JESSICA SMITH writer | director

Jessica Smith is an ADG Award winning, multi-hyphenate filmmaker with 15 years of production experience on high-profile projects, including Scream 4, Shantaram, Better Man and The Clearing.

As a director's attachment she worked with Academy Award winner Peter Farrelly on Ricky Stanicky and trained at Neighbours, directing multiple episodes of the iconic Australian soap.

Her short film, The Test, enjoyed an award-winning run on the international festival circuit - premiering at Outfest Los Angeles before going on to screen at the likes of Frameline, Show Me Shorts, St Kilda Film Festival and Flickerfest - and now has over 750K views on YouTube. 

In 2024, Jess made her series debut with Videoland, which won Best Series in the Comedy Competition at Series Mania, earned a nomination for Best Online Drama or Comedy at the AACTA Awards, and was a finalist at the C21 International Drama Awards. Jess was recognised with an Australian Director’s Guild Award for her work as the show’s sole director. Acquired by Netflix ANZ, Videoland premiered in the Top 10 Most Watched TV Shows in both Australia and New Zealand. The series - praised by TV Tonight as “a promising start to an emerging screen career” - established Jess as a bold new voice in Australian storytelling. She is currently developing her next project, the romantic comedy Hardly A Wallflower, as part of the SBS Digital Originals initiative.

A passionate advocate for inclusion and diversity on screen, Jess is committed to creating engaging and relatable stories centring historically underrepresented characters.