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Dog Moms

"Dog Moms" is a coming of age story about a 30-year-old woman forging her own path forward, when her life doesn’t look like what she thought it would.

After Sasha’s chaotic dog ruins her younger sister’s baby shower, she finds solace in a long walk with another dog mom — prompting her to release her fears about the future in an unexpected way.

  • Jess Fee
    Director
    Transmissions from Inner Space (2022)
  • Jess Fee
    Writer
    Transmissions from Inner Space (2022)
  • Irene Ashu
    Producer
    Safe From Harm (2024), Two Parts Black, Origin (2024), S is For Story (2018)
  • George Fan
    Producer
  • Angela Giarratana
    Key Cast
    "Sasha"
    Smosh, Guts (Sundance, 2024), Pool Party (Outfest, 2023), Minx (2022)
  • Tatyana Komaguchi
    Key Cast
    "Jorja"
    A Cure for All Things (2020), They Won't Last (2019), Red Handed (2022)
  • Chad Damiani
    Key Cast
    "Harvey"
    Stand Up and Clown, Stamptown, Class Acts (webseries)
  • Andrea Guevara
    Key Cast
    "Melinda"
    Nova (2024), Revenge of the Abandoned Heiress (2024)
  • Holgie Forrester
    Key Cast
    "Grandma"
    The Young and the Restless (1973), As Evil Does (2018), Days of Our Lives (1965)
  • Dani Lyle
    Key Cast
    "Tiffany"
    Barely Adult (Sketch Show), Read the Room (2024), Chakras for Sale, The Ice Queen Society (2019)
  • Serena Koo
    Key Cast
    "Fiona"
    Twenty (2017), Making Malcolm (2019), Good Trouble (2019),
  • Project Type:
    Short, Television
  • Runtime:
    10 minutes 14 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    September 19, 2024
  • Production Budget:
    45,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United States
  • Country of Filming:
    United States
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    Arri Alexa Mini LF
  • Aspect Ratio:
    1.66
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Digital Cinema Package:
    Unavailable
Director Biography - Jess Fee

Jess is a director, writer, producer and performer.

Bay Area born and NYU educated, she now lives in Hollywood... which is much less glamorous than it sounds.

As a director, she's helmed projects for brands including Amazon, MLS, and Snapchat, and is known for creating stylish visual pieces infused with her signature sense of humor and curiosity. Her work has been featured on Booooooom.tv, Variance Magazine, Promonews and EarMilk. Her short film, "Transmissions from Inner Space" won Best Experimental Film at the Hollywood Reel Film Festival in 2022.

She is also active in the LA improv community, and is a member of the team Lake Fantasy, which is coached by improv-legend Craig Cackowski.

Her biggest pride and joy is her deeply opinionated terrier-poodle-mutt mix, Marley.

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Director Statement

"Dog Moms" is a project born out of a deep sense of community — both in the pet parent world, and in my local improv and filmmaking scene.

When I first moved to Los Angeles, I found it sprawling, isolating, and deeply lonely. Everything was a 20-minute drive away (at best), and people were constantly cancelling plans. I also noticed people seemed abnormally attached to their dogs. It wasn't until I adopted my deeply-opinionated terrier mutt-mix, Marley, that I understood why LA was such a dog town.

Walking my dog gave me a reason to meet my neighbors in a way that seemed unfathomable before. I struck up conversations with the elderly Ukrainian woman while Marley sniffed her small blind shitzu, Gladiator. She even offered to watch my dog while I was out of town. I made friends with the influencer who lives next door, who calls herself the "Poop Patrol" and films "gotcha" videos of people who refuse to pick up their dog's poop.

Ultimately, I see this short film as one story in a larger anthology of stories about a diverse community of Dog Moms, where the characters are loosely connected by their pets. The protagonist of one story becomes a passing character in another.

This specific story is about my experience as a newly single dog mom, who is sharing joint custody of her dog with her ex boyfriend of five-years, feeling like her life is stunted at age 30, while every other woman around her seems to be getting married and having kids.

It's also a story about my relationship with my own mom, and the ways in which I see my own chaos mirroring my fur-baby's. For better or for worse, she still cleans up after me when my feral side comes out, in a way that only mothers can do. And above all else, her love for me is unconditional.

The crew and cast of this film is made up almost entirely of people I've met in the LA improv community, which is something I started doing once the world opened back up after Covid. There's something magical about live-performance in a post-pandemic world, and in a film about community, I wanted to fill it with people who prioritize this kind of creative play together.