Louisa Connolly- Burnham told David Hennessy about her short film Sister Wives, the story of two women married to the same man who fall for each other and which was inspired by a fundamentalist sect of Mormons where polygamy is the norm.
Sister Wives is written, directed and stars Louisa Connolly-Burnham.
The story centres around two women: Kaidence, played by Connolly-Burnham, and Galilee who is played by EE BAFTA Rising Star recipient Mia McKenna-Bruce.
Mia McKenna-Bruce broke out in the film How to Have Sex but she has been acting since she was a child.
Louisa Connolly- Burnham has also been acting since she was very young which is when the two actresses first met.
Louisa Connolly-Burnham is an award-winning director and screenwriter hailing from Birmingham who founded her production Thimble Films in 2019.
Her directorial debut The Call Centre, which she also penned, had a successful festival run, including Foyle Film Festival, Aesthetica & Underwire & winning audience awards at ÉCU Film Festival & Sunday Shorts Film Festival.
The Call Centre currently has 2+ million views on Omeleto making it one of the most successful films on the platform.
In Sister Wives Kaidence and Galilee, who are married to the same man, begin to discover feelings for one another.
The short was the Best British Film award winner at the prestigious Iris Prize and is currently being developed into a feature film with McKenna-Bruce set to reprise her role.
The film has qualified to be considered for the 2025 BAFTAs and Oscars. It was also longlisted for a British Independent Film Award.
What inspired Sister Wives? What moved you to make this film?
“Well, I saw a documentary about this group of people that live in Utah.
“They’re quite extreme Mormons.
“They’re called the Fundamentalist Church of the Latter Day Saints.
“They practice polygamy and some of the men have 30, 40, 50 wives.
“They kind of dress like they’re from another time.
“They dress in these almost Victorian, prairie style dresses and the women never cut their hair so they look incredibly unique.
“The inner workings of what’s happening within this church and within this community is crazy and I couldn’t find any narrative films about them.
“There’s a lot of documentaries, there’s a lot of podcasts but nobody had really done a dramatic telling from within this group.
“I thought, ‘There’s so many wives in these households, they can’t all be getting the love and affection and attention that they desire from their husbands so what if they started to turn to one another?’
“I started writing it not long after I saw that documentary.
“I basically wrote the whole thing on a flight and then edited.”
You say they look like they are from another time. Watching the film I thought it could be from any time but kind of figure it was long, long ago until I saw the Nokia 3210 that Galilee secretly had. That it was that modern was a surprise..
“We kind of wanted to surprise the audience, lead them down a path of thinking that they were watching a period drama and then finding out that this stuff is actually happening right now.
“It’s very real and that community is alive and well today.”
Was it difficult to research a community that is so insular?
“Well, there is quite a lot of stuff about them because a lot of people have escaped and they tell their stories.
“I have managed to find quite a lot of stuff about them.
“There are books about them but you are right in the fact that they are incredibly insular and isolated.
“I think that they like to protect the community and there are obviously some incredibly dark secrets from within that I imagine they don’t want to get out but a lot of it is seeping out.”
The characters in your piece are not allowed to have much fun though, are they? There is that scene in the film where they decide to jump in the water and swim but then we see three other women watching from a distance and deciding to tell somebody..
“I know and also how incredibly sad it is to see how women have been pitted against each other in that group.
“As I say, I don’t fully know all the inner workings of the group but there seems to be this level of competition between the wives, a lot of women telling on telling on each other.
“It’s a shame that the patriarchy has really seeped through and I don’t get the impression that there’s much sisterhood there within which is kind of why I wanted to write a story where there was.
“I like to believe that there are nice stories from within where there’s a camaraderie between the wives but from what I’ve seen so far, they all seem to hate each other.
“There seems to be a lot of jealousy, a lot of fighting for the attention of the man, a lot of competition within the fertility of the women.
“The woman that is multiplying is held in much higher regard than a woman that would struggle to get pregnant.
