Photography by Justine Stevens
Up and coming actor and filmmaker Erin Carter stars in the award-winning indie feature dramedy Suck It Up set to make its festival rounds this Fall 2017 starting with the 2017 Atlantic Film Festival taking place on September 17th , 2017 at Cinepelex Cinemas Park Lane Theatre 5 (5657 Spring Garden Rd) in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The screening will begin at 6:15 PM followed by a Q&A. Watch the trailer below.
[su_youtube url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgLrKccvAi4″]
Suck It Up follows the story of two best friends, Ronnie (Grace Glowicki) and Faye (Erin Carter), who take off on an adventure in hopes of getting over the death of the man they both loved. When Ronnie’s brother- and Faye’s first love – Garrett, dies of cancer, both girls must redefine their lives without him. For Ronnie, this means an epic drinking spree. For Faye, this means taking care of Ronnie. When Ronnie’s bender hits Olympic proportions, Faye realizes she needs to get her friend out of this Garrett-tainted environment. Here begins their summer getaway, and what Faye hopes will be a fresh start, at the family’s lakeside cabin in Invermere, BC. Their small-town debauchery with the local townies proves to be a nice distraction until they run into the sublime Alex, an old friend of Garrett’s with a secret from his past, and both Faye and Ronnie are forced to face their loss and re-examine their friendship.
Suck It Up is written by Julia Hoff and directed by Jordan Canning (This Hour Has 22 Minutes). The film was an official selection at the 2017 Slamdance Film Festival and received a Women In The Director’s Chair (WIDC) feature film award. Coming up, Suck It Up will be screening at Cinefest Sudbury, the 2017 Calgary Film Festival, the 2017 Vancouver Film Festival and the 2017 St. John’s International Women’s Film Festival.
Born in Edmonton and raised in Calgary, Alberta, Erin Carter found her passion for the performing arts at a very young age. Growing up, Erin was always part of the theatre productions in middle school and always had an interest in film. It wasn’t until high school that she really looked to acting as a career choice. From there, she decided to enroll and become a student at The American Academy of Dramatic Arts in Los Angeles, California, a two-year performing arts conservatory aimed at training students to become professional working actors in theatre, film and television. Notable alumni of the academy include Jessica Chastain, Anne Hathaway, Paul Rudd and Robert Redford, among others.
Erin is also a graduate of the Canadian Film Centre’s prestigious Actors Conservatory which offers actors a transformative artistic experience that strengthens the performer’s instrument for the screen and builds a professional skill set. Applicants are nominated by an agent, casting director, director, producer, artistic director, acting teacher, writer, playwright, broadcast or production executive. Additionally, Erin studied comedy at The Upright Citizens Brigade, an improvisational and sketch comedy group that emerged from Chicago’s ImprovOlympic in 1990. Her credits include CBC’s Murdoch Mysteries and several short films including Setup, Punch
(Tribeca Film Festival), Fox Trouble, and Bonfire (LA Shorts Fest), which she wrote, produced and starred in.
Outside of acting Erin Carter continues to fuel her love for writing, yoga, camping and 35mm photography.
Hi, Erin! We are excited for your indie film “Suck It Up.” It’s making the festival rounds. That’s exciting. How’s it being received, thus far?
The reception has been so overwhelmingly wonderful. We premiered in January to a very enthusiastic crowd at Slamdance and had such lovely press that followed. It’s a really supportive and intimate festival, and it was amazing to have so many peers and audience members alike give such beautiful feedback. Especially because our film was such a passion project, it was great to premiere at a festival that appreciates ‘the making of’, so to speak. The tone of the film is quite interesting, in that we really ride that line between comedy and drama, and I think that makes for a really different experience with each screening. Some audiences laughed throughout most of the film, and some were very dropped into the weight of the story. Neither experience is more valid than the other, I just love that the film can be ingested so differently. We had some really great reviews coming out of Slamdance, and I’m so excited for Canada to see it!
What inspired the film?
It was such a collaborative experience making this film, so we had many different kinds of inspiration coming from each person involved. Initially, my co-star Grace Glowicki and I were noticing a really large gap in the projects we saw coming our way. The roles we were auditioning for and the scripts we were seeing were mostly lacking the female characters we craved. Our initial inspirations came from this desire. The desire to play more multi-dimensional and complicated women, roles we didn’t see come our way all that often.
Of course, moving this very vague idea into a fleshed out the script was the genius of our writer Julia Hoff. She had her own inspirations to write something both funny and deep in meaning, and of course, she was really excited about it being such a female driven project. We had spoken early on about the lack of specifically female driven comedy out there, and so many of our favorite movies fell under this blurred line between genres. We had all been inspired tonally by movies like Your Sister’s Sister and Obvious Child.
When Jordan Canning came on to direct in the early stages of redrafts she had her own experience and inspiration to fold in, she really helped hone in on the truth of Ronnie and Faye’s story. Ultimately we were all inspired to tell a story about grief and what it means to move through those feelings.
I will also say that Invermere, our fabulous location, and my childhood summer hot spot (oh, yes), was also very much an inspiration from the beginning. When Grace and I pitched the possibility of writing a movie to Julia we wrote out a list of places in Invermere that we thought would be spectacular locations. Admittedly most of them made the cut! Everything from the bowling alley to the candy store. Invermere gave a lot to our film, and I truly believe it would not have been the same anywhere else. That gorgeous and intimate small town feel can’t be replicated.
What should the audience expect?
I’d like to think the audience can expect tons of laughs and probably a few tears. Yes, the movie is about grief and loss, but ultimately it’s a story about friendship and I think there is a lot of fun in the time Ronnie and Faye spend together. Despite everything they are going through, they can’t deny the wild and wacky things Invermere, BC, tosses their way.
We sense a moral to this story. What would you say it is?
We had spoken early on about grieving and about shedding light on the fact that everyone grieves differently. We wanted to show two characters grieving the same loss in two very different ways, but what became really prevalent over time was Ronnie and Faye’s lack of communication. So often we see films with these shining friendships, friends coming to our rescue, and of course that exists, but we wanted to show a very realistic experience of two friends who can’t seem to see eye to eye through the haze of their feelings.
I’m not sure I’d call it a moral, I would say more of a contemplation of grief and how it factors into friendship. I think it’s a really common thing to struggle with communication. We wanted to talk about how hard it is to convey those feelings, and how hard it can be to ask for help. Sometimes things aren’t cut and dry, sometimes it’s really difficult to be there for the people we love, and it’s equally as hard to ask them for support in return.
When can people watch the film?
We have an exciting fall festival run coming up, starting with our Canadian premiere in Halifax at the Atlantic Film Festival, but if you’re not around for any of those Suck It Up will be in select theatres mid-October!
Thank you for chatting with us about Suck It Up. Is there anything else you would like to add that we didn’t cover?
Thank you so much for chatting with me. It was a true dream to see Suck It Up come to life, I’m so honored to have worked with such amazing artists on my first feature. I can’t wait for people to see it!
Connect with Erin:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ErinC007
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/erinmcarter/
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm5574410/
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