SMOG

Stellan could be flying a private jet of questionable ownership for his latest sales trip, but instead he’s just another passenger squeezed into a commercial flight. The possibility of the FAA discovering his forged credentials forced him into an early retirement. He could be watching outdoor movies at Hollywood Forever Cemetery with his two sisters, but after witnessing the death of his disturbed friend, both of them fled Tinseltown to nurse their film career and bullet wounds respectively. L.A. was supposed to be more fun. 

 

Stellan left Texas to escape the shadow of his abusive father and forget the death of his mother, and he wanted to do it in the sunshine. Instead, he spends most of his time shielding his actress sister Juliet’s fragile ego, and keeping his adopted sister Nix distracted long enough to forget the life of child prostitution that he rescued her from. There’s also the matter of the one-for-one shoe start up that he co-owns with Jude, a brooding author with a past that threatens the hazy artifice Stellan has constructed around himself. 

 

Told from the POVs of Stellan and the four most important people in his life, SMOG is a satirical, pre #metoo time capsule that’s kinder and gentler than LESS THAN ZERO, but never warm or fuzzy. Obama is still in office and the world has not yet experienced the onslaught of "bae," the man bun and the incessant misuse of “literally.” It’s a tale of white saviors, unaddressed mental health issues, childhood trauma, and apathy in Hollywood. This is a story not just of tan, homegrown hipsters, but of transplants with baggage struggling to be simultaneously carefree and purposeful. 

 

 

TRIGGER WARNING: depression, anxiety, child abuse, spousal abuse, sexual assault, sex-trafficking of minors, racism, workplace abuse, cancer, death, suicidal ideation, violence.