“It’s complicated and definitely very toxic, I’d say.”
That’s true of Kaidence’s situation, isn’t it? She hasn’t given her husband a child and so brings another woman into the home..
“Yeah, to be honest it’s incredible that Jeremiah hasn’t taken a second wife already because they’ve been trying to have children for a very long time.
“The only ways that communities like this survive is by multiplying so the fact that he’s waited so long because of a promise that they made to each other when they were younger is incredible.
“I actually think Jeremiah doesn’t rejoice in the idea of taking a second wife but he’s been left no choice because he too is a victim of the society that they’ve grown up in.
“There is immense pressure on him as well, a lot of shame, a lot of emasculation.
“I think that’s why he does it. It’s incredibly sad.”
Your co- star is Mia McKenna- Bruce who has been lauded for her role in How to Have Sex. I thought she came to your attention with that film but you actually go back a long way with Mia, don’t you?
“We grew up on CBBC together.
“She was in the Tracy Beaker franchise and I was on a show called Wolfblood.
“Both of those shows shot in Newcastle so I’ve known Mia for 12 years and then in 2022 we got cast together on the same show called Vampire Academy.
“That’s when we became really close.
“I started writing Sister Wives in 2023 and she was always at the forefront of my mind for it.
“I’ve always been such a big fan of hers and I consider her a very dear friend.
“She’s a wonderful actress and a wonderful human being as well.”
As you say you started very young with those CBBC programmes. Have you always known this is what you’ve wanted to do?
“Well, I’ve definitely always known that I wanted to act.
“The filmmaking journey started about five years ago and I’m surprised at how quickly and deeply my love of filmmaking has just taken over everything.
“I think I always had the type of personality that could go into filmmaking but I never really knew how to make it happen until I made my first film in 2019, so my career has definitely gone a direction that I wasn’t expecting but I have to say I’m really loving it. I do feel like I’m where I’m supposed to be right now.
“I still love acting and I definitely still want to act but it feels really empowering to have a few more strings to my bow.
“It feels like I’m not just waiting for the phone to ring, auditioning and never hearing again.
“It’s nice to make stuff.
“It feels like I’ve got some autonomy.”
When you’re shooting Sister Wives and you’re writer/ director/ producer/ actress, isn’t that a lot of hats to wear at once?
“It is tough.
“It’s something that I’ve done a few times now.
“I’ve made five films as a filmmaker and the first film that I ever made, it was called the Call Centre and I wrote, directed, produced and starred in that, so, in a way, I don’t know any other way.
“I started my film making career with all those hats on so I feel like I’m kind of used to it.
“A lot of it, of course, comes down to prep.
“We have to prep quite militantly if I’m acting and directing at the same time.
“A lot of the team that I worked with on Sister Wives I’ve worked with for years, and there’s definitely a rhythm and a flow that we have nailed and I trust my team.
“I trust that if something goes wrong, I believe that someone’s got my back.”
Whether it is your film Call Centre or Sister Wives, it seems something very specific draws you to the subject..
“I think that there’s a theme through all of my work of women that feel oppressed, women harbouring secrets, often introverted women that go through this journey of finding their voice.
“This actually wasn’t intentional, that’s just something that I’ve realised particularly since Sister Wives has come out. I have definitely noticed that there’s a pattern there.
“I don’t know how intentional that is. I guess maybe I’m writing the stories that I want to see.
“I’m perhaps writing about issues and topics that would affect somebody like me, things that I’ve seen, things that I’ve seen friends go through.
“I guess it all kind of seeps into the work.”
Another commonality I notice, again taking The Call Centre and Sister Wives, is that these characters have no idea their world is about to be altered.
The first Kaidence hears about another woman joining her and her husband in their home is when he comes in and says it.
Your character in The Cell Centre does not know what is going to happen when she goes to work that morning..
“Exactly, I think with short films you have to be quite punchy.
