Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/911416
While on location in Miami, Burke began working with the Miami Rescue Mission. In the weeks while the film was on hold, the kids there told her about an upcoming Christmas pageant. "Well, I make costumes..." she thought. So she volunteered to make their costumes. Working on her dining room table, she personally sewed and constructed costumes to measure for every kid in the company. More recently, Burke has seen a need to be more proac- tive. While doing a job in Atlanta, she worked with stitchers who were Syrian refugees and became involved in the non- profit in that city that assisted them. When the administra- tor of that organization asked her to look in on a group of refugees in California, Burke agreed. "So, I went to see them and they had nothing. No lamps. No beds. 'Where are the non-profits?' I asked myself. 'Where are the people who are supposed to help?' There was nobody there. So, that's the moment when I had to double down on all of this and say, 'I can help you' and 'here we go.'" She started making lists of things that people would need when they arrived and to get on their feet. That shopping list became the basis for Second Families, a non-profit that now serves dozens of refugee fami- lies in the El Cajon area of San Diego. Stepping up that community effort paralleled a shift in her own career as a storyteller. Directing had been her goal since she started making short films in high school. When Burke happened across Warner Bros. Emerging Film Directors Workshop, she sent in a screenplay and short. "I shot it on my ipad in my house with the neighbor kids, my dog, and my dogwalker. Ivy Thaide was a grip. But I didn't tell anybody what it was for. When I finally heard that I got in, I cried for five hours." Burke found the transition from Costume Design to director's chair a smooth one, because the skill sets parallel and even overlap. As a Costume Designer, she knew how to speak with actors and talk about their performance, which is something that few other departments experience. "We create that character with them in the fitting room, so those discussions are very easy for someone who has done that for twenty-five years, and you get great performances because of it." With the proceeds of the Warner Bros. workshop, she wrote and directed Urban Myth: Nest, which premiered in July. Burke is becoming one of the growing number of women in the director's chair. "We're at a point now where things are possible for women that were not before. People want women to direct movies and television shows. They want the point of view. They realize that there is tremendous value in a diverse storytelling point of view, so I'm very happy, very honored, to be part of that change."