REALTIMERS: Sean Kelly, Senior Producer
Meet Sean Kelly, our Senior Producer, who spends quite a lot of his weekends and holidays travelling the country to conduct weddings for people! Piqued your interest? Thought so.
Name & job title:
Sean Kelly, Senior Producer
Where do you fit in?
I mean, very few places, frankly, but here I’m on the Games Team.
How did you get your start in the industry?
Honestly, I kinda fell into it sideways, I finished Uni doing Marketing and Management (don’t judge me) and joined a Grad Scheme for the Royal Bank of Scotland. I ended up doing a placement in their in-house film team – and fell in love with that. I worked my way up to Producer, then head of the team, before going out into the wide blue yonder. I worked in various agencies directing, writing, and producing live action stuff before that tiny worldwide pandemic hit, and I moved to Animation and VFX – and never looked back.
Your superpower?
I’m from the West of Scotland, so I can’t ever say anything positive about myself I’m afraid.
If I had to choose, I suppose it’s an unending ability to make jokes at even the worst of times…often especially at the worst of times.
What inspires you on the day-to-day?
It’s the really obvious answer, isn’t it? Working with really talented people who do some amazing stuff that I could never hope to in a million years. Working with them and learning as much as possible is constantly a source of amazement and inspiration for me.
My desert island film / TV show / animation / game /artform / piece of artwork is:
Grim Fandango. One of the first games I played on my absolute trash fire of a PC as a kid. Got me into the whole Lucasarts point n click – not to mention warped my sense of humour in general.
Something about the melding of Film Noir, Art Deco, and Mexican/Day of the Dead aesthetic and storyline just got me good. I had never played anything like it before. Even loved the remake that came out a few years back. And the music…. oh the music.
Your soundtrack whilst working:
Quite a lot of lo-fi video game soundtracks strangely enough. I’m a sucker for anything with big brassy stabs though, so anything with that I’m your huckleberry.
If you could work with anyone who?
I suppose since this is a work thing, I should be classy and aspirational and say someone like Billy Wilder or Mel Brooks.
But, meh why not if this is a fantasy – Indiana Jones. Fight me.
If not this, then what?
If not producing, I’d probably have darker hair…or still in Marketing and comms…shudder
Why REALTIME?
I have a powerful urge to pay my bills and eat.
But perhaps more than that, I really wanted to get more involved in gaming and away from TV and Film. REALTIME has a great range of projects they work on, and some genuinely lovely people to work with.
People would be surprised that…
I am a Legal Humanist Celebrant and spend quite a lot of my weekends and holidays travelling the country to conduct weddings for people and steal as many canapes on the way out as possible.
I can legally marry you or bury you. Nothing in-between
Advice you’d give yourself if you were just starting out?
Nothing is ever as good or as bad as you think.
Learn from the f**k-ups and move on. Enjoy the win’s but don’t get cocky kid.