Interview with Nina Gilmore and Valerie Buhagiar

Valerie is a Toronto based actor and filmmaker. At 18 years of age she toured China, the U.S. and Canada as a Puppeteer. She is a scholarship Graduate of George Brown’s Acting Program and a Dora Mavor Moore award winner. Valerie first gained international recognition playing the leading roles in Bruce McDonald’s Highway 61 and Roadkill. She has been a host for The Showcase Revue and has appeared as a guest star in various T.V. episodics and several Independent features. Valerie has been Associate Producer and one of the lead actors in the award-winning feature film Expecting.

The Passion of Rita Camilleri was Valerie’s writing, directing and producing debut. The film was completed in the spring of 1993 and won several prizes. The Karlovy Vary film Festival held a retrospective of Valerie’s work as an actor and a filmmaker. Other credits include: One Day I Stood Still, L’amour L’amour Shut the Door Por Favor and BoomBoom Baby Wants to Go. She has directed a Public Service Announcement for Centre of Opportunity, Respect and Empowerment (C.O.R.E), a biography on Colin Linden for the Toronto Arts Awards and two Bravo!FACT shorts entitled Pictures from Home and Omneya – Wish. Valerie also directed the Festival of Lights, a parade full of vignettes set on rooftops of Toronto’s Kensington Market, as well as video images for Theatre Gargantua’s production of Nod. Tell Us the Truth Josephine – a bitter immigrant story won the best experimental film at the Female Eye Film Festival.

Valerie can be seen on the small screen as well with recent roles including a guest star spot on the CBC hit series The Border and she continues to work in a recurring role on the international hit series Degrassi. On top of all of this Valerie just finished her latest film, Small, Stupid and Insignificant(42 min. RT) and won the best experimental drama award at the 2011 Female Eye Film Festival.