BABY GAY
Los Angeles, California | Film Short
Comedy, LGBTQ
SEX EDUCATION meets RAMY in this slice-of-life comedy following a naïve, type-A Chinese-American baby gay as she chases queer validation in all the wrong places. Proof-of-concept for a half-hour dramedy series.
BABY GAY
Los Angeles, California | Film Short
Comedy, LGBTQ
1 Campaigns | California, United States
Green Light
This campaign raised $19,019 for production. Follow the filmmaker to receive future updates on this project.
147 supporters | followers
Enter the amount you would like to pledge
SEX EDUCATION meets RAMY in this slice-of-life comedy following a naïve, type-A Chinese-American baby gay as she chases queer validation in all the wrong places. Proof-of-concept for a half-hour dramedy series.
About The Project
- The Story
- Wishlist
- Updates
- The Team
- Community
Mission Statement
The Story
23-year-old Stevie has always yearned for a girlfriend. It's been six years since coming out to her family (her very Chinese, very immigrant parents and grandmother, whom she still lives with) and it still hasn't happened. Nothing has happened.
When she meets Dani, an impossibly hot, cool, aloof honest-to-goodness lesbian, Stevie decides that winning her over will be the key to finally feeling like a “real” queer person. In trying to prove herself, Stevie comes head-to-head with her own sexual incompetence in new and embarrassing ways–and finds queer community in the last place she ever expected: her family.
From the writer:
Whenever I show this script to someone, their first question is always "did this really happen to you?"
I won’t answer that question because I love having secrets. However, I will say that I’m intimately familiar with Stevie's struggle of simultaneously not feeling queer enough and having too much internalized homophobia to actually do the things that would validate her identity. Almost all of my femme bi friends have struggled with this push-pull. For people who've been socially conditioned as women, approaching other women and nonbinary people is uncharted territory. There are no social scripts, you have to build game from scratch, and after years of being unknowingly indoctrinated with predatory lesbian tropes, even starting a conversation can make you feel like a creep.
For how common these sentiments are, I’m surprised we haven't seen more of it on screen. We've seen characters bullied for being queer, we've seen them deal with rejection from their families after coming out, and we've seen them as confident players at the "end" of their coming out journey. These are all important stories. It is additionally important to depict non-traumatic queer love and queer joy.
I think it is ALSO important, and funny, to depict queer cringe, and that's what BABY GAY is about: a queer woman of color making an absolute fool of herself.
The lighting and coloring in BABY GAY will reflect the grounded, quiet chaos of Stevie’s self-inflicted predicament. Stevie is earnest, naive, and emotionally vulnerable–and so each frame should be warm and soft like a childhood home. Bold colors and patterns will jump out, hinting at her emotional uncertainty as she dips her toes outside of her comfort zone.
Warm, bold colors and soft lighting will visually represent Stevie’s relationship with her family and where she feels like her most authentic self. This look is inspired by the way James Sweeney's STRAIGHT UP (2019) uses warm colors and a homey atmosphere to illustrate its protagonists’ familiar relationship with each other. Cooler colors and sharp, dynamic patterns disrupt the compositional symmetry and create cracks in their facade of a stable couple.
But like Stevie’s sexual journey, her family home is not perfectly buttoned up. That’s not to say that it’s necessarily messy–but a Chinese family has lived there for twenty years. Faded photos and free calendars line the walls. There are books, decorations, and household objects that haven’t been put away in months, that have settled into new homes that defy logic. We’re inspired by the lived-in set styling of Alice Wu's THE HALF OF IT (2020).
Our heroine’s love life and related identity crisis are chaotic but ultimately harmless, and her clownishness will manifest itself on the screen through pops of color, patterns, and textures in wardrobe and furniture. We love the way the little-known Australian comedy series WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS (2018) uses color and patterns to reflect the energy of a raunchy group of friends getting into trouble. Though Stevie is on a deeply personal journey–and embarrassing herself along the way–there is still a joyous fun to trying things that scare her.
