Small towns, big laughs: Stuart Armstrong on queer life, dark comedy, and making films his own way.
Our Young Programmers had the chance to sit down with Stuart Armstrong, a screenwriter and director from Cumbria whose work blends dark comedy with heartfelt storytelling. In this interview, he talks about his creative influences, the challenges of making films far from industry hubs, and what it means to tell stories rooted in his own experiences and community.
Stuart Armstrong is a screenwriter and director from Cumbria, UK. His recent work includes queer Film Hub North and BFI NETWORK comedy short Meat Raffle (2025), multi award-winning micro short Lay-by (2024) and BIFA long-listed Beatles cult comedy short Paul Is Dead (2018). He’s now in development on his debut feature.
Meat Raffle had its world premiere at Bolton Film Festival this month and has been selected for Best British Short at Iris Prize LGBTQ+ Film Festival, meaning the film will be broadcast and available to stream on Channel 4 later this year.
Where did your inspiration for this story come from? And who/what are your biggest influences in film?
Meat Raffle came out of my own experiences growing up queer in rural Cumbria. It’s very much a world of emotional repression and ‘discreet’ Grindr profiles up here. I wanted to capture the mix of bleak humour and tenderness you get when families can’t say what they mean, so they deflect with jokes or awkward, weird behaviour. I also wanted to write a contained farce set in a pub and thought an exasperated bloke trying to fix a meat raffle would be a funny, visual story device.
Influence-wise, I love black comedies that walk the line between the grotesque and the heartfelt – like Withnail & I, The League of Gentlemen, and Rita, Sue & Bob Too - but I also wanted to capture that rural queerness in a sincere way, like God’s Own Country or My Summer of Love do so well.
What have been some of the challenges you've faced in trying to produce your films and share them with audiences?
Honestly, geography is a big one. Being based in Carlisle/Cumbria, there isn’t really any industry infrastructure here, so you’re always having to convince people it’s possible.
Getting crew to travel up, finding resources, persuading people it’s worth it – that’s half the battle. Y’know, Glasgow is 80 miles north, Manchester is 120 miles south – there aren’t many film folk about!
But the flipside is that local people were so generous. It felt like the whole community chipped in. And that’s not to mention the chance Film Hub North took on me and the team by funding Meat Raffle and giving us the chance to make it here.
As an independent filmmaker is there anything you feel could be changed about the industry?
So many things! In terms of public funding, BFI and Film4 do a great job with the limited cash they’ve got, but it feels like everyone’s fighting tooth and nail for the same tiny suitcase of cash right now. There’s just not enough to go around.
The reality is that there’s no way to make writing, directing or producing a viable job unless you’ve already got decent, successful work behind you – but getting to that point is chicken and egg. You’ve still got to work and pay the bills. I know people who’ve directed one or two feature films and are still stuck in office or bar jobs they’d rather not be in. I’m there myself, and it’s exhausting trying to find the time or headspace to write or pitch or network when you’re burnt out – especially if you don’t live in one of the industry centres.
So basically, if you don’t come from money, you’re at a huge disadvantage. That’s always been the case, but what we need is more support at a grassroots level, especially in project development, so people don’t give up before they’ve even begun. Even quick-fire grants of a couple of grand could make all the difference – just to let a writer take a month off to focus, or give a producer or director time to package a project properly.
I think as indie filmmakers we also have to start thinking outside the box about how films are developed and financed. More and more people are pulling together microbudget features now, and in some ways that feels like where the industry is heading.
In what way do you think Meat Raffle reflects you as both a filmmaker and an individual, if at all?
It’s probably the most personal thing I’ve made. Rich, the protagonist, is a mash-up of relatives and old gadgies from pubs I’ve drank or worked in.
He’s ashamed of his sexuality and is scared of passing his ‘curse’ onto his son, but instead of just having a chat about it, he decides the best thing to do is to try and convince his secret lover – the local butcher – to fiddle the local Christmas turkey raffle to prove he’s a real man.
Now, as you can imagine, this is far from an autobiographical story, but I hope echoes people I know and the world I’m from. I suppose Meat Raffle is a tragicomic tale and I hope I’ve struck a decent balance between humour and bleakness, and that the film has an emotional undercurrent that sneaks up on you.
What do you hope audiences take away after watching this film?
I hope they find it funny, first of all. Please God let the film get laughs. But then I hope they feel a lump in their throat they maybe weren’t expecting.
I hope audiences from small towns feel seen, queer or not, and that people recognise their own dads, uncles and neighbours in Rich. I’d love it if people left talking about how they can better communicate with their family members and talk about difficult issues – Lord knows that’s something we’re all going to have to learn to do as 2029 looms.
What’s next for this project and you as a filmmaker?
Meat Raffle is just starting its festival run – Bolton International Film Festival is our world premiere on 1st October, then we’re off to Iris Prize on the 17th, where we’re up for Best British Short, which makes the film BAFTA-qualifying. Thanks to that nomination, it’ll also be broadcast on Film4 and Channel 4 in November, where it’ll be available to stream for a year.
For me, I’ve just accepted an offer of representation from my new agent, which is very exciting and we hope to announce properly soon.
I’ve got a few feature film projects in development as a writer, and I’m also developing my first feature as a writer-director – a psychosexual queer thriller set about rural hookup culture and the second homes crisis here in Cumbria.
I’m also gunning for TV, music promo and commercial work, which with any luck will carry through-lines of my style: funny, dark, character-driven stories rooted in overlooked places.
