MEDIA RELEASE: Jeremiah Hayes’ award-winning film Dear Audrey opens in three Canadian cities on August 19

• Filmmaker-activist Martin Duckworth has devoted his life to peace and justice. But now he’s put down his camera to fight for the most important cause he’s ever faced—caring for his wife, Audrey Schirmer, through the final stages of Alzheimer’s disease.
• The film is a powerful testament to Martin’s love and devotion, which has deepened over the decades. While Audrey gradually fades away—and their autistic daughter, Jacqueline, struggles with her mother’s illness—Martin commits everything he’s got to making their lives meaningful and still creative, as life-long artists.
• Jeremiah’s first job after film school in 1991 was with Martin Duckworth at the NFB, as assistant editor on Peacekeeper at War. Five years ago, after Martin’s wife Audrey was diagnosed, their friendship started to grow, and Jeremiah began filming them in their home.
• Principal photography on Dear Audrey spanned nearly 50 shooting days and at least 90 hours of footage, with Martin narrating in his own words, distilled from about 15 hours of interviews.

Theatrical release schedule
Dear Audrey opens on August 19 in the following cities:

• Montreal, Cinéma du Parc (English version with French subtitles)
• Montreal, Cinémathèque Québécoise (English version with French subtitles)
• Edmonton, Metro Cinema
• Vancouver, VIFF Centre

Awards

• People’s Choice Award, 2021 Montreal International Documentary Festival
• Cercle d’or for Best Feature Documentary, 2022 Festival Cinéma du monde de Sherbrooke, Quebec
• Feature Winner, Best of Documentary, 2022 Indy Film Fest, Indianapolis
• Winner of the Dr. Sydney K. Shapiro Philanthropic Award, 2022 Phoenix Film Festival
• Silver Winner of Best Feature Documentary, 2022 Tokyo Film Awards, Japan

Quotes

• “Anyone who watches Dear Audrey will undoubtedly conclude that Hayes is a masterful filmmaker.” – Charlie Smith, The Georgia Straight
• “Dear Audrey is the kind of film that Indy Film Fest audiences will love… emotionally honest stories that inspire not by manipulation but by human beings fumbling their way toward something beautiful even when life gets really, really challenging.”– Richard Propes, The Independent Critic

Credits
Dear Audrey is a co-production of Cineflix Media in Montreal and the NFB’s Quebec and Atlantic Studio. The film is produced by Jeremiah Hayes, André Barro (Cineflix) and Annette Clarke (NFB).

About Jeremiah Hayes
Jeremiah Hayes is an award-winning director, editor and writer. He is best known as the co-director, co-writer and editor of the Rezolution/NFB film Reel Injun, for which he won a Gemini Award and a Peabody Award. Jeremiah is also recognized for his work on the Emmy-nominated and Sundance award-winning feature documentary Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World, for which he received the Canadian Screen Award for Best Editing in a Documentary Program.

About Martin Duckworth
Raised during the Great Depression, Martin began his career at the age of 30, creating films that are artful, socially conscious and award-winning. He was on staff at the NFB from 1963 to 1970 and continued to work with the NFB as a freelancer. He travelled the globe, directed 30 films and was the cinematographer for 100, through which he saw the horrors of war in Vietnam, Cambodia, Japan and Afghanistan. Recently, he received one of Quebec’s highest honours, the Prix Albert-Tessier, for lifetime achievement in cinema.

– 30 –