The winner of the Queer Your Stories Short Film Competition through outACTRA and Inside Out Film Festival.

Written by Izad Etemadi & Lauren Holfeuer
A Proud Pictures Film

Plant Daddy follows Phil, a quirky, down-on-his-luck gay man who never quite resolved the tension he holds with his distant and imperfect father. When Phil can’t bring himself to visit his father on his deathbed, the pressure and guilt send Phil into crisis. Unable to cope, Phil throws himself into caring for an abandoned potted plant. As pressure from his family mounts, Phil’s ‘plant parenthood’ spirals into an absurd obsession.

The short is about focusing on plants as a distraction from the real problems in life. At the heart of this comedy is a deeply relatable issue for queer audiences: the crippling pressure to forgive parents for not always being the allies we needed. Plant Daddy uses humour to explore the phenomenon of Millenials (and Gen Z) coping with their childhood traumas by raising ‘plant children’ with the level of care they wish they'd received as children.