CEEA Talks: Anita Doron on scriptwriting: “When in doubt, be deranged!”

Anita Doron has a wealth of stories to tell that can inspire young artists. That is why she was invited to lead a masterclass at CEE Animation Workshop 2026, where she fulfilled her role with flying colours. A writer and director, her main connection to the animation industry is her screenplay for Nora Twomey’s THE BREADWINNER.

Anita Doron spoke about her life, her motivations and views on filmmaking. I jotted down some of her most striking phrases and put them to her afterwards. Rather than a traditional career overview, this conversation explores those ideas and statements. It all began with her introduction: “Hi, I’m Anita Doron. I am a wayward Hungarian born in Transcarpathia; I grew up in the Soviet Union and spent most of my life in Canada. I am a writer, director, member of the Academy’s writers branch, occasionally a shepherd, and I love filmmaking.”

You said ‘shepherd’. And everyone in the room was like… “Did she say ‘shepherd’?
Anita Doron: The grassy slope in a valley near my house seemed perfect for sheep. We started with two, until one day, a lost old sheep came out of the forest and spontaneously joined our ‘gang’. She wasn’t shorn for years; grass grew on her back. A few years later, a disease broke out, and we couldn’t save her; she died in my arms. Only one sheep survived. I’m not ready for a new flock yet.

That story started so promisingly, but in the end everyone died…
Doron: After all, I am still an Eastern European!

Another keyword I noted was ‘emotional honesty’.
Doron: I congratulate the CEEA Workshop projects for addressing very personal, sometimes difficult issues in a raw and honest way. It’s not a necessity, but a choice – a project can also be enjoyable because it draws you in and entertains you – but I recognised this emotional courage throughout the selection, and I’m sure the selection committee did too.

“At the age of six, I wrote a poem. I wrote two sentences and showed them to my mother, and she had tears in her eyes. This made me realise the impact of words, and I was hooked.” Are we all doing the things we do to make our mothers proud?
Doron: That moment captures why I became a filmmaker. I wanted to stir up feelings in people. Poetry matters where I come from, and our origins shape us all.

Can we ever deny or outgrow those origins?
Doron: If we deny them, that denial becomes part of a new suit we’re wearing. By denying our origins, we still acknowledge them. I grew up in a country that no longer exists, which means I don’t really have any particular roots. That has its upsides and downsides. I feel comfortable anywhere in the world, but sometimes I look at people with a strong sense of ancestry and belonging and see the self-confidence they draw from it.

Does that lack of roots influence the stories you write?
Doron: In THE BREADWINNER, Parvana has a deep sense of belonging in Afghanistan, the country that was once her home. People generally don’t want to flee their homes; they simply have to. Most Afghans I’ve met still long for their country, but circumstances prevent them from living there. I have great respect for people who are firmly rooted. Sometimes I long for a total sense of belonging, but other times my lack of roots helps me understand others better. I’ve never been sure how much I wanted to put down roots myself, and now you’re making me question it again.

One thing I particularly appreciated about THE BREADWINNER was how completely immersed I became in everyday life through all those little details. I probably didn’t fully realise how important they were until you pointed it out.
Doron: As a method writer, I become my character in a way. I want to see the world she lives in, the scents and flavours, the colour of her pain and joy. When I write about a young girl’s daily life in Kabul, I think about the dust, the clothes, the food on the table. Those visceral details bring her world to life and make the story authentic. The historical and political context helps us understand a country’s complexity, but unfortunately, that’s all we ever hear about Afghanistan. We don’t hear enough about the people. You care so much more about a country when you experience it through one person’s world rather than through its political context.

We first came to know you as a live-action director.
Doron: I actually started out making a documentary. When I was 12, the local river, which had once been dug by my communist grandfather, was completely polluted. A friend’s father had a Super 8mm camera, so I thought, why not talk to people and make a documentary about it? Only the drunks would talk to us; everyone else thought it was too dangerous. One day, the deputy mayor summoned us to his office. We thought he wanted to be in our film! Instead, he told us, two 12-year-olds, to stop filming. If we didn’t, our parents would lose their jobs. But my parents had guts. They told us to keep filming!

With THE BREADWINNER, you suddenly found yourself “in a world of animation, full of wonderful people, with less ego…” Most of the CEEA audience wanted to hear more about why this is such a wonderful world.
Doron: People in animation tend to be more playful and joyful. Animation connects you with that colourful, innocent side of yourself. It’s a very tactile form of creativity, and I think that’s what draws people to it. The motivation is to create and play, so there’s less ego involved.

Now you call them ‘playful’, but in your lecture, you used a rather different word: “One of the most important things as a filmmaker is to be deranged.”
Doron: To believe that your stories really matter, you have to be insane. I encourage filmmakers to embrace that side of themselves. When in doubt, be deranged! We’re nothing but clowns in a small world, so don’t let fear hold you back from telling your story!

