By Donalyn Dela Cruz
In the early 2000s, Ciara Leinaʻala Lacy was obsessed with watching music videos. For this Kamehameha Schools and Yale University graduate, that obsession drew her to New York City.
“I tried to get a job as a production assistant here and there, and I took random jobs,” said Lacy. “It was like, you know, the things you do when you’re still not sure of what you want to do.”
She did it all – from coffee runs and getting city permits for production shoots to driving trucks and picking up equipment.
“I can say that I parallel parked a 14-foot box truck in Chinatown, New York,” she said with a smile.
Surrounded by like-minded friends from college who were all looking for a break into the field or had already made it to the other side, Lacy was pulled into the world of film crew production workflow. She learned about adjusting operations, budgets, and worked in non-fiction TV and music videos. Lacy also produced a concert DVD for Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds at Radio City Hall.
Her video music obsession peaked as a production assistant on videos for Cindy Lauper and Martina McBride.
It wasn’t long after that Lacy made her way from music to the feature and independent films arena. She took on small – and not-so-small – film crew positions.
With each new venture, Lacy’s interests and circles grew. She took a part-time gig to allow her more time to delve into writing. “I joined a theater writing group and we would write in Times Square at the Marriott Marquee,” she said. “It was very intense and a lot of fun.”
Oscar-nominated film producer Terry Leonard, now living in Los Angeles, recalled taking Lacy “under my wing.”
“No one person can make a film,” Leonard said. “You really need to be able to surround yourself with other talented people and collaborate to be able to pull these things off together.”
All of that New York hustle came to a halt in 2011 when an unexpected medical condition brought Lacy back to Hawaiʻi. She took time to heal, reevaluate, and reconnect. That year, she also met her future husband.
“We met at Bar 35 and I was immediately moved by him,” Lacy said. “I had just lost my grandfather, and he reminded me so much of him. They have the same eyes.”
Lacy re-rooted herself in Honolulu and never lost sight of her passion for filmmaking. After learning about Native Hawaiian inmates in Arizona, she wrote and directed her first feature documentary, Out of State.
“In the film, you watch two men as they come home and reintegrate post-incarceration, it gave me a connection to being Hawaiian again. When I was living in New York, I wasn’t connected to being kānaka,” said Lacy.
Out of State was a dose of rediscovering her cultural roots. “Looking back, it makes a lot of sense, but I don’t think I could have predicted it,” she noted.
Out of State received numerous awards including the 2017 Hawaiʻi International Film Festival (HIFF) Audience Choice Award & Best Feature “Made In Hawaiʻi,” Best Documentary at the CayFilm Festival, and the Audience Award on PBS’ Independent Lens.
She has since worked on projects that have been featured on Netflix, PBS, ABC, Al Jazeera, and the Criterion Collection. She was an inaugural Sundance Institute Merata Mita Fellow and has consulted for Pixar, Ubisoft, and Quibi.
Lacy’s latest work is a departure from long form feature films. The Queen’s Flowers is an animated short based on a 1915 true story about Emma, a young girl who creates a special gift for Queen Liliʻuokalani. It intertwines elements of history, culture, and fantasy, providing audiences of all ages with a unique window into Hawaiʻi’s past.
“It’s a tribute to my heritage and a chance to reclaim and share a piece of our history with the world,” said Lacy. “Bringing Emma’s story to life through animation has allowed us to infuse the film with layers of meaning and cultural significance.”
The Queen’s Flowers has already received a number of awards at local, national and international film festivals. In October, it premiered locally at HIFF where it garnered the Best Short Award.
“I love that she finds these nuanced niche stories to tell which are all great on their own but even more powerful because it’s coming from someone who embraces the community and the world that she grew up in,” said Leonard. “I continually want to make things with and support her in everything she does.”
They joined forces as part of the film crew for the 2023 Netflix Documentary Is this Black Enough For You !?! which earned an Emmy nomination.
An upcoming film initiated by HIFF with Daniel Dae Kim on board to executive produce will be created and co-directed by eight native Hawaiian filmmakers. Lacy is one of them.
She has partnered with many kānaka filmmakers in dozens of projects and is quick to praise the undeniable rise of Kānaka Maoli films and its storytelling.
“Hawaiians are very good at showing up to support each other in times of need,” said Lacy. “I’ve seen it time and time again and I’d like to think our filmmaking community exists with that same mentality. What are the stories we can tell that will help us address and heal our pressure points as a community. How can it help us all rise together?”