“I think you need a really clear structure of a beginning, middle and end and you’ve got to pack a punch because you’ve got usually between 10 and 25 minutes to really make a lasting impression on your audience, judges panels, things like that.
“There does seem to be a theme with me where something big and unexpected happens to the protagonist.
“I like to tell stories that show how quickly your life can be turned on its head and how one deals with that.”
Sister Wives is going to be a feature film so that will allow you to study the world and the characters in more depth..
“Yeah, I’m so excited for that because there’s so much more to discover about these women and about him as well, the husband.
“But I also want to know more, see more, tell more about the whole community.
“The feature is going to involve the church quite a lot which I think is important because the church is the centre of this whole community.
“I want to meet some of the other households.
“I want to meet the families that they came from.
“I actually want to really explore Kaidence and Jeremiah’s love before Galilee comes in because I think that way when he does make that choice to take a second wife, that should hit even harder for us as an audience, it should break our hearts.
“You want to buy into their love before she comes along so it really makes sense as to why she’s so heartbroken and why he’s so heartbroken and why it blows up their life in the way that it does.
“It’s going to be really exciting.
“We are hoping to shoot next summer and we are potentially shooting in Ireland.
“There’s so many potential places in Ireland to shoot something like Sister Wives because it’s so rural and beautiful and sometimes you can feel like there is not anyone else around for thousands of miles.
“There’s a lovely isolation to some areas of Ireland that I think will work really well for Sister Wives.”
Do you have Irish blood yourself? “Yeah, I do have Irish blood.
“My ancestors are from Waterford and Mayo.
“I think I’m actually more Irish than I am English.
“I’ve got way more Irish blood than I do English blood.
“I think I look quite Irish as well and I’ve got an Irish surname, so I really love the idea of shooting Sister Wives there next year.
“I’ve got an Irish film called Fleeting and it’s about the Repeal the Eighth referendum and it’s been a shame because that’s been on the circuit at the same time as Sister Wives and they keep clashing, so I haven’t actually got to experience much of the Irish film circuit yet.
“Fleeting is in Waterford Film Festival next weekend but I’m in Newcastle with Sister Wives. It’s a nice position to be in but it’s still a bit sad that I can’t be there.”
Tell us about Fleeting, the Irish film you mentioned..
“Fleeting was written by one of my best friends.
“Her name’s Lisa O’Connor.
“She’s a Clare girl.
“It was a play at the Southwark Playhouse.
“Fleeting is based on a girl and her father discussing lots of things but kind of circling the conversation around the repeal the eighth referendum, and it’s set in a pub.
“My dad is a pub landlord.
“I actually grew up living in pubs and so for ages I’ve been looking out for something to maybe shoot in my dad’s pub.
“But after I saw that play I said to Lisa, ‘Have you ever considered turning this into a short film? Because I have a pub that we can use’.
“And she was like, ‘Yeah, let’s do it’.
“That’s how it came about.
“It’s had a beautiful, beautiful festival run so it’s really connecting with Irish audiences and it’s doing quite well over here as well.
“I’m really, really proud of that.”
How have you enjoyed the reaction to Sister Wives?
“I have been completely blown away by the response.
“Some audiences cry their eyes out.
“Some audiences find it really funny.
“That was one thing that really surprised me.
“I knew that there was a couple of comedy moments but some audiences I find just laughing so much and I wasn’t expecting it.
“What’s obviously been lovely about making a short film like Sister Wives is I’m experiencing the LGBTQIA+ film festival circuit for the first time.
“It’s the first queer film I’ve ever made and obviously it’s really resonating for them and sometimes deeply emotional.
“There’s definitely a difference between watching it with audiences in America and watching it with audiences in the UK.
“When I’ve watched it with audiences in America, they immediately know exactly who we’re talking about.
“They know the FLDS.
“They know some of those more extreme Mormon sects and that’s always interesting because we don’t really have those kind of communities over here.”
Sister Wives is available to stream on 4 on demand.
