All of Garden

All of Garden is a short film about a young woman who leads you through a first date with her to the Olive Garden. You go from your house, to her car, and finally to the Olive Garden itself, where the date begins to kaleidoscope around you and you become more and more uncertain of who exactly this woman is. With All of Garden I wanted to create a space outside of reality where I could play with the tropes and expectations of a first date narrative. Getting to know someone new can be such a thrilling experience, but it's also usually an incredibly anxious one, at least for me. For every moment of profound intimacy reached between two people, there are far more moments of insecurity or self-doubt. Do they really like me? Am I boring them? Are they only saying what they think I want to hear? First dates produce such a frenzy of nerves but put you in a situation where you’re meant to fulfill nebulous and contradictory social expectations. And part of those expectations is to outwardly deny those fevered feelings. So, for All of Garden I wanted to create a character made up of incompatible impulses that bubble forth, presenting themselves as a visceral emotionality. I hope that in watching this character a viewer feels encouraged to examine within themselves the contradictions and absurdities that inform their own insecurities and desires.