DOC - Meant to Be Maddie
Documentary Feature
Title: Meant to Be Maddie
TRT: 01:20:00
Project Status: In Postproduction
Logline
MEANT TO BE MADDIE chronicles a decade in the life of a North Carolina transgender teenager as she navigates her identity and adolescence with the unwavering support of her family. An intimate and funny coming of age story, Maddie’s journey unfolds against the backdrop of growing anti-trans rhetoric, legislation, and conservative backlash against the LGBTQ community.
Synopsis
When Maddie was six years old, she started first grade as a girl, the gender she always knew she was. While she was assigned male at birth, she had been telling her parents, Katie and Craig, about her gender for as long as she could speak. After seeing a therapist with Maddie and watching their child suffer for too long, they agreed that Maddie could transition publicly. Maddie's arrival to school in a dress caused a local TV news crew to film a segment in front of Maddie’s elementary school, without the family’s consent, and claimed “a student who started school as a boy came back this fall as a girl.”
Two years later, North Carolina’s “Bathroom Bill” would catapult the state and trans youth to center stage, and Maddie would be forced to walk across the hall from her class to use the only individual stall. With Trump’s election in 2016, the family was faced with the decision of whether or not to become outspoken activists, risking their safety and their privacy. They chose to fight. This decade-long film follows Maddie through adolescence as she and her family work to build a life filled with joy, love, unconditional acceptance and purpose. For Maddie's mom, Katie, that means going to law school at age 45 to become an attorney specializing in trans rights so that she can be ready and able to fight for the safety and sanity of her daughter. While Maddie continues to find her voice in activism, she begins to wish that she can be like every other teenager whose only worries are getting on the cheerleading squad, passing her driving test and hanging out past 10.
The film is based in verité: viewers will come along as Maddie meets friends at the pool, does TV and newspaper interviews with her mom, and goes to doctors appointments. They’ll see Katie sworn in as a lawyer and attending a pride march. They’ll ride with Craig on his motorcycle and attend class at UNC Chapel Hill with older sister Grace. Adding to these scenes are interviews our team has conducted over the years, and Maddie’s own narration will weave everything together, allowing her to look back at these formative ten years of her life.
Additional Project Information
We were selected for Gotham Week Spotlight on Documentaries in 2025, and Anna is a 2025 BAVC Media Maker Fellow. We were also selected to pitch at the Athena Film Festival Documentary Pitch in 2024.
Director's Statement:
Meant to Be Maddie is the most ambitious and challenging project I’ve embarked on; and the one I am the most proud of. That is entirely due to Maddie and her family: the relationships we have built and the love and respect we have for each other. This is truly a collaboration with the participants and it makes for a unique film; one that enables viewers to see inside the lives, feelings and experiences of Maddie and her family. It is a privilege for me to connect with them and share this story, and it is a privilege for the viewers who will get to meet them.
I come from a family of artists and storytellers and believe in the power of story to create social change, which is ultimately how and why I began collaborating with Maddie and her family in 2016 when the bathroom bill was passed.
When we began working together, I thought it would be a triumphant joyful piece about how a family overcame the challenge of a bigoted law and moved forward.But it’s become much more than that, having taken place during one of the most turbulent decades of U.S. history, particularly for the trans community. Despite more youth identifying as LGBTQ than ever before, there are also more laws curbing their basic human rights and taking away healthcare and education. We hope that trans people and their families will see themselves and their lives reflected in Maddie’s story; that they will be inspired by her joy, hope, and support that she is surrounded by. And this film is, in a large part, for the cisgender community. We need them to reflect deeply on the overwhelming weight that Maddie and her family carry. They cannot do it alone. It is all of our responsibility to stand up to blatant discrimination.
About our team and ethics:
I met this family at a crucial and terrifying time in North Carolina politics: the passing of HB2, or the “bathroom bill.” It was a scary time for trans and gender-non conforming people and their families. In building a working relationship together, the family has wanted this film to grow into what it is today.
What began as a 10-minute video has turned into a 10-year project because of the relationships that we have built together. I'm constantly aware of my identity as a cis woman, and I continue to bring in other collaborators to help me combat the bias that my identity brings with it. I have made sure to create a team that is representative of the community the film is portraying.
I am deeply proud of the team we have assembled to make this film. It is imperative that our team is representative of the people in the film, in order to ensure that we are doing justice to Maddie, and not bringing harm to her or her communities. Our core team is composed of cis women, trans folks and parents of trans kids. We hire consultants and sensitivity viewers from within the trans community to discuss our materials and edits. Some of us are queer, some of us are allies, and some of us are still trying to figure out how we identify.
This constant questioning and work to combat my internal biases, my long relationship with the family, and the trust that we have built together make me the right person to make this film.
I ask for consent every single time we schedule a shoot. We have regular check-ins – in person or on the phone – to talk about the direction of the film, our goals for what the film can and should accomplish, and who we want to work with. The family has seen the sample and met the editor and we plan to involve them in the editing process of the feature film. Maddie has veto power in regards to anything around her gender identity being included in the film or not. And finally, we plan to work very closely with the family, and in particular with Katie, to develop the impact campaign that will include a curriculum aimed at families who have gender non-conforming children, as well as all students because they are likely to encounter a multitude of gender identities and expressions in their classrooms.
Team
Director, Producer, DP: Anna Clare Spelman
Producer, DP: Bridgette Cyr
Producer: Luchina Fisher
Editor: Miles Hill
Co-Editor: Andrea Patiño Contreras
Executive Producers: Julie Parker Benello, Olympia Stone, Susie Polsky
Financials
We have been supported by The Southern Documentary Fund's Prouduction Grant, the Southern Producers' Lab grant, and the BAVC MediaMaker Fellowship. We have also fundraised through private donations and events. Please contact us for further financial information.
Seeking
Investors, Producing Partners and Distribution
Project Website
Contact
Anna Spelman - Mermaid Productions - acspelman@gmail.com
acspelman@gmail.com