Opprobrium is the story of a Woman in a losing battle with a Monster. The Monster moves with her. The Monster embodies her. The Monster stares, decides, accompanies, rejects, sabotages... In our film the Woman goes on a date after meeting a Man online. She has a wonderful time and he texts her for a second date. Why can't she reply? As she stares at her own reflection we see the Monster for who It truly is... will she fight back? Or will her prison be complete?

Laura Mae Stacey (Writer, Executive Producer, "Woman") - Laura is a 48-year-old actor, writer, director, producer, real estate agent, mother of three boys, and wife. Most of her work involves horror/thriller short films. Current work: Crispy (Amazon Prime), Death Returns, and Another Relationship (YouTube, Corpening Media). IMDb

Missy Bell (Director) - Missy is the award winning director of current festival circuit shorts: The Woodsman, Canary, Ink, and The Library at the End of the Universe. She has been directing and coaching actors on the stage and screen for over 22 years. Her short film, Sink, is currently available on ReelHouse. IMDb

Michael Bell (Producer, Director of Photography, Editor) - Michael came into filmmaking from a combined background in theatrical lighting and photography. Passionate about stories and beautiful images, he takes on almost any role needed to get a story he is passionate about into the world. Credits include: The Library at the End of the Universe, Ink, Death Returns, The Woodsman, and Canary. IMDb

Neil Lee Griffin (Original Score) - Neil is making waves in the music world with a multitude of scoring credits under his belt including: The Nest (Suttle Films) and Three Quarters, for which he won the award for best score at the Austin International Art Festival and best composer at Accord Cine Fest. IMDb

Ava Tennis (1st Assitant Director) - Ava is a filmmaker based in Winston-Salem as she finishes up her senior year at UNC School of the Arts, concentrating in Producing. She has Produced, Production Managed, and 1st AD'd a broad range of films, and plans to move to LA after graduation to pursue a career in Creative Producing. 

Rohan Myers (Art Director) - Rohan is an artist, actor, and is interested in all the aspects of filmmaking. He got his start into film through the Actors Center of Asheville at age 10 for acting, and has been involved in filmmaking in NC ever since, both as an actor and in the art department. He has worked in the art department on The Nest, Here There Be Tygers, and To Sonny. IMDb

Ren Allen (Hair & Makeup) - Ren's work as a full-time make-up artist takes her to many interesting places with other creative humans. She has spent 21 years exploring the ways that this art form can transform people, not only for storytelling purposes, but for important events and celebrations. Credits include: Delta Spirit’s Music Video: What’s Done is Done and The Ebbing. IMDb

James Cuellar ("Man") - James makes his film debut in Opprobrium. A musician and still photographer, he is also Laura’s real life husband. He is excited to do any project that has to do with empowering communities who are currently oppressed and helping to make their voices heard.

Aaron Ybarra ("Bartender") - Aaron is actor, writer, and musician. He has appeared on Murder Comes to Town (Investigation Discovery) as well as Bones (20th Century Fox) and Crispy (Amazon Prime). This is his second project with director, Missy Bell, who guided him through his stage debut in Cafe le Monde. IMDb

The way our minds portray ourselves is subjective and sometimes dimly lit and distorted. With colors and lighting based in the Impressonist paintings of the turn of the 19th Century and shadow cut directly from Cubism, our filmmakers will be creating a piece of art that centers around depth, distortion, reflection, refraction, and a barrage of greens, violets, and blues.

Our shoot date is September 12th and we hope to have our final cut complete and headed to our composer by October 31st. We plan to release Opprobrium onto the festival circuit beginning in December, 2022. After it's done a year on the festival circuit, we'll be hosting a premiere event in Asheville, NC and then making it publicly available world-wide! See some of the great incentives to see how you can snag tickets for the event.

Women’s rights are under attack in this country. It is more important than ever for women of all age groups to ban together to lift one another up and to share our experiences and truths as widely as possible.

This film aims to shed an intimate and immersive light on the reality of aging and the plague of seeking our validation not from flesh and blood but from comments and likes.

How can you get involved? See your options below!

Follow our campaign here on Seed&Spark so you can stay updated on the latest happenings with Opprobrium. Even if you don’t do anything else, this helps us because Seed&Spark has tiered rewards based on how many followers we get; the more followers, the more products, services, and festival fee waivers we get.

Pledge to make a monetary contribution to our film. We get to keep our funds only when we have collected 80% of our goal. If we go beyond our goal, we'll spend it taking even better care of our cast and crew with nicer meals, and potentially even spreading filming over to a second day! There are lots of ways to pledge: you can pledge toward a wishlist item, pick an incentive to cash in on, or you can simply pledge whatever amount fits your budget. Even small donations make a difference! You can see our wishlist for the places we'll spend pledges, including Covid-19 PPE and testing to keep everyone on set safe.

Share our campaign with your networks. We don’t know enough people to make this work without you and your personal network, so take a moment to share the campaign with your social media circles, your email contacts, your neighbors over the fence, or anyone else you can think of. We simply cannot do this without you!

Join our team to help make this project a reality. We have a few crew and acting positions still open!

Have writer’s block? Just copy and paste the paragraph below, or use it as inspiration.

I am so inspired by the team at “Opprobrium”, a short film looking for funding on Seed and Spark. The film is about beauty and womanhood and seeking validation from people instead of likes. It would be amazing if you joined up with me to help them reach there goal! Just click here to check it out! https://seedandspark.com/fund/opprobrium