On Losing It All and Gaining Back My Voice

Veteran producer Summer Shelton details her intimate journey making her debut feature as actor-writer-director, the romantic drama You & I

I have not been shy about stating that I made my directorial debut, You & I, during the pandemic as something of a Hail Mary for my career, but what I have failed to acknowledge is that I also made the film with hopes of saving myself.

I am nervous about writing this. I am self-conscious about being misunderstood, appearing weak, being a trope and, of course, revealing my missteps and failures, but the greatest gift these past years have given me is learning that all of these experiences, intimate thoughts, fears, delicate emotions, curiosities and moments of rawness are what makes me who I am. These are the ingredients of my voice.

I made You & I when I was alone and felt unseen in many aspects of my life. I felt like I had lost myself trying to be everything I should be to everyone around me, while I was being nothing to myself.

Summer Shelton in You & I. (Photo by Bruce Thierry Cheung.)

Putting myself in the position to write, direct, produce, star in and edit You & I allowed me to control my own fate during a time when everything I had built was crumbling — my health, my career, my marriage and my sense of self. I had built these things based on doing what I thought I “should” do or what was “the right thing,” but life slowly revealed to me that I was not doing the right things at all.

One of my most difficult losses was the slow deterioration of my worldview and recognizing that my behavioral patterns contributed to my loss of self. I allowed my identity and success to be based on what I could do for others. It is good to be selfless, but it should not be my default behavior all the time. I entered into partnerships and relationships based on either what gaps I could fill, what improvements I could make or what I could contribute to the happiness of others. People will take as much as you will give; I gave all of myself away.

I could blame one of many people, relationships, past traumas, misfortunes or bad cards dealt, but I only blame myself. I blame myself because when I felt like I was not being seen or heard, I stopped speaking altogether. I thought that if everyone else was happy, I should be too, right? I was not thinking about myself, and that is my own loss, because I have discovered that I am a talented, interesting person and that I matter.

When I stopped speaking, my body began shutting down – mentally, emotionally and physically. The first two you can mask as long as you continue meeting the needs of those around you, but the latter will stop you in your tracks.

Summer Shelton at the 2018 Independent Spirit Awards, where she won the Producers Award. (Photo courtesy Summer Shelton.)

The strongest connection I had with myself was looking into a steam-covered mirror – I could see that I existed, but I couldn’t see myself clearly. I pulled the shower curtain back and entered into my escape room – a hot shower. I hoped the pulsing water would pound the lethargy out of my soul and beat energy into existence. For a few moments, I could relax. My enjoyment would be short lived, though, as my anxiety crept back in, with every handful of hair that I’d pull out of my head, with every wring and rinse. I’d use the tile wall to collect this web of evidence that I would stare at, wondering what was happening to me.

Toweling myself dry was painful – literally the bending and twisting – but what was most disheartening was that my body felt different. I could squeeze rolls of skin in my back, my legs, my waist. As the fog lifted, the mirror slowly unveiled my puffy face and swollen eyes, and with a closer look, I realized I needed my most prized possession – tweezers. The routine inspection: lips, cheeks, chin, neck, boobs, belly. With every pluck, I would hear the voices from doctors and peers: “This is what happens when you turn 40.” “Say goodbye to your metabolism.” “Do you exercise? You should try yoga.” “Drink more water and walk more.” “Try relaxing, reducing your stress.” “Do you have a therapist? You should get one.” And of course, “This is your new normal.”

I did not want this to be my new normal, and something told me it should not be. I knew something was wrong.

While I was navigating this mystery of entering into middle age, I was also trying to understand why I could not make meaningful career advancements. In 2018, I won the Producers Award at the Independent Spirit Awards, which was extremely helpful for setting up meetings and people answering my emails. I was making a concerted effort to graduate from making micro- and low-budget movies. I had an award-winning script by an established female director and was able to attach four famous and talented women in the leading roles. When pitching, people deemed the project either “too small” or “too big;” across the board, everyone wanted to know who was playing the “supporting male,” as that was what could help unlock the financing. Four celebrated, established leading women were not enough, but one supporting male – that could do the trick?

Summer Shelton with co-star Clayne Crawford during the making of You & I. (Photo by Patrick Leonard.)

I have never been able to sustain myself solely as a producer, and always supplemented my income by line producing, doing corporate consulting, making budgets and schedules, and teaching. My seeming inability to gain professional momentum, though, exacerbated my worries. From 2018 to 2020, I applied for upwards of 40 jobs across the fields of education, arts and nonprofits, looking for a full-time, stable foundation for the next chapter of my life, but nothing panned out. I could not see a path forward.

Whether pitching projects, pitching myself or pitching symptoms to doctors, I felt like no one seemed to care about my story. I had consistently been making strides in my work for almost 15 years. All of sudden, I found myself at a standstill. And then in March 2020, the world came to a standstill, too.

Not long after the word “COVID” became ingrained into our vernacular, a weekend trip to urgent care set me on a path to a diagnosis: an autoimmune disorder called chronic lymphocytic thyroiditis (aka Hashimoto’s Disease). Learning that I had an autoimmune disorder at the beginning of a pandemic was nerve wracking, but for the first time in a while, I felt seen and understood.

