Background
Deborah Chow is the half-Chinese daughter of parents who emigrated from Australia to Toronto, Canada, where she grew up.
director filmmaker screenwriter
Deborah Chow is the half-Chinese daughter of parents who emigrated from Australia to Toronto, Canada, where she grew up.
She is best known for her first feature film, which she wrote and directed, The High Cost of Living. Her recent directorial works include the television Movie adaption of Flowers in the Attic and episodes of the series Copper, Murdoch Mysteries, Reign, Beauty and the Beast, and Mr. Robot. She received her undergraduate degree, major of cultural theory and minor in art history, from McGill University in Montreal, where she made her first short film.
Chow began her career writing and directing short films while studying film at university and broke out with her first feature film, The High Cost of Living, in 2010.
As a film director, she"s worked with notable actors James Urbaniak, Zach Braff and Isabelle Blais, among others As a television director, she"s worked on the British Broadcasting Corporation show Copper, the CW programs Reign and Beauty and the Beast, the Canadian Broadcasting Company show Murdoch Mysteries and the United States of America Network series Mr.
Robot. She also directed the recent adaptation of Flowers in the Attic on Lifetime which starred Heather Graham and Mad Men"s Kiernan Shipka.
She has also recently directed hit television show "The Vampire Diaries" The High Cost of Living has received positive reviews. This film bears all the hallmarks of a conventional indie drama: “a downbeat scenario, flawed protagonists, and a strongly regional inflection.” Chow is credited on hitting every mark and narrative turning point.
The result is a strange dramatic complexity, with a work of superficial depth.
Her short film, Daypass, won the Best Actor Award at the Milano Film Festival and the Best Short at the Turin Film Festival. The feature-length screenplay version of the film won the Comedy Central Award for Best Comedy Screenplay. Chow was the winner of the 2005 Kodak New Vision Mentorship award for her short film The Hill, the winnings from which included funding for her first feature film. She was a participant in the Berlinale Talent Campus, Toronto International Film Festival Talent Laboratory, and the Praxis Screenwriting Laboratory Her debut feature film The High Cost of Living won Best First Feature and Top Ten at the Toronto International Film Festival, Best Canadian Feature at the Female Eye Film Fest, and Prix Super-Écran at the Rendez-vous du cinéma québécois.
