Biography

Margaret Milner Schmueck was born and grew up in Mayfield in Cork City. After graduating from UCC with a BSc Hons, she lived in London, working across several careers, which took her to live in South Korea, Germany and Australia. Margaret eventually turned her attention to film and media production and worked on independent films in a variety of roles. Margaret produces under the banner of Split Second Films, a company she co-founded in the East Midlands in the UK in 2005. She opened an Irish sister company and office in Cork City in 2024, where she has a home in Mayfield.

Margaret has produced several award-winning short films working with industry screen agencies Film London, EM-Media, UKFC and BFI: these have played at hundreds of film festivals worldwide. Her first commissioned film "Wheeling Dealing" in 2004 starred Jane Horrocks and related to the final piece of legislation being passed around disability rights in the UK, the film was funded by a bequest from the Estate of the late Louis Stanley, who was chairman and joint managing director of British Racing Motors. Margaret produced Peter Baynton's short animation "Over the Hill", funded by EM-Media and UKFC, which received Academy Awards consideration in 2009. She produced Alex Chandon's comedy/horror film "Inbred" (2012), on which she was the delegate producer, for which Arclight subsequently sold worldwide rights. Also through the 2010s, Margaret enjoyed a successful career in creative advertising as an Agile practitioner doing digital production management work for advertising agencies such as Publicis Chemistry, Tribal, and TAG and delivered a multi-gaming platform called "Connect Friends" linked to TV transmissions at the BBC for CBBC. In 2017, she took parental leave and in 2022 returned to work. In 2023, she produced Thom Petty's short film "Ticker", funded by the BFI, which was shot in the rural West Midlands UK on film, and streamed on Channel 4 for 12 months. The film won best short film awards in 2024 at Cork's Fastnet Film Festival and Drogheda Boyne Valley Film Festival and other prizes and accolades in film festivals, including runner-up in the Iris Prize.

Margaret is a graduate of the Film Business School in Ronda, Spain, a participant in the Berlinale Talent Campus, an alumnus of the UK's Clore Leadership Programme and a full BAFTA voting member.
- IMDb mini biography by: Margaret Milner Schmueck