Other pieces of information began to reveal themselves: I learned that my then husband would be deploying that summer, and there was a strong possibility that we would be moving again upon his return the following year. With these things in mind, I put the pieces together that I was about to experience an extended period of time where I would be alone. No matter how it is packaged, time is a gift, a precious commodity, and I did not want to squander it. There are all types of clichés about a woman alone with her thoughts, but all I can say is that when the world shut down, I woke up. What awakened in me was a fearlessness that I can only associate with feeling like I had nothing left to lose.

Clayne Crawford and Summer Shelton in You & I.

One last swing for the fences could determine my fate – but regardless of the outcome, at least I was in control of my efforts. If I had to pivot away from the industry, I would do it on my own terms. I would exit knowing I had put it all on the table – or in this case, on the screen. If no one would give me opportunities, I would give them to myself.

You & I was my swing. It would be my directorial debut which I would write, produce, edit and star in. Had I done all those things before? No. I was not afraid of what I did not know how to do; I was more afraid of the regret I would feel if I chose not to do any of them.

As I took steps to make You & I, I found a sense of purpose which kept me focused and made getting out of bed easier. With a new cocktail of prescriptions to manage my Hashimoto’s, a diet overhaul and an exercise routine, within a few months, my body and mind felt “normal.” I could stay awake for a full day, my joints did not hurt as much, I lost about 35 pounds, and I noticed I wasn’t grabbing for the tweezers as much. I felt confident, like this was who I was supposed to be. I felt like I was shining as bright as I was capable of shining.

Despite my new lease on life, I still received frequent reminders that I alone am not enough for this industry. Many times when trying to secure financing, sales and distribution, I was told that the film’s success in the extremely competitive, saturated marketplace was dependent on a top tier festival premiere or my well-established male co-star, Clayne Crawford, as I myself had “no value.” I was advised to attach a more established filmmaker as an executive producer to help give the film more credibility; my 15-year lauded career was not enough.

Clayne Crawford and Summer Shelton in You & I.

I realized that the feedback I was hearing was from professionals interested in eliminating risk and having marketplace security. I, however, did not need that. I was willing to take the risk of betting on myself. I would not let others’ doubts dim my light which I had worked so hard to reignite.

I stopped chasing affirmations, and instead I focused on the journey. While I had no idea where we would wind up, one thing I knew for sure was the film I wanted to make.

You & I is a romance, but at its core it is a story of regret, guilt, memories, and words unspoken. A love story that is poignant and painful. These are emotions and feelings I know all too well. There is truth from my life in the leading characters – both individuals who regret things they did not do while doing what they thought was expected of them. They get a second chance to explore the “what if?” All the same things I was trying to give myself by making the film.

Needless to say, You & I has faced some obstacles along the way. It was shot during pre-vaccine COVID, and we were on the festival circuit during the SAG-AFTRA strike, which prohibited us from doing publicity. I wanted to speak, but felt silenced, like I could not advocate for myself during the most crucial time to launch and celebrate the film. Our digital release was on December 3 – buried under awards season headlines or passed on by press outlets because we were “just too small.” One obstacle after another.

I recognize the irony of my journey. I wasn’t feeling seen, so I made a film about a woman who longs to remember a time when she felt seen … and now I fear that You & I may not be seen.

During the edit, my filmmaker friend Ben Nabors gifted me a copy of Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke. In Letter One, Rilke writes back to a poet who asked him if his work is good, begging the young man to avoid seeking outside validation, which he believes will only interrupt his artistic growth. Rilke says he should “go inside yourself” and examine what has driven him to create, as “a work of art is good if it has grown out of necessity.”

Summer Shelton and Clayne Crawford on the set of You & I. (Photo by Patrick Leonard.)

By Rilke’s standards, You & I is “a good piece of art.” It is a byproduct from my inward exploration of whom I always knew myself to be – observant, thoughtful, honest, passionate, sensitive, loving and vulnerable. All the qualities that in the past I was afraid of being are what have made people interested in You & I.

Rather than constantly worrying about people seeing the film, I am focusing on the people who have already found the film and told me they felt seen watching it: the Polish woman at the American Film Festival who tearfully told her story of lost love, and the kind senior man at the New Orleans Film Festival who grabbed my arm and started a delightful conversation with the words, “So honest and heartbreaking.”

I have no idea if You & I will pay off in terms of advancing my career, but what I do know is that I am no longer going to wait for permission to create. I will create out of necessity, to keep discovering who I am and what I am capable of being.

Summer Shelton was the recipient of the 2018 Independent Spirit Producers Award. Her directorial debut, You & I, which she also wrote, produced and co-starred in opposite Clayne Crawford, is now available on digital. She produced the acclaimed films Maine, Keep the Change, People Places Things and Little Accidents, and is a frequent collaborator of Ramin Bahrani, including working as associate producer on his features Goodbye Solo and At Any Price. She was the recipient of the inaugural Bingham Ray Creative Producing Fellowship, awarded by the Sundance Institute (2012), a Rotterdam Producing Fellowship (2013), Film Independent Sloan Producing Fellowship (2014) and Cannes Producing Fellowship (2021) awarded by the Gotham.