UT Student Creates On-Screen Conversations about Females and Addiction

By Abby Moore

As a 4-year-old watching the animated series “Little Bear,” Gretchen Lynch became angry with the lack of complex female characters. Her mother responded by challenging the feisty young girl to make a change. Now a junior at the University of Texas at Austin, Lynch has used the fire fueled by her mother to do just that.

Her production of the upcoming film, “Seahorse,” follows the story of a young mother struggling with heroin addiction. The neorealist drama encompasses a wide range of social issues including motherhood, addiction and immigration. Lynch is developing the film alongside director Rommel Eclarinal, co-writer, lead actress Natalie Houchins, producer Charles Mulford and fellow student and co-producer Cailen Hollins.

Mulford graduated from UT Austin with a degree in radio-television-film and went on to produce the movie, “Two Step,” which premiered at the Austin film and music festival, South by Southwest in 2014.

Two years later, Mulford was seeking associates for his latest project when he was introduced to Lynch and Hollins by the teaching assistant of their Producing Film and Television course.

“Like most producers, he had multiple projects on his radar and Seahorse stood out to me because of the complex issues it tackled,” Hollins said.

Both Lynch and Hollins were drawn to the film for its potential social impact and the opportunity to highlight a multidimensional female character.

The movie’s title comes from the idea that male seahorses carry and tend to their babies, rather than the mother — a concept that coincides with the theme of the movie, Lynch said. “While a young woman is struggling, suffering and trying to get her life together, it’s the men in the film who have to take on a maternal role.”

The main character in the film, Emily, is played by Natalie Houchins, who said her inspiration for the character was drawn from shows like “Breaking Bad” and “Mad Men.” Both series featured men who struggled and women who nurtured them.

“I got sick of that,” Houchins said. “I was really excited to write a movie where the woman behaves badly, and the men have to deal with it.”

Not only is the main character striving to overcome addiction, she is also learning how to be a mother. The inner workings of Emily’s conflicts are made visible through her fight to get clean, maintain sobriety and prove to her ex-partner that she is capable of having joint custody.

“You get to see Emily’s life, her fears and her aspirations, and you begin to understand her in a deeper, more sympathetic way,” Hollins said.

The intricacy of Emily’s character aims to disrupt the norm of female personalities that Lynch recognized in “Little Bear” years ago. Her childhood goal of changing conversations on-screen is materializing because of her ability to begin projects with the end in mind, according to UT radio-television-film professor Micah Barber.

“I imagine Gretchen is not just thinking about how to get it made,” Barber said, “She’s also thinking who is the audience for this, who’s going to respond to it, and what are some of the places that this project will be successful?”

Through the fundraising process, Lynch identified the breadth of her audience. “This story hits home with people that I never would have assumed were affected by this epidemic,” Lynch said. Several donations came from people who she said wanted to take part in telling that story.

After President Trump declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency in October, the Seahorse team recognized the film’s potential. Lynch said she believes it will spark discussion about a topic that is often kept behind closed doors.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website states that “Ninety-one Americans die every day from an opioid overdose.” Lynch and the rest of the crew aim to inform others about the drug crisis and hope to break the stigma surrounding addiction.

“This film doesn’t turn the addict into the villain,” Lynch said. “So many wonderful people have been affected by the disease of addiction, so we’re hoping to lift that curtain a little bit.”

The interweaving story of a flawed female character and the humanization of addiction was conceived by the marriage of each writer’s motivation. Houchins’s female focus was complimented by director and co-writer Eclarinal’s personal encounter with addiction.

Months after helping a loved one check into a rehabilitation center, Eclarinal “found her in front of a seedy motel with unsavory people,” Lynch said. After going through a period of frustration, he realized there was a bigger issue with opioids that people were not talking about.

Addiction affects both men and women, but the American Society of Addiction Medicine’s website reported that “heroin overdose deaths among women have tripled in the last few years.” Lynch is creating “Seahorse” to voice these legitimate female issues that are often ignored in film.

The impassioned young girl has turned her cartoon critiques into content creation, and said she hopes to continue putting out movies with more weight.

“This is not a film that’s going to make you feel great when you walk out,” Lynch said, “but it’s a story that has hope woven throughout, and I think that matters.”