Annette Haywood-Carter

Annette is a passionate storyteller with a strong creative voice and is a true visual storyteller. Her short, The Foot Shooting Party (Leonardo DiCaprio, Katzenberg / Touchstone) launched her directing career. Her 2023 feature, Daughter of the Bride (Marcia Gay Harden, Aidan Quinn / MarVista) opened theatrically in five cities before a FOX Broadcast exclusive and streamer release.Many credit Annette with discovering Angelina Jolie on her feature debut, Foxfire. Steven Spielberg hired her for her first TV episode, SeaQuest. She has a remarkable track record for casting A-list actors in her films including Julie Harris, Ron Silver, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Sam Shepard and (with an early career in camera) delivering beautifully crafted films.In addition to directing four movies, two TV episodes and a 30-min short, Annette shadowed directors on The Rookie (Tara Miele) and Homeland (Alex Graves, Lesli Linka Glatter). She is a produced screenwriter and script doctor; student of acting coach, Joan Darling; and script supervisor on 24 movies for A-list directors (Bruce Beresford, Hector Babenco, Renny Harlin) and producers (Saul Zaentz, Richard Zanuck, Joel Silver).She was selected for the DGA WSC - SQUAD (inaugural group) and mentored a first-time director on a short film selected for the 2026 American Pavilion Emerging Filmmaker Showcase at Cannes.Annette is the writer-producer-director on a transgender family film starring trans-actor Hari Nef with Best Picture Oscar winner Bruce Cohen (American Beauty) the Consulting Producer.Member of DGA and WGA since 1994. Former member of IATSE. Represented by attorney Jackie Eckhouse at Sloss, Eckhouse, Dasti, Haynes LawCo, New York.Annette has a reputation for getting the best performances from actors, seasoned and novice, and bringing the very best out of devoted crew.