Photography: Emily Chalk.
Actress and filmmaker Chelsie Preston Crayford knows what it’s like to produce not one, but two magnificent labours of love at the same time – soon after filming her semi-autobiographical movie Caterpillar, she discovered she was pregnant with her and comedian Guy Montgomery’s daughter Billie, who’s now nine months old.
“Thank God I was growing our baby through post-production,” says the star of A Remarkable Place To Die and Dark City: The Cleaner.
“Making a movie is a major undertaking, so during filming would’ve been so challenging. It was the perfect time to be pregnant.”
Thankfully for mum of two Chelsie, 39, her epic morning sickness didn’t kick in until she’d returned home to Auckland from filming Caterpillar in Wellington.
“During the edit, I’d regularly rush to the bathroom to throw up, but the post-production people were so accommodating, they moved the edit suite to my house and our amazing editor came over every day, which was fantastic.”
The women who shaped her
The arrangement also meant she was able to be home for her older daughter Olive, 10. Forging a strong bond with her girls is key for Chelsie, whose new film is based on her formative teenage years and is a love letter to her own family, including her mum, acclaimed filmmaker Dame Gaylene Preston, and her grandmother Tui Preston.
“In a way, it was like I had two mothers,” Chelsie recalls of her Wellington upbringing.
“Mum is a trail-blazing feminist filmmaker and a real force to be reckoned with, while Tui was a woman who’d grown up in wildly different times as a Depression-era housewife on the West Coast.”
The heart of the family
Chelsie describes Tui as the domestic glue who held their family together.
“There’s such a special exchange between grandkids and grandparents, and Tui and I were super-close,” she says.
“While Tui and Mum were very different, they had this symbiotic relationship as they raised me together, but it wasn’t until I started working on the film that I realised what a privilege it was to grow up in such a matriarchal household.”
Art inspired by real life
When asked if she ever tried to rebel against following in her acclaimed mum’s footsteps, Chelsie laughs, “I rebelled by getting into quite basic things.” I rebelled against my artistic feminist mother by plucking my eyebrows really thin and being into boy racers, but only for a short time!
Caterpillar follows three generations of women – one going through puberty, another in menopause and the other nearing the end of her life.
Chelsie explains, “The characters grew from us, but they evolved into their own beasts, combined with my own imaginings of what happens when those stages smash up against one another. “It’s especially interesting to have made the film from this perspective now that I’m the mother in the middle with two growing daughters and a gracefully ageing mother. I’m very aware of the push and pull of wanting to be a great mother as well as wanting to make great art, and how I balance all those roles.”
Balancing motherhood and filming
That juggle would be so much harder to achieve without the loving support around her. Currently filming season two of A Remarkable Place To Die, Chelsie tells, “Guy has been down in Queenstown with us being primary caregiver and his parents are down here too, which is great. Production’s also been super-supportive, especially with breastfeeding as I’ve been pumping every couple of hours for the past six months. I wish all mothers had this much support!”
As for what’s next, Chelsie’s looking forward to spending more time with her family.
“Caterpillar has been eight years from genesis to now, and Guy and I have been together the whole time I’ve been working on the film,” she says.
Watching him become a father
“Seeing him become a father is one of the greatest gifts of my life. He’s already an incredible stepdad to Olive, but he didn’t get to see her as a baby, so witnessing him with this little baby has been the most beautiful thing. He’s the most wonderful dad.”
“I’m so excited about spending some time together as a family, maybe do some gardening and go for walks, and hopefully resuscitate our houseplants that have been rather neglected of late. “Those are my big hopes for the future – and also for people to see the film. To take their mums and their daughters, and for them to connect with it, as I made this film to be shared.”
Caterpillar opens in cinemas on Thursday.