The title card design for BABY GAY was created by the wonderful Joycelyn Liu! We are so, so grateful for her work and involvement on this project. Check out her portfolio!
This short is an excerpt from an original pilot of the same name. The pilot script for BABY GAY advanced to the Second Round in the Comedy Teleplay Pilot category at Austin Film Fest 2022 and was selected as an Honorable Mention in the 2022 Diverse Writers Outreach at The Santa Barbara International Screenplay Awards.
BABY GAY will take 2 days to shoot. We have already secured locations and will begin to hire crew members as we raise funds. The bulk of our costs will come from paying cast and crew, renting camera and lighting equipment, and paying the post-production team (editing, mixing, coloring, etc.).
This will be a SAG signatory production. With this comes Pension and Health fringe costs for talent, as well as additional testing and safety measures to be COVID compliant, per union regulations. We will also be hiring an experienced intimacy coordinator.
If we make our fundraising goal and are able to shoot, we’ll have a 6-minute short! BABY GAY will then go out to festivals before being released online.
TIMELINE:
- Preproduction: October 2022 - January 2023
- Shoot: January 14 - 15, 2023
- Post-production: January - March 2023
FOLLOW
Follow our campaign on Seed&Spark and stay up-to-date on the BABY GAY latest! It’s absolutely free!
As we gain followers, Seed&Spark will reward us for building our audience on their platform with products, services, and festival fee waivers–all of which will be a huge help.
CONTRIBUTE AND PLEDGE
You can contribute to our film by pledging–either by choosing one of our incentives or making a pledge to one of our wishlist items. No amount is too small–every dollar makes a difference!
Our film qualifies for 501(c)(3) status and all contributions are tax-deductible! Our nonprofit status is sponsored by From the Heart Productions.
LOANS & DONATIONS
Can't make a monetary pledge but still want to support the film? Check out our wishlist for goods/services you can donate or loan! We'll offer credit and/or advertising.
Here are some items we would love help with:
- Craft services (snacks, coffee, bottled water)
- Catering
- Production assistants
- PPE
SPREAD THE WORD
This part is crucial! We will only reach our fundraising goal if we reach beyond our individual networks. You can make a HUGE difference in making our queer, AAPI film come to life with just a simple repost!
Here are some examples. Feel free to copy and paste! Share on social media, by word of mouth, on niche internet forums–however you want.
Help @melizardpeng and @ariellebgood make BABY GAY, a comedy following an all-theory-no-praxis bisexual woman who is continually thwarted by her own gay impostor syndrome. Learn more: www.seedandspark.com/fund/baby-gay
Want some more queer Asian Americans on your screen? Support BABY GAY, a heartfelt queer cringe comedy from @melizardpeng and @ariellebgood. Pledge to and share our @seedandspark campaign (www.seedandspark.com/fund/baby-gay) and follow us on Instagram @babygay_film!
Support queer Asian American filmmakers by pledging to the BABY GAY @SeedandSpark (www.seedandspark.com/fund/baby-gay). This unsexy sex comedy follows Stevie, a bisexual Chinese American woman who bluffs her way into a lesbian threesome in order to “prove” her queerness.
Wishlist
Use the WishList to Pledge cash and Loan items - or - Make a pledge by selecting an Incentive directly.
COVID supplies and testing
Costs $500
To keep our cast and crew safe and healthy.
Festival distribution
Costs $1,000
To cover entry fees when submitting to festivals.
Cash Pledge
Costs $0
Cast
Costs $1,814
To compensate the actors gracing our film for their hard work.
Crew labor
Costs $5,700
To compensate our incredible crew for their hard work.
Art supplies
Costs $800
To bring our sets to life with props, decor, and furnishings.
Gear rentals and insurance
Costs $5,000
To rent camera, lighting, and sound equipment.
Post production labor
Costs $2,500
To pay for editing, color correction, and sound design.
Hard drives
Costs $500
To store our footage.
