Gender confusion, acceptance at the heart of Sunscreen’s ‘Two Lives’

“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”

That quote, generally attributed to John Lennon, is a tidy summation of the independent film Two Lives in Pittsburgh, screening Sunday (April 28) at the Sunscreen Film Festival in St. Petersburg.

Written and directed by Brian Silverman, it’s the story of a conservative blue-collar worker raising his 10-year-old son by himself. Matty has little interest in baseball or hockey, and at first Bernie Evers (played by Silverman) is frustrated and angry.

Matty now wants to be called Maddie. And he wants to be a girl.

“The heart of the story is imperfect people doing the best they can,” explains producer Tiffany Murray. “And I think that’s so relatable on so many different levels. It speaks to everyone even if they haven’t gone through a situation like this.”

Producer, cinematographer and on-set medic Tiffany Murray.

Murray was also the low-budget film’s cinematographer, and the on-set medic. Because of the budget, “A lot of us wore multiple hats,” she says with a chuckle.

“Everyone was of the same mindset – whatever we need to do to make it happen, let’s do it. Everyone on our crew was so passionate about the story. And we made sure of that when interviewing and hiring; we wanted to have lengthy conversations with every person on set to make sure that they were aligned with our views and how we wanted to run the shoot.”

When Bernie discovers Maddie playing dress-up in front of a mirror, he fight the preconceptions and biases that have been bred into him. He loves Maddie, and wants to understand – and accept – what’s going on inside her head as she grapples with gender identification.

Two Lives in Pittsburgh takes a sensitive subject and examines it from different angles. Bernie’s beer-swilling, tough-talking friends are beside themselves; the kids at school have already begun figuring it out. But Clara, Bernie’s terminally ill mother, is the voice of reason.

There is great warmth in the film, and – perhaps improbably – moments of tremendous humor.

It won the Audience Award at Dances With Films, and multiple Best Narrative Feature awards at Indie Spirit, OutSouth, Three Rivers, ScreenCritix, Omaha, Alexandria, and Arlington International Film Festival.

“A compassionate and intelligent discussion of gender identity, race and orientation,” wrote Film Threat.

Maddie is play by Oregon’s Emma Basques, who was 11 when the film was made in 2022. “This is her first time onscreen, ever,” Murray says. “We found her through a generic casting call. We knew we wanted to cast a trans actor.

“We were all just so surprised at how subtle she can be with emotion. A lot of kid actors have this like overacting sense, and she was so natural and subdued … and we really thought that was a great way to play Maddie.”

The cast was finalized, and production was revving up when Covid-19 arrived in March 2020.

“We were delayed filming because of Covid,” Murray says, “and so we had about a year and a half to two years of prep. And throughout that time, Brian and Emma talked a lot. And one of the things that Emma said was ‘I see where Maddie’s coming from, but she’s not really as sure as I am.’

“I think that was really interesting that she could relate, and see Maddie’s journey, but also know that she was confident in where she was in her journey.”

Producers Tiffany Murray and Lola Noh will attend the April 28 screening. For details and tickets to the Sunscreen Film Festival, click here.