SERIOUS COMEDY
‘Unpregnant’ is a buddy movie about teen seeking abortion
This isn’t the kind of buddy road trip you’d expect to be played for laughs.
In the dramedy “Unpregnant” — hitting HBO Max on Thursday and based on last year’s novel of the same name by Jenni Hendriks and Ted Caplan — Haley Lu Richardson stars as overachieving Missouri teen Veronica, who will do anything to get an abortion.
In this case, that means recruiting her ex-best friend Bailey (“Euphoria” star Barbie Ferreira) to drive her nearly 1,000 miles to Albuquerque, N.M., the nearest city where she won’t need parental consent.
Making an abortion-centric movie that mines comedy out of such a serious subject “did kind of scare me, because I’m opening myself up as a person to people that very adamantly believe different[ly] to then associate me with this conversation and hate me,” Richardson, 25, told the Daily News last week on a video call with director Rachel Lee Goldenberg.
The “Five Feet Apart” star noted that since sharing the buddy film’s trailer on Instagram, she’s gotten “hate” and “really intense stuff” in response.
The comments section of that post was bombarded by pro-life advocates dismissing the film as “disgusting” and “making fun of killing unborn babies.”
“So you think making a movie about abortion is setting a good example for young women?” commented one user. “Killing babies is a good thing to do?”
Another remarked, “This is a life you’re taking. There is nothing comedic about it.”
Richardson, who also appeared in 2016’s psychological horror film “Split,” had to deal with the backlash. “I’ve never experienced [that reaction] before because I’ve never been a part of something like this,” she said.
For Goldenberg, who also co-wrote “Unpregnant,” the discussion hits closer to home.
“I’ve had an abortion and it’s something that one in four people who can get an abortion, do,” she told The News. “So it’s something that I think is actually very common and it’s more the discussion around it that’s divisive.”
The “Everything’s Gonna Be Okay” director added that she wants to let people know that “It’s OK to talk about” abortion. “This film felt like an opportunity for me to bring this conversation to people and not to present it in a really traumatic or dramatic way.”
Initially wary of the film’s tone, Richardson signed on, thinking of its ppotential realworld impact.
“The thing that scared me about how much of a challenge it would be … also kind of inspired me,” she explained. “Because if this actually works and we get the balance right of the truth and the importance of the situation within this fun movie, it can be something that … can actually start real conversations that need to be started.”
Amid coronavirus, the film hasn’t had many prerelease focus groups weighing in, but Goldenberg already saw evidence of its ability to start a dialogue when she showed it to a group of teens dduring the editing process.
“Multiple girls told me tthat they had never thought aabout this deeply and now it was giving them a chance to think about it and they had qquestions about it,” said the director.
Of course, the debate surrounding reproductive rights will always be polarizing. But Richardson believes that if those attacking the film and abortion on social media instead had one-onone discussions with those facing the difficult choice, some might see the issue from another perspective.
“I guarantee you that if you were sitting on a bed with someone,” Richardson explains, “that it would be so hard to look in someone’s eyes — like Veronica or someone in a similar situation — and not have some sort of empathy or understanding or respect for what they’re going through, even if it’s completely different than your choice that you would make or the way that you view the world.”