Catering and craft services
Costs $1,200
To provide meals and snacks for cast and crew.
Direct link:
Share this update!
About This Team
Melissa Peng, writer and producer
Melissa is a comedy writer, performer, and producer from the Bay Area. She’s studied sketch and TV writing at UCLA, Upright Citizens Brigade, the Ruby LA, Writing Pad, and East West Players. Her comedy background has included writing and filming sketches with Sleepless, one of the Ruby LA's sketch teams, as well as performing improv with Lil Guy, a house team at the Pack theater. As a writer, she draws inspiration from the understated chaos of Nathan for You and the slice-of-life soul-searching of shows like Ramy and Insecure. She loves a scary movie and a spreadable cheese.
Arielle Frances Bagood, director
Arielle (she/they) is a director, writer, and performer raised half in New Jersey and half in North Carolina. She has happily called Los Angeles her home for the past decade since moving there after watching too much Glee. Arielle is an alumni of the UCLA Center for EthnoCommunications, and her documentary shorts "Lights Up: Asian American Theater at UCLA" and "hiya: Queer Filipino Americans and Mental Health" have been presented at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival 2019 and UCLA Asian American Studies 50th Anniversary Film Festival, respectively. Arielle is a proud dog mom to Lexa (iykyk). Florence Pugh and Jessica Henwick, I am free Thursday night if either of you want to hang out on Thursday night when I'm free.
Sam Shapiro, producer
Sam Shapiro is a Los Angeles based producer from Watchung, New Jersey. After studying Television, Radio, and Film at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Sam moved to sunny SoCal to pursue a career in film and television. He has worked a variety of production jobs on many levels ranging from independent film, music videos, commercials, and studio television, including For All Mankind Season 3 (Sony for Apple TV +) and Hacks Season 2 (NBC Universal for HBOMAX). When Sam is not working, he enjoys going to concerts, road tripping, good food and drink, and dog sitting for his friends.
Patrick Zhang, associate producer
Patrick is so excited to be associate producing BABY GAY! As a multidisciplinary artist himself, he is passionate about facilitating the creative process of others. A longtime fan of all things Melissa Peng and Arielle Bagood (and non-hegemonic voices in storytelling.... but mostly Melissa and Arielle), Patrick can't wait to bring their vision to life. Aside from producing films, Patrick also produces carbon dioxide, methane, and ammonia.
Current Team
Incentives
- The Story
- Wishlist
- Updates
- The Team
- Community
Mission Statement
The Story
23-year-old Stevie has always yearned for a girlfriend. It's been six years since coming out to her family (her very Chinese, very immigrant parents and grandmother, whom she still lives with) and it still hasn't happened. Nothing has happened.
When she meets Dani, an impossibly hot, cool, aloof honest-to-goodness lesbian, Stevie decides that winning her over will be the key to finally feeling like a “real” queer person. In trying to prove herself, Stevie comes head-to-head with her own sexual incompetence in new and embarrassing ways–and finds queer community in the last place she ever expected: her family.
From the writer:
Whenever I show this script to someone, their first question is always "did this really happen to you?"
I won’t answer that question because I love having secrets. However, I will say that I’m intimately familiar with Stevie's struggle of simultaneously not feeling queer enough and having too much internalized homophobia to actually do the things that would validate her identity. Almost all of my femme bi friends have struggled with this push-pull. For people who've been socially conditioned as women, approaching other women and nonbinary people is uncharted territory. There are no social scripts, you have to build game from scratch, and after years of being unknowingly indoctrinated with predatory lesbian tropes, even starting a conversation can make you feel like a creep.
For how common these sentiments are, I’m surprised we haven't seen more of it on screen. We've seen characters bullied for being queer, we've seen them deal with rejection from their families after coming out, and we've seen them as confident players at the "end" of their coming out journey. These are all important stories. It is additionally important to depict non-traumatic queer love and queer joy.
