Logline & Synopsis
A closeted Irish pop princess undergoes a darkly comic assault on the senses as she wrestles with a fiendish record label that'll stop at NOTHING to make her a star.
It's 1999, and Charity is a pop product, not a person. Her Swedish svengali Oskar and maniacal stylist Mikey Z control her every move, morphing her from a singer-songwriter into a "Y2K Pop Tart" with a bejewelled belly-button pager. But when a haunting vision of her ex-girlfriend Sarah appears, Charity's suppressed self finally rebels. As her own manufactured pop personas attack her in a hall of mirrors, Charity must fight to reclaim her Queer identity before their evil pop remix consumes her forever…
Logline & Synopsis
A closeted Irish pop princess undergoes a darkly comic assault on the senses as she wrestles with a fiendish record label that'll stop at NOTHING to make her a star.
It's 1999, and Charity is a pop product, not a person. Her Swedish svengali Oskar and maniacal stylist Mikey Z control her every move, morphing her from a singer-songwriter into a "Y2K Pop Tart" with a bejewelled belly-button pager. But when a haunting vision of her ex-girlfriend Sarah appears, Charity's suppressed self finally rebels. As her own manufactured pop personas attack her in a hall of mirrors, Charity must fight to reclaim her Queer identity before their evil pop remix consumes her forever…
About the Project
Short musical comedy | 15 mins | 2025
Starring Niamh McCormack (Screen's Rising Stars Ireland 2025), CHARITY! is a subversive LGBTQIA+ musical comedy short brimming with high-camp humour, body horror, and iconic Y2K styling. With an evil boyband and an original soundtrack of pop bangers, it's an eye-popping satire on the factory of fame - and the fierce fight to own your own voice.
CHARITY! made the finals of The Pitch Film Fund before being selected in 2023 for BFI NETWORK Short Film funding; one of only 37 projects funded out of 1,116 submissions that year. Filmed in 2024, CHARITY! made its debut at a BFI screening in February 2026, and will begin its festival run this year at GAZE International LGBTQIA Film Festival in Dublin. Written and directed by Stephen T Lally, produced by Cian O'Leary, and supported by the BFI.
The Creative
“I fell in love with Y2K pop as a kid (the divas, the music videos, the merch!) but never knew what was really going on behind the sparkly curtain. And let's face it, misogyny and exploitation were as much a part of that era as hip huggers and Max Martin. That cavernous contrast - between the pop fantasy projected on screen and the grotesque reality behind it - is the murky place where this short film lives. Think The Substance meets Josie and the Pussycats on the set of a Billie Piper music video, with a dash of David Cronenberg and a whole heap of body glitter..!
CHARITY! was built on a small budget but with outsized ambition; stop-motion puppetry filmed in my garage, merch designed with my Dad in my kitchen, and even my puppy Mokey playing Charity's dog. It’s a DIY love letter to all the female pop icons who raised me, as well as a critique of the machine that built them. It’s also a rallying cry for anyone who's ever felt their identity being written for them.
With poptastic bangers and maximalist Y2K visuals (fisheye lenses, plasticky textures, and a belly-button piercing turned Cronenbergian weapon), this short film is flashy and trashy in equal measure. It’s wild, unflinching and packed with earworms! But beneath the comedy, CHARITY! is about being your fully authentic self - even if it means taking on an evil record label to do it.”
For more information or to request a screener: stephen@stephentlally.com