‘I ran underage teen discos and set up a small coffee shop in Dublin … now I’m making a movie’

Peter Lavery, from Dún Laoghaire, says he didn’t do well in his Leaving Cert, but started running discos in Dublin city centre in 2015, when he was just 17, before setting up a coffee shop.

However, he always wanted to do something creative and bit the bullet when he turned 21 and moved to London to study film as a mature student.

In 2019, he received his degree in Practical Filmmaking from the MetFilm School in Ealing. Now he’s working on his debut feature film, All That Glitters.

“Like most Irish people, I always loved storytelling. It’s weirdly something that’s there and ingrained as a very natural thing,” Mr Lavery told the Irish Independent.

“I didn’t do it straight away. I did very badly in the Leaving Cert. I wasn’t able to go to college, I just didn’t have the qualifications for it. I spent time working in Ireland and running a couple of my own businesses.

“I was in nightclub promotion, so I ran underage teen discos in Dublin city centre. Back in 2015, when I was 17, a school friend and I ran discos in a nightclub.

“After school, I was in hospitality. I set up a coffee shop in Dublin and ran that for two years. The opportunity just fell into my lap to run a small café.

“I loved film and I loved writing things on the side. But I never really thought I was good at it because I did so badly in the Leaving Cert. I just assumed there were no jobs in it.

“I saved and moved to London aged 21 as a mature student. I did a two-year film-making degree and made a couple of short films with friends I met there.

“It kept snowballing, my short films did well on festival circuits. My producer Joe, who’s based in the UK, the two of us set up a company here and we’ve basically spent the last year and a half getting this film up to where it is now.

“It’s all very exciting. We’re low budget, but it’s a team of very hard-working, passionate people who believe in the script which is really heart-warming,” he added.

All That Glitters intertwines Shakespearean romance with the chaos of modern school life and explores themes of love, rivalry, and self-discovery against the backdrop of anxious teens and TikTok scrollers.

It draws parallels between Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and two present day students, Ryan and Jasmine, telling a contemporary love story.

The cast features Paul Ready (Motherland, Bring Them Down, A Gentleman in Moscow) and Elliot Grihault (House of the Dragon, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child).

“We begin filming in two weeks’ time with a bunch of both British and Irish cast,” Mr Lavery said. “I love Ireland, it’s my home. But I did the age-old thing and came to London for work.”