I think it is ALSO important, and funny, to depict queer cringe, and that's what BABY GAY is about: a queer woman of color making an absolute fool of herself.
The lighting and coloring in BABY GAY will reflect the grounded, quiet chaos of Stevie’s self-inflicted predicament. Stevie is earnest, naive, and emotionally vulnerable–and so each frame should be warm and soft like a childhood home. Bold colors and patterns will jump out, hinting at her emotional uncertainty as she dips her toes outside of her comfort zone.
Warm, bold colors and soft lighting will visually represent Stevie’s relationship with her family and where she feels like her most authentic self. This look is inspired by the way James Sweeney's STRAIGHT UP (2019) uses warm colors and a homey atmosphere to illustrate its protagonists’ familiar relationship with each other. Cooler colors and sharp, dynamic patterns disrupt the compositional symmetry and create cracks in their facade of a stable couple.
But like Stevie’s sexual journey, her family home is not perfectly buttoned up. That’s not to say that it’s necessarily messy–but a Chinese family has lived there for twenty years. Faded photos and free calendars line the walls. There are books, decorations, and household objects that haven’t been put away in months, that have settled into new homes that defy logic. We’re inspired by the lived-in set styling of Alice Wu's THE HALF OF IT (2020).
Our heroine’s love life and related identity crisis are chaotic but ultimately harmless, and her clownishness will manifest itself on the screen through pops of color, patterns, and textures in wardrobe and furniture. We love the way the little-known Australian comedy series WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS (2018) uses color and patterns to reflect the energy of a raunchy group of friends getting into trouble. Though Stevie is on a deeply personal journey–and embarrassing herself along the way–there is still a joyous fun to trying things that scare her.
The title card design for BABY GAY was created by the wonderful Joycelyn Liu! We are so, so grateful for her work and involvement on this project. Check out her portfolio!
This short is an excerpt from an original pilot of the same name. The pilot script for BABY GAY advanced to the Second Round in the Comedy Teleplay Pilot category at Austin Film Fest 2022 and was selected as an Honorable Mention in the 2022 Diverse Writers Outreach at The Santa Barbara International Screenplay Awards.
BABY GAY will take 2 days to shoot. We have already secured locations and will begin to hire crew members as we raise funds. The bulk of our costs will come from paying cast and crew, renting camera and lighting equipment, and paying the post-production team (editing, mixing, coloring, etc.).
This will be a SAG signatory production. With this comes Pension and Health fringe costs for talent, as well as additional testing and safety measures to be COVID compliant, per union regulations. We will also be hiring an experienced intimacy coordinator.
If we make our fundraising goal and are able to shoot, we’ll have a 6-minute short! BABY GAY will then go out to festivals before being released online.
TIMELINE:
- Preproduction: October 2022 - January 2023
- Shoot: January 14 - 15, 2023
- Post-production: January - March 2023
FOLLOW
Follow our campaign on Seed&Spark and stay up-to-date on the BABY GAY latest! It’s absolutely free!
As we gain followers, Seed&Spark will reward us for building our audience on their platform with products, services, and festival fee waivers–all of which will be a huge help.
CONTRIBUTE AND PLEDGE
You can contribute to our film by pledging–either by choosing one of our incentives or making a pledge to one of our wishlist items. No amount is too small–every dollar makes a difference!
Our film qualifies for 501(c)(3) status and all contributions are tax-deductible! Our nonprofit status is sponsored by From the Heart Productions.
LOANS & DONATIONS
Can't make a monetary pledge but still want to support the film? Check out our wishlist for goods/services you can donate or loan! We'll offer credit and/or advertising.
Here are some items we would love help with:
- Craft services (snacks, coffee, bottled water)
- Catering
- Production assistants
- PPE
SPREAD THE WORD
This part is crucial! We will only reach our fundraising goal if we reach beyond our individual networks. You can make a HUGE difference in making our queer, AAPI film come to life with just a simple repost!
Here are some examples. Feel free to copy and paste! Share on social media, by word of mouth, on niche internet forums–however you want.
