SAINT MARY is a psychological shortabout a celibate Christian woman who impulsively propositions a stranger in Central Park — catalyzing a sexual and spiritual reckoning.
Written, directed by, and starring Erin Germaine Mahoney, SAINT MARY is inspired by true stories of late bloomers, spiritual sensualists, and women tangling with their deepest — and often, their most conflicting — desires. The film will be both a stand-alone project for film festivals as well as proof of concept for a television series (imagine an exvangelical Fleabag).
SAINT MARY was sparked by writer/director Erin's personal story of navigating sexuality after spending the first decade of her adulthood committed to Christian celibacy.
It's a deeply personal project, inspired by the confusion and dysphoria of leaving purity culture and navigating the reality — the risky, erotic, destabilizing and conflicting reality – of sexual exploration in your 30s, and of trying on new identities before they're fully formed.
SAINT MARY : A FILM BY ERIN GERMAINE MAHONEY
SAINT MARY SAINT MARY SAINT MARY
is spiritual. is erotic. is troubling.
SAINT MARY is a coming-of-age-a-little-late story about the messiness of doing what we think we want to do. It's about taking risks, sometimes extreme ones, in the process of change. It's about sexuality and spirituality; about danger and desire; about bewilderment and becoming; about encountering a stranger, and about being strange to yourself. It's about how imagination meets reality on the path to liberation.
While in development at the Actors Gym NY with Bobby Moresco (Co-Writer of Crash and Million Dollar Baby), where both Erin and our Creative Producer Michaela Morton are writing/acting members, we've seen how the script has resonated.
We are excited to make SAINT MARY with an incredible team, including the brilliant Kristin Krall as EP/Line Producer (Netflix, HBO, Universal TV/CBS, incl. FBI Most Wanted, The Punisher) and the visionary Cody Blevins of Omnipolitan Films as DP (The Fall of Diddy, Taste the Nation) .
We’ll be shooting SAINT MARY over three days in late winter/early spring in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Our baseline budget of $30,000 comprises pay for cast and crew, equipment, insurance, craft services, logistics — all the nitty gritty – and our partnership with Fractured Atlas makes all donations tax-deductible!
We're doing our fundraising in a tight timeframe, targeting our shoot for last weekend of March. With this timeline, the fundraiser will stay live through production to give ample opportunity for folks to support the project as it evolves – and as the movie-making gods give us their own take on timing — but our intention is to raise our baseline budget by mid-March.
Funds raised beyond $30,000 will allow us to fully account for post-production, editorial, and festival submissions, alongside fair wages for cast and crew.
You can follow along on IG at @saintmaryfilm, where we'll be posting more about the project, including teasers, BTS, deeper dives into themes, tone, world, interviews with cast and creative, and invitations to special events with conversations on sexuality, spirituality, and creativity — and of course you can make your tax-deductible donation to the project here! We are so grateful for every gift.
