STEP ONE: Breaking the Shell
Tim Brown - Actor, Producer, Writer
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“Is it a story other people would be interested in?” I asked.
“Is it even a story?”
“Write it,” he answered. “Just write it.”
We were sitting in my living room, Trampas and I. We had just returned from seeing a movie together (Mad Max: Fury Road, if you’re curious). A movie that I could tell was well-made and entertaining, but - like most things in my life at that time –one I found no enjoyment in.
I had been suffering from severe anxiety and depression for years. I had hidden it from everyone in my life, including my family and even my wife at the time, as best as I could for as long as I could. And then I couldn’t anymore. And then I fell apart. And that night, the social mask I still struggled to maintain crumbled away again - revealing to my good friend, Trampas, the emotional mess I had become. After some time I began to calm down, and I found myself pitching him a short film idea that had been bouncing around in my head for a couple of weeks. A story based on what I had been going through. STEP ONE is that story.
The characters and events of STEP ONE are fictional. The words, feelings, and emotional journey of the character Ken, however, are almost a transcription of what I experienced in the months and years leading up to that night with my friend Trampas. STEP ONE reflects moments and conversations I had quite a few times in various forms and with various people in my life. It is an emotional self-portrait set in the frame of a fictional narrative.
A representation of the way I felt for a very long time.
Thankfully, I don’t live there anymore. I wouldn’t say I’m cured. But I am healing. And I’ve come a very long way. I am eternally grateful for the family, friends, therapists, teachers, and ancient plant medicines that have helped in my healing process these past couple of years. Without their help, I would not have been able to crawl out of the darkness I had been living in for so long to present you with this film.
Hopefully this film is not just an exercise in therapeutic self-expression, but a story in which others may find themselves reflected - so that they may feel (for a moment, at least) less alone in their struggle. And that they, too, will find a way to take that first, most difficult step towards healing.