Ellen realizes she has to book one more SAG job by the end of the year… or she’ll lose her health insurance. She does everything in her power to get more work in a broken system and tries to navigate her way through the stressful world of possibly losing it, but when the unexpected happens she realizes she has to take matters into her own hands.

Director’s Vision for ‘Ellen Needs Insurance’

As a working artist living in America sometimes you get to make your dream project. Other times you’re forced to make something just to survive. And sometimes you get to make both. When Ellen and I set out to make this film we did so out of necessity: we had just found out we were going to have a baby, and we knew our health insurance was going to run out a month before the due date. We wanted to highlight the stress we felt in that moment, but also the stress that working artists face on a daily, weekly, and yearly basis. We also knew we weren’t alone, and we wanted to cast as many actors as we possibly could who found themselves in the same situation… needing that one last job to help secure their own insurance. So we reached out to our friends and networks looking for reccs, and they delivered. I’m exceptionally proud of this film and the people involved. As the strikes have shown it’s harder and harder to be a working artist these days. But the one thing the studios can’t take away is our desire to look out for one another.