Hot Shots 2023: Will Hewitt

Will Hewitt made a splash with his work on BBC Scotland’s Sink Or Swim, a 2019 doc that followed two contestants in the World Stone Skimming Championships. The 30-minute film, which he shot, edited and co-directed for his indie Melt the Fly, scored a BBC1 primetime TX.

Continuing as a self-shooting, self-editing director, Hewitt bagged a Scottish Bafta for Harmonic Spectrum, a short commissioned by the Scottish Documentary Institute that showed how a pianist used his instrument to navigate life on the autistic spectrum. Hewitt himself is neurodivergent and attributes his love of visual storytelling partly to his dyslexia.

In 2022, he released his first feature doc as co-director and editor. The RTS Award-nominated Long Live My Happy Head follows an artist who makes comic books about his brain tumour. Exec producer Amy Hardie says the doc “establishes Will’s ability to bring a lightness of touch and a compulsive narrative even to difficult subjects”.

Hewitt is now focusing on creative documentary editing, having edited another Scottish Bafta winner, the 60-minute broadcast version of feature doc The Hermit Of Treig.

He’s on a placement with the Grierson/Netflix DocLab in Focus: Editing scheme, working as an assistant on a Rogan Productions Netflix doc about the Uefa Euro 2020 final.

“Will’s talent for structuring a story is clear,” says Hardie. “With his ability to tell a visual story, plus his attention to detail and focus, he will always be in demand as a creative collaborator.”