The Moms
A film by Katie Goodman
Synopsis
5 Moms. 7 minutes. One Prius. And 432 opinions they will die for. Welcome to Moms night out.
This film is about parents, and the period of time in which we shouldn’t be allowed to communicate with others.
Parents have opinions. Opinions that they’re willing to lose friends over. Opinions they’re willing to hold life-long grudges with family members about. Opinions that they’re willing to shout at strangers in the baby aisle at Target.
This film is for the parents out there who know they are right. Because being right is really what this is all about.
Directed by Katie Goodman. Written by Soren Kisiel. Director of Photography, Sam Henriques. Starring Tana Sirois, Aubrey Taylor, Katie Goodman, Danielle Cohn and Molly Kelleher.
Director Statement
We thought we had opinions before we became parents. Political opinions; ethical opinions; stylistic opinions. Opinions that we would share, and debate. (Soren has the opinion that leftover pizza with peanut butter makes a great breakfast, and Katie, well, does not.)
But it was only after Katie got pregnant that we really understood. What had previously seemed like simple matters of preference suddenly became life-or-death. Natural childbirth, or epidurals? Breastmilk only, or supplemental formula? Sleep-training, or co-sleeping? Slings, or strollers?... Our opinions were affecting the actual future of an actual human being, who that human would become — they were suddenly the weightiest opinions we would ever have. Anyone with opposing opinions was cruel, or reckless, or just plain stupid.
On top of that, whichever opinions we happened to have required a lot of work. As the character Rachel says in the film, “When one has put a lot of effort into something, like if we let our baby learn to go to sleep by crying it out, or conversely if we spend endless sleepless nights cuddling our babies to sleep, either way we’ve really suffered through something. And so it can feel really important to us that we were right about our decision. Or we feel like we wasted our time suffering, you know?”
And then, once our child was two or three years old, we never thought of those particular opinions again. We could reenter society as reasonable people.
Katie Goodman - Director / “Liz”
Katie Goodman, along with her husband Soren Kisiel (author of The Karens), are the co-authors and co-directors of Broad Comedy, an internationally touring, award-winning, all-women sketch comedy and political satire troupe headlined by Katie, which has garnered millions of views online, run Off-Broadway, been showcased at Caroline’s Comedy Club in Times Square, won the Pick-of-the-Fringe Award at the Vancouver Fringe Festival, and was listed as one of the top ten sketch troupes at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland. Broad Comedy has been touring the USA for the last 20 years, and has raised over $2,000,000 for progressive feminist causes through their comedy shows. Katie has been seen on Showtime’s The Green Room With Paul Provenza, and Impractical Jokers (and yes, she was in on the joke). Katie and Soren were nominated for the White House Project’s Emerging Artists Award, and for the MacArthur Foundation's Fellowship for their unique work in theater. www.katiegoodman.com
Cinematographer - Sam Henriques
Two time Emmy award winner Sam Henriques is now in production on a feature Documentary about the elusive conceptual artist Dave Hammons. His recent credits include Hate Thy Neighbor: Hunting the White Devil / Viceland, Mouth Full of Shame: Jim Norton / Netflix, Indiana Joe’s / A&E, Failosophy / MTV and Armageddon 101 / Nat Geo. His short film about inventor Dean Kamen; Sling Shot premiered at and won third place at Sundance Film Festival in the Focus Forward: Short Films Big Ideas series. The feature length version of Sling Shot can now be seen on Netflix. Sam’s recent documentary works include: The Good Soldier, which won him an Emmy as Producer, Portrait of Wally, Burning the Future, Good People Go To Hell, Nursery University,The Klezmatics, A Cantor’s Tale, and My Architect. Henriques is best known for shooting Academy Award nominee Angola; The Farm, Produced and Directed by Jonathan Stack and Liz Garbus, about inmates at the notorious Angola State Penitentiary for which he won a Primetime Emmy for non-fiction Cinematography. www.samhenriques.com
Writer - Soren Kisiel
Soren is the co-author/director of Broad Comedy, an internationally-touring all-women sketch comedy and musical satire troupe written with his wife comedian Katie Goodman, named a Time Out New York Critics’ Pick for their Off-Broadway run at New York City's SoHo Playhouse. He is the librettist of an original, non-Japan-based adaptation of Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Mikado which London’s Opera Now magazine called “ingenuously written and hilariously funny,” and the children’s books The Night Our Parents Went Out and Once Upon a Tree. Soren has a second-degree blackbelt in taekwondo, and is ordained in the Plum Village Zen Buddhist tradition, which means he could kick your butt if he wasn’t so darned peaceful. www.sorenkisiel.com
“Ella” - Aubrey Lace Taylor
Aubrey Lace Taylor is a performance artist with a background in comedy, physical theatre, and vocal performance. After completing training at Circle in the Square Conservatory, she worked in Children's Theatre writing, directing, touring, and performing at New World Stages. Other accomplishments include performing over 1,100 shows in Off-Broadway's hit Drunk Shakespeare, securing 1st place in Seattle's August Wilson Workshop/Monologue Competition, and being cast in Stanford University's studio performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream as Hermia. When Aubrey is not working in theatre, she enjoys shooting photography and working behind the scenes in film/tv productions such as Showtime's Three Women, Somewhere in Queens, and HBO's The Other Two.
“Trina” - Tana Sirois
Tana Sirois trained at The Liverpool Institute For Performing Arts. Film credits include Alexis (Blue Bloods), Katie (For Hope), and Elise (Whisper). NYC theatre credits: the title role in Fernando Arrabal's Garden Of Delights, Alice in Painted Alice, Nina in Stupid Fucking Bird, Tracy in Seascape With Sharks And Dancer, Judy in Easy Laughter, and a screwed up version of herself in Crushing Baby Animals which she co-wrote in 2019. Her devised two-hander movement theatre piece My Favorite Person ran at HERE Arts, and at The Istanbul Fringe Festival. She is part of the international movement theatre collective, The How, Co-Founder of Culture Lab LIC, Artistic Director of Dirt [contained] Theatre Company, and a proud company member in the feminist, musical comedy troupe, Broad Comedy, which has played Off-Broadway at The SoHo Playhouse. www.tanasirois.com
“Amanda” - Molly Kelleher
Molly Kelleher's acting and writing work has brought her to stages off-broadway, to create content for multiple organizations (teenVOGUE and Forward Montana), and to produce short films and webseries. Additionally, she owns a yoga/Pilates/fitness company, Bumble+Flow. mollykelleher.com Socials: @mollyakelleher
“Rachel”- Danielle Cohn
Danielle Cohn is currently in the Off-Broadway hit comedy Drunk Shakespeare, in which she has done over 600 performances. She is also a proud Broad of over 8 years, board member for Fat Knight Theatre, and most recently director/composer for playwright Charlotte Ahlin's Plague Doctor (SheNYC Arts Festival winner: Best Production, Best Director; Honorable Mention Best Score). She holds a BFA in Acting from the University of Michigan (Go Blue!) and has UCB improv training. For more, visit daniellecohn.wixsite.com/actress/