 

To coincide with International Women’s Day 2020, Juliette has given an in-depth interview to Pitch editor Sherry Collins, in which she reveals her difficult childhood and the determined nature which enabled her to find success despite all the adversity that peppered her formative years. She says: “When I consider where I went from being destitute and homeless (1987/1992), having seriously nothing, and told when I went into an institution that I wasn’t coming out, to 10 years later winning Best Music Video Producer (2001), it actually brings me to tears.” 

Juliette celebrates diversity in her company and has striven for inclusivity and gender- parity in terms of the PRETTYBIRD UK team, many of whom are women, and with the roster, which features creative and filmmakers from a wide age range and mix of cultural backgrounds. Juliette comments in the podcast: “We are phenomenal now. I can crew up inclusively. Some shoots can be 80 or 90% (women). I’ve had bigger and smaller amounts, but you’d be hard pushed to come to one of my sets and think that we were just a white and male industry.” 

Juliette works with many formidable women directors, including the Queen & Slim director Melina Matsoukas, who she first teamed up with on the set of the Grammy- award winning ‘We Found Love’ promo for Rihanna. Juliette says: "The first job I did with Melina was Rihanna ‘We Found Love’. I remember working with her and her saying ’there isn’t anyone else that looks like me’. But then Melina very quickly made sure that what you look at on screen is more representational.” 

Determined to succeed in the industry, early in her career Juliette worked at Godman where ‘all the women were in production and there were 20 directors who were all men’, and she worked closely for a time with the legendary photographer Corinne Day, her commitment and hard work enabling her to buy her Mum a house at the age of 28. 

Juliette talks opens up to Pitch editor Sherry Collins during the Pitch Podcast, explaining how she overcame a series of obstacles which could have been completely incapacitating for some people, but for someone with her determination these obstacles spurred her on to become successful in the film industry, after falling in love with films when her school friend’s dad worked on the Magnificent men in their flying machines. After recovering from meningitis as a young woman, spending time away from her family at boarding school, becoming homelessness and couch surfing or squatting for many years, and battling mental health issues, Juliette went on to channel all that grief and adversity into a fruitful career as one of the most respected women in production and winning many awards as a producer and executive producer, including a Grammy for Rihanna’s We Found Love.

Juliettte explains: “I really focussed. I wanted to get ahead. I put everything in my past behind me and I worked longer and harder than most of the people around me. Because I didn’t have the privileges that they had with an education, or a family that could just even emotionally support them.” 

The Podcast featuring Juliette Larthe will be launched on international women’s day on March 8th, but will be promoted from Monday the 9th of March by ACAST.

Juliette is currently shooting a commercial in Los Angeles, has features in development with ifeatures, BFI and BBC Films and a documentary. She will be on the British Arrows 2020 Craft and AICP Juries, and also a Creative Review Annual 2020 judge. Juliette is also newly appointed to the Development Board at End Youth Homeless, a national movement to end youth homelessness in the UK aka EYH. To donate visit here.