Help @melizardpeng and @ariellebgood make BABY GAY, a comedy following an all-theory-no-praxis bisexual woman who is continually thwarted by her own gay impostor syndrome. Learn more: www.seedandspark.com/fund/baby-gay
Want some more queer Asian Americans on your screen? Support BABY GAY, a heartfelt queer cringe comedy from @melizardpeng and @ariellebgood. Pledge to and share our @seedandspark campaign (www.seedandspark.com/fund/baby-gay) and follow us on Instagram @babygay_film!
Support queer Asian American filmmakers by pledging to the BABY GAY @SeedandSpark (www.seedandspark.com/fund/baby-gay). This unsexy sex comedy follows Stevie, a bisexual Chinese American woman who bluffs her way into a lesbian threesome in order to “prove” her queerness.
Wishlist
Use the WishList to Pledge cash and Loan items - or - Make a pledge by selecting an Incentive directly.
COVID supplies and testing
Costs $500
To keep our cast and crew safe and healthy.
Festival distribution
Costs $1,000
To cover entry fees when submitting to festivals.
Cash Pledge
Costs $0
Cast
Costs $1,814
To compensate the actors gracing our film for their hard work.
Crew labor
Costs $5,700
To compensate our incredible crew for their hard work.
Art supplies
Costs $800
To bring our sets to life with props, decor, and furnishings.
Gear rentals and insurance
Costs $5,000
To rent camera, lighting, and sound equipment.
Post production labor
Costs $2,500
To pay for editing, color correction, and sound design.
Hard drives
Costs $500
To store our footage.
Catering and craft services
Costs $1,200
To provide meals and snacks for cast and crew.
Direct link:
Share this update!
About This Team
Melissa Peng, writer and producer
Melissa is a comedy writer, performer, and producer from the Bay Area. She’s studied sketch and TV writing at UCLA, Upright Citizens Brigade, the Ruby LA, Writing Pad, and East West Players. Her comedy background has included writing and filming sketches with Sleepless, one of the Ruby LA's sketch teams, as well as performing improv with Lil Guy, a house team at the Pack theater. As a writer, she draws inspiration from the understated chaos of Nathan for You and the slice-of-life soul-searching of shows like Ramy and Insecure. She loves a scary movie and a spreadable cheese.
Arielle Frances Bagood, director
Arielle (she/they) is a director, writer, and performer raised half in New Jersey and half in North Carolina. She has happily called Los Angeles her home for the past decade since moving there after watching too much Glee. Arielle is an alumni of the UCLA Center for EthnoCommunications, and her documentary shorts "Lights Up: Asian American Theater at UCLA" and "hiya: Queer Filipino Americans and Mental Health" have been presented at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival 2019 and UCLA Asian American Studies 50th Anniversary Film Festival, respectively. Arielle is a proud dog mom to Lexa (iykyk). Florence Pugh and Jessica Henwick, I am free Thursday night if either of you want to hang out on Thursday night when I'm free.
Sam Shapiro, producer
Sam Shapiro is a Los Angeles based producer from Watchung, New Jersey. After studying Television, Radio, and Film at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Sam moved to sunny SoCal to pursue a career in film and television. He has worked a variety of production jobs on many levels ranging from independent film, music videos, commercials, and studio television, including For All Mankind Season 3 (Sony for Apple TV +) and Hacks Season 2 (NBC Universal for HBOMAX). When Sam is not working, he enjoys going to concerts, road tripping, good food and drink, and dog sitting for his friends.
Patrick Zhang, associate producer
Patrick is so excited to be associate producing BABY GAY! As a multidisciplinary artist himself, he is passionate about facilitating the creative process of others. A longtime fan of all things Melissa Peng and Arielle Bagood (and non-hegemonic voices in storytelling.... but mostly Melissa and Arielle), Patrick can't wait to bring their vision to life. Aside from producing films, Patrick also produces carbon dioxide, methane, and ammonia.