The con­tin­u­ing COVID-19 pan­dem­ic has cost na­tion­al Taro­mi Lour­des Joseph a chance to make a more mean­ing­ful con­tri­bu­tion at the 2020 Di­ver­si­ty in Cannes Fes­ti­val.

In April, Joseph land­ed a spot on the Short­film Show­case Screen­ing Com­mit­tee, an in­de­pen­dent glob­al film move­ment that pro­motes in­clu­sion at the Cannes Film Fes­ti­val. It seeks to strength­en the cross-cul­tur­al net­work of the var­i­ous eth­nic groups rep­re­sent­ed at the Cannes Film Fes­ti­val. The com­mit­tee views, cri­tiques and rates the en­trants to the pres­ti­gious event. Some 18 short films were to be screened at this year’s event, which was sched­uled to run from May 12-23.

Be­ing on the Screen­ing Com­mit­tee al­lowed her to meet and col­lab­o­rate with oth­er cre­atives from the world over as they got to dis­cuss what they love most – film. Joseph ad­mit­ted she had to keep a lev­el head when she re­alised her fel­low com­mit­tee mem­bers were peo­ple who have worked with HBO, PBS, E!en­ter­tain­ment, Bol­ly­wood, In­dieWire, Net­flix, the NAACP, SXSW, Tribeca Film Fes­ti­val, BBC, BAF­TA, just to name a few.

"I am in­spired, hum­bled and in awe to be in their pres­ence and on the team," she said.

Di­ver­si­ty in Cannes has an­nounced the of­fi­cial se­lec­tions of the short film show­case on so­cial me­dia but man­age­ment has not yet de­cid­ed how these films will be shown as yet. In the in­ter­im, man­age­ment has launched "Cannes Con­ver­sa­tions" which high­lights Cannes Film Fes­ti­val alums and oth­er fes­ti­val con­nois­seurs. These con­ver­sa­tions can be viewed on their Face­book page. The Cannes Film Fes­ti­val's con­tin­gency plan in­volves trav­el­ling to oth­er glob­al fes­ti­vals to cu­rate films lat­er in the year as well. The fi­nal de­ci­sion will be pred­i­cat­ed on the sug­ges­tions of the World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO) and the Cen­ter of Dis­ease Con­trol (CDC) re­gard­ing trav­el.

Asked how she was cop­ing with the COVID shut­down mea­sures in the US, Joseph said she was adapt­ing to the sit­u­a­tion and mak­ing the most of it as best as pos­si­ble. She has filmed a movie that was shot via the video app Zoom dur­ing the lock­down with a di­rec­tor based in Vir­ginia and is cur­rent­ly work­ing on an­oth­er movie to be fea­tured on In­sta­gram through The Cast­ing Di­rec­tor’s Cut in Cal­i­for­nia.

She said, "I am very im­pressed and in­spired by the in­dus­try pro­fes­sion­als that have giv­en of their time and the free train­ing on­line dur­ing this quar­an­tine. I have at­tend­ed work­shops with Fe­li­cia Hen­der­son (Soul Food, Gos­sip Girl, Moe­sha, Sis­ter Sis­ter), Jerome But­ler (Star Trek Voy­ager, De­ja Vu, GI Joe Re­tal­i­a­tion, When They See Us), Em­my award-win­ning Mea­gan Lewis, Mark Fin­can­non, Ja­son Lock­hart, Chase Paris and Tony De­Mil."

Joseph added that she is a life­long learn­er and keeps an open mind to­wards her craft and the in­dus­try. She said with COVID-19 in the equa­tion, the in­dus­try has to evolve and adapt for safe­ty and health sake. But she ad­mit­ted she is not in a hur­ry to get back out in­to the in­dus­try as a re­sult of COVID-19, so she’s tak­ing her time and play­ing it safe.

She en­cour­aged film­mak­ers from Trinidad and To­ba­go to check out the Di­ver­si­ty in Cannes Film Fes­ti­val and make it as an op­tion when they are sub­mit­ting their films to var­i­ous fes­ti­vals. Fol­low Joseph on so­cial me­dia @taromilordes.