The Strawberry Jam

“The Strawberry Jam” is a love letter to moms everywhere. It tells the story of Mrs. Doodle, a mom who, like many moms, is consumed with asking after what everyone else wants and never stops to ask what she herself might want. I hope that this story, which witnesses a small victory for Mrs. Doodle, expresses gratitude for the sacrifices that so many women make, and that it reminds all of us, of any gender, that it is those small victories which often mean the most.

Our film was an exercise in visual storytelling. Thanks to extensive production design, carefully placed inserts, and a vocal original score, we were able to tell this 17-minute story with almost no dialogue—and the first half with no dialogue at all.

It was also an exercise in subjective storytelling and in pushing the bounds of theatricality on screen. The film’s art direction takes us inside Mrs. Doodle’s perspective, an organized, straight-line world that insists on finding beauty in objects as mundane as a kitchen pantry, and a world beset with temptation (cookies! cinnamon buns!) and a gauntlet of critical choices like which peanut butter to buy (“The Kind on Sale” or “The Expensive Kind”?).

Our team is especially proud to bring this female-centric story to life as an all-female production team, with women or non-binary individuals also filling the roles of writer, director, editor, composer, production designer, art director, illustrator, colorist, and costume designer. We are also proud that a large number of our team are people of color, and that our team includes a range of individuals diverse across gender, racial and socio-economic boundaries.