Are you planning to stay in the world of animation for a while?
Doron: I’m here for good! I’ll still do some live-action, because I adore its immediacy and I love working with actors, cinematographers, and production designers – the amazing crews I’ve met around the world were wonderful to collaborate with. But animation is more peaceful. Making an animated film doesn’t give you an adrenaline rush. That only comes at the end, when you present your work.

Your next animated project is a Hungarian classic with the bizarre title VERY HARD…
Doron: FAIRY HEART!! Or Tündér Lala (Lala the Fairy), based on Magda Szabó’s classic Hungarian children’s novel from 1965. At the time, she was blacklisted by the authorities for her subversive literature and was only allowed to write children’s books. But brilliant as she was, she snuck her critique of authoritarianism into a fairy tale. Like many Hungarians, I grew up with this book, and I feel a great responsibility to do justice to its legacy. The exciting challenge was making the story relevant to today’s society. I have woven the state of the environment into the story: we’re destroying the planet, and we’re all equally culpable. That’s what unites us. The dark forces in the story believe humanity deserves to be destroyed. But we do have one undeniable gift: our capacity to love and be loved. And that’s the best thing in the world.

During your lecture, you went into detail about the scriptwriting process. Can I put some of your advice to the test? For instance: “You have to know why you love your hero.”
Doron: You have to be in love with your main character! What is it about them that you love? It might be something quirky or strange, but it has to be specific. You need to know their past, even if it never appears in the story. I write backstories to get to know my characters better. What are their contradictions? What are they afraid of? What happened to them that led them astray? What are their weaknesses, flaws, and secrets? How do they express themselves? Are they articulate or not? Do they slide through life on intuition, or do they plan everything? And the most fun story engine of all: what secretly motivates them, deep down at a subconscious level? I’m a method writer: I enter my characters and write from within them, like an actor. Except I can’t act, but I can hear their voices and the melody of their speech.

But they need to go through a process of change.
Doron: They do, but they don’t necessarily have to improve or become better people. We’re in Europe, after all; this isn’t America. But they have to go somewhere, and something needs to change by the end of the story. From selfish to altruistic, or the other way around? From innocent to streetwise? From anger to acceptance, or from acceptance to anger?

You explained the process through multiple musical references: the structure of a song, the rhythm of dialogue…
Doron: I like to think of filmmaking in terms of music and rhythm. When does the film speed up or slow down? When does the intensity rise, and when does everything become still? Rhythm plays a big part in both writing and editing. Then we fill the film with colours and lines. Those are the instruments we use to complete our song.

You also stressed the importance of research, but with certain restrictions.
Doron: I love research, paying meticulous attention to details. And then, at some point, you have to let go and not be overwhelmed by what you know. Break the tyranny of knowledge! The first feature I directed, THE END OF SILENCE, I wouldn’t have made that film today, with everything I know now. It was a crazy, impossible project, but we did it because I didn’t know any better. I try to unlearn things over and over again, looking at every element through the eyes of a novice, an ignorant newbie.

That explains why you said, “I love the moment when I’m completely lost.”
Doron: You always reach a point when you no longer know what the story is about and nothing makes sense. I love it! I used to fear that moment. “Oh no, I’ve lost it, now I’ll never finish this script!” But these days, I revel in it. I honour that feeling of being lost, because it can lead to a much clearer picture and an unexpected way out of the impasse. My advice is to embrace confusion. Give it time; things are happening in our subconscious while we feel lost. Trust it.

But when it comes to ‘killing your darlings’, should reason take precedence over feelings?
Doron: It took me years to come to terms with that. You have to kill your darlings over and over again. There’s a whole graveyard of darlings somewhere out there! These days, I ask myself: Is this scene essential? What happens if I get rid of it? Most of the time, something better comes out of it. Whenever I fight too hard to keep a particular element, I know it probably has to go. I’m no longer afraid: Grab hold of it and throw it out! The story will grow from it. Sometimes there’s a mourning process. I go to the funeral, burn some stuff, walk around the well, and let it go.

You were invited to the CEEA Workshop to inspire participants. Do you ever question your role on stage?
Doron: We all marinate in the imposter syndrome, but I try not to overthink it. If you start engineering it, you lose its authenticity. I just want to find something nutritious for the audience. I share my journey as a filmmaker, how I got to where I am today. Maybe it’s like a tarot card, awakening something you already knew but had never thought about. I want to talk about what excites me enough to share.

One last fascinating quote from you: “There are no others.”
Doron: In the Soviet Union, travelling was easy. My parents took me to Uzbekistan, Georgia, Armenia, to the mountains… My mind was opened to new ways of being, and I realised there are no ‘others’. I probably have more in common with a heavy-metal-loving poet from Bhutan than with a conservative Catholic bank manager in France. But if we dig deep enough, we will always find shared values. I love learning about people living in distant places, in circumstances I’ve never experienced. I try to steer clear of a narrow, Global-North-centric worldview. Once you do, you begin to see that we are all part of the same human family, sharing a lot of pain and joy. The good and the bad, the honest and the dishonest… we are doing it, and recognising that makes us more humane.

Gert Hermans