Playback’s 10 to Watch 2024: Cheryl Meyer

Meyer has spent years learning the nuances of production. As a screenwriter, she’s focusing on projects that highlight disability and women finding their voice.

Playback is proud to present the 2024 cohort for our annual 10 to Watch. This year’s group of Canadian screen industry talents were selected from more than 250 submissions. We are rolling out profiles on each individual this month.

If there’s one word colleagues use to describe Cheryl Meyer, it’s “tenacious.”

Add in her adaptability, creativity, and industry knowledge, Meyer’s progression from an office assistant to a screenwriter — with three feature films made in the past four years — isn’t a surprise to those who know her.

Meyer tells Playback Daily she always knew she wanted to pursue screenwriting, but didn’t know how to break into the industry or meet the right people. Growing up in Timmins, Ont., she loved TV and film. But, at the time, there were no productions in her area to get involved with. So she moved eight hours away to Toronto, where she briefly acted until she realized production had her heart.

“I took a Bachelor of Commerce at the Metropolitan University of Toronto, so I understood the business side of what was required, but I wanted to learn more about the craft,” she says.

She enrolled at the University of Toronto and studied screenwriting, while learning the ins and outs of production through a variety of roles. Over the years, she’s been a production coordinator, a production manager and a second AD. She’s also worked in post-production and produced a low-budget feature film.

“I always knew [Meyer] wanted to become a writer, and I brought her into several productions,” says producer Bruno Marino of High Star Entertainment (Gridlocked). “She was smart enough to realize, even though they weren’t writer positions, she could immerse herself in the industry.”

In 2018, Meyer switched from production to screenwriting, writing on shows like Bristow Global Media’s It’s My Party and Project 10’s My Perfect Landing. At the same time, her health took a turn and she developed a chronic pain condition. When she wasn’t working, she researched, investigated, and saw specialists and physiotherapists.

“I joke that I had two jobs because screenwriting and my health both required 100%,” she says. “I finally got a few diagnoses, and I could actually do the things I needed to do in my everyday life. I’ve been able to give more energy back into my job, which is the thing I love most in the world.”

In 2020, Meyer’s first feature film, The Last Mark, went to camera in northern Ontario. It was one of the first productions back post-shutdown, and she recalls daily meetings, constant schedule shifts and new protocols.

“There was this challenge of being ill and also not wanting to be ill from COVID, so that put an extra layer on everything,” she recalls. “But I could say it went really well. It was a miracle, and I can’t believe nobody caught COVID on that shoot.”

The Last Mark became a Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) 2021 Industry Select and was acquired by Super Channel. Meyer followed it up with All The Lost Ones, a Telefilm, Ontario Creates, and NOHFC-backed project that debuts theatrically this year. Meanwhile, her horror feature script Invalid earned a 2022 Wscripted Cannes Screenplay nomination, which led to her writing the upcoming Hulu horror film Carved with writer-director Justin Harding.

“Cheryl is one of the most tenacious people I’ve ever met, but she’s also one of the only people that I know in the industry that can take a project from creation to production and then to fruition,” says Kara Harun, a long-time collaborator of Meyer’s who is also working with her on the development of a Zero Repeat Forever project, based on the book by Gabrielle S. Prendergast.

“She’s extremely creative and collaborative, and I also feel like she’s a lifelong learner,” says Harun. “She’s always trying to improve her skills and become an even better writer and producer.”

Meyer says that as someone who had to find her own voice, she’s interested in stories about women who have messy journeys. She loves propulsive narratives and “run for your life” scenarios and prefers exploring these stories through genres like crime thriller, grounded sci-fi or psychological horror. When working on family dramas, like Prime Video’s Beyond Black Beauty, she tries to find her way into the characters through high emotional stakes.

When Meyer writes her own stories, like a true crime series she is currently developing with Toronto’s Yellow Bear Studios, Montreal’s Zone3 and London- and Berlin-based Marathon Studio, she approaches the project with a business mindset.

“So many people have to love it beyond me, and I’m very aware of that,” she says. “I try to find those undeniable projects because I love them, and I know others will love them, too. Not just other producers or people in the industry, but audiences.”

In telling these stories, Meyer also wants to represent disability and be a voice at the table following her own experiences with chronic illness. She recalls a time when it felt “to disclose a disability would jeopardize your opportunities” and remembers it taking a while to find others in the industry who faced similar challenges.

Eventually, a collective emerged and Meyer was on the call with interim executive director Andrew Morris when they came up with the name for the Disability Screen Office. She’s also been selected for the 2023 Disability Belongs Entertainment Lab, has been a community advisor for ReelAbilities Accessible Writers Lab, and was a speaker on accessibility at TIFF Canada’s Top Ten Industry Forum. Meanwhile, her TV pilot, Chronic Elle, based on her experiences with chronic illness, was selected for the 2024 Athena Film Festival’s Episodic Writers Lab.

“Cheryl can transmute any pain that she’s had in her life or any struggles that are very much of the human experience,” says Harun. “She’s able to play with tone, make it feel universal, and capture human experience and struggle. That’s what makes a good writer; being able to make that universal for everyone.”

Since embracing her new career, Meyer has continued to work hard at her craft through programs like the 2023 Stowe Story Writers Room Lab, the 2023 TIFF Series Accelerator Lab and the 2024 Inevitable Foundation Elevate Collective. She also makes it a habit to attend markets like the Banff World Media Festival, Content Canada and Prime Time.

“I make these a big part of my job because I understand how important it is to get the projects out there and put the right teams together,” she says. “Find the people who are excited about it, find the people who you want, somebody who believes in it in a big way, because the other thing I learned was that these projects, you’re going to live with them for seven years, for 10 years, for two decades.”

“She has that tenacity,” adds Marino. “In this industry, especially in Canada, you have to have a very tough skin, and you have to have the intestinal fortitude to keep going because it’s so difficult to get your work out there and get hired. Cheryl’s the full package.”

Image courtesy of Cheryl Meyer

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