Film / News
Growing a movement of storytellers
Mafia Weekend began when James Broadley was just 22. He had freshly graduated from acting school and after lots of rejection emails, he decided to make his own creative opportunity – for himself and his community.
Mafia sees participants make a film in a weekend (Mafia Weekend, geddit?), with James saying that he is “trying to bring people back to the body and a sense of play”.
“All of life begins in the body. We spend most of our lives extracted from our body, right? We’re in our brain and our heads, and typing on screens.”
The first filming weekend in 2019 had 12 young people create a film in just two days.
“We created a feeling of community belonging, building people’s capacity and sense of agency. That feeling is the North Star that we’ve been walking towards,” James said.
Now in its seventh year, Mafia Weekend has grown from its sole focus on film into an exploration of all artforms, leading workshops on dance, visual art, writing and more.
Mafia Weekend’s current programme, ‘Eat, Make, Share’, is “building a movement of interdisciplinary storytellers that believe in the power of narrative to change their communities,” James told Bristol 24/7.
The programme invites participants into a series of monthly workshops in Barton Hill, where they can create, share and celebrate stories of climate optimism.
Alongside its creative offerings, Mafia Weekend serves hot, organic, locally grown meals in collaboration with the farmers of Sims Hill Shared Harvest.
With accessibility at the heart of its mission, Mafia Weekend provides free and low cost tickets for the most underserved in Bristol’s communities.
As a part of this programme, Mafia Weekend is supporting three artists in residence to illustrate and elevate Bristol’s local community leaders and to explore community resilience.
“With the artist residency, we’re hoping to shift our perception of individualism as normal,” James said. “It’s absurdly strange. We’re designed to be together, we’re social animals.”
As communities and individuals in Bristol, the climate crisis poses an ever-increasing threat to our future. This is why Mafia Weekend is building community resilience now.
With his workshops, James is creating narratives to help Bristol’s communities build resilience towards the ever-increasing pressures of the climate crisis.
James told Bristol24/7: “Stories have this beautiful way of touching the heart. For anything to change, people’s hearts need to be touched first. There’s no point just giving people facts and science.”
Looking to the future, James aims to raise enough funds to employ leaders with lived experiences of the people he most wants to serve: “As a Cis white dude, I want to ensure that Mafia Weekend’s workshops are actually in tune with that community’s needs rather than my assumptions.”
Despite challenges in raising funding and winning contracts, James has been rewarded by seeing the positive impact he’s had on Bristol’s underserved communities.
“I love it when people leave smiling and leave connected to other people and to the land. I love seeing that initial isolation transform as they experience their creative gifts.”
Tyreke Morgan, tutor at City Bristol College, long-term supporter of Mafia Weekend and a Bristol Legends nominee, said: “Mafia Weekend is really needed for today because it takes you away from the very rushed, kind of chaotic life that most people have living in a city…
“James makes us feel part of a community and nature. I think he’s got a real gift in breaking the ice with us and other people.”
Main photo: Aurora Amaryllis
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