It’s 2017. Same-sex marriage is the law of the land... for now. And Sarah wants nothing to do with it. For her, marriage is assimilation, marriage is an outdated institution, marriage is the thing everyone else in her family has failed at. Sarah couldn’t be happier in her relationship with her girlfriend, Kristen. So why would she want to ruin it by getting married?

The problem is... Kristen has always wanted to get married. For her, marriage is the ultimate commitment to a partnership, marriage is a hard-fought right, marriage comes with so many benefits, both symbolic and practical - who wouldn’t want to take part in that?

And then the unexpected happens. Sarah finds her estranged father’s wedding ring in a forgotten box at her mother’s house, and somehow accidentally proposes to Kristen. This miscommunication sparks a conversation about marriage she could had never have anticipated. What is marriage, anyway? When does it work? Why does it fail? Does it mean something different if you’re gay, lesbian - queer? Why is Sarah so hung-up on the idea?

Determined to find answers, Sarah embarks on making a documentary film about same-sex marriage. She interviews young people, old people, men, women, the happily married, the not-so-happily married, and the people who decided they were better off not-married. As Sarah explores the most intimate details of other people’s relationships, she is thrust into questioning her own - if she and Kristen did get married, then what?

Fast forward three years into the future and Sarah and Kristen are happily married. Then Kristen loses her job. As the one who shoulders most of the financial responsibilities of the relationship, Kristen always felt obligated to work long hours at a job she didn’t particularly like. With new freedom forced upon her, she spirals into an identity crisis, ultimately resurfacing having made the decision to pursue what she really loves - being a chef.

Kristen fully submerges herself in the opportunity to work at an up-and-coming restaurant. She is finally fulfilled at work, happy, and ecstatically exhausted at the end of every day. But her new schedule and long nights in the kitchen take her away from her relationship. She and Sarah rarely see each other anymore. When Kristen gets offered a position as head chef in a restaurant across the country, she suddenly feels like she is put in the position of choosing between her dream job and her marriage. Sarah and Kristen are both growing, but in different directions. What happens to a marriage when the partnership gets in the way of each individual’s own happiness?

As we interweave these two stories together, intercut with documentary interviews with real-life couples and individuals, we begin to see the threads of what makes a relationship, a marriage, come together or fall apart. As Sarah and Kristen each confront their relationship, they ultimately must confront themselves, choosing whether or not they have the courage to take a leap of faith into the unknown, with or without each other.

As gay filmmakers, we are dedicated to exploring our truth on camera. By starting with a story that is incredibly personal to us, as both the writers and as a couple, and then by expanding the theme of that story outward through interviews with real LGBTQ couples, we hope to create a film that will feel true to our audience. We want to ask big questions about relationships and same-sex marriage without presenting any concrete answers. We are interested in capturing the complex intricacies of what we know and what we don’t know.

As with our previous film, That’s Not Us (a Seed&Spark alum), the dialogue in The Ring Thing is improvised. Working from a structured story outline, we gave the actors the freedom to find their own words within the scene. The ultra-naturalism of the improv lends itself to finding raw truth on screen, complimenting the tone of the documentary footage throughout the film and blurring the line between script and reality.

The documentary interviews serve as transition points between our present and future stories, propelling our characters back and forth in time. This non-linear structure brings us into Sarah and Kristen's states of mind - they are trying to figure something out, piecing together the framework of marriage while piecing together herself. Through these shifts in time, we hope to create uncertainty in our storytelling, just as Sarah and Kristen face uncertainty about her relationship. 

Our hope is to draw the audience into Sarah and Kristen's decision-making process, allowing them to draw their own conclusions and spark a conversation that continues off-screen. If this film is a puzzle, we want the audience to be instrumental in putting the pieces together.