Amanda Cawthorne (Jess), Randy Benge (Mr. Palmer), and Cole Simon (Bailey) in the Curtain Players 2008 staged reading of Separation Anxiety.
Separation Anxiety, the film, is based on a play of the same name by Jeremy Sony, which received a staged reading at the 2008 Curtain Players Theater playwrights festival. It was there that Jeremy met Cole Simon, who would play a key role in bringing the play from the stage to the screen through his film company, Glass City Films. Originally cast as an actor in the play, Cole would go on to become the film's director.
Before that happened, Jeremy partnered with Glass City Films to write and direct an investment trailer that Glass City Films used to raise funds for the movie. Cole stepped in to direct the feature film as Jeremy turned his focus to writing the screenplay, while producer John Klein began securing a cast and crew, including two-time Emmy Award winner John Wesley Shipp. Glass City Films shot Separation Anxiety in the fall of 2009 in Columbus and Toledo, Ohio, and it premiered in both cities in November 2010.
Both the stage play and film were born out of a need to grapple with loss. While the events in the story are fiction, the emotions that inspired them are real — exploring how people deal with an unexpected death when they can't be there for each other. While death is something we all experience during our lives, this film is ultimately about how we live, how we are remembered, and what we leave behind.
Behind the scenes on the set of Separation Anxiety.
Polly Adams and Tyler Seiple discuss a scene with director Cole Simon as the crew sets up a shot while filming in Toledo, Ohio.
