Film Director Amy Koppelman on Writing and Directing "A Mouthful of Air" Starring Amanda Seyfried and on Maternal Depression and Suicide

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This week writer and director Amy Koppelman joins me to discuss her new film "A Mouthful of Air", starring Amanda Seyfried, based on her powerful novel of the same name. Within the narrative of "A Mouthful of Air" is an argument about the nature of maternal depression—its causes, cures, and the price it exacts from its victims. This brutally honest portrayal of family and self illuminates the power and complexity of the human psyche and lends hope and support to those who may be currently struggling.

QUOTES

"Depression, real depression, it's an illness, no different from asthma and diabetes"

"Nobody tells you how scary it is to be a mom...it forces you, whether you want to or not, to confront things from your childhood...giving birth is physically rough on the body but it is also emotionally jarring"

Resources:

"A Mouthful of Air" Film -Out in select theaters October 29, 2021

Get "A Mouthful of Air" Book

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IG: @Amy_koppelman

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About "A Mouthful of Air"

A Mouthful of Air is a compassionate and wrenching portrait of Julie Davis, a young wife and mother torn between the love she feels for her family and the voice in her head that insists they’d be better off without her.

When it was originally published almost twenty years ago, A Mouthful of Air was compared to seminal feminist works such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “A Yellow Wallpaper” and Sylvia Plath’s "The Bell Jar". It is a powerful, tragic Statement on motherhood, family, and survival. Within the narrative of A Mouthful of Air is an argument about the nature of depression—its causes, cures, and the price it exacts from its victims. With spare, elegant prose, this brutally honest portrayal of family and self illuminates the power and complexity of the human psyche.

Amy Koppelman is a graduate of Columbia's MFA program. Her writing has appeared in The New York Observer and Lilith. She lives in New York City with her husband and two children, and is the author of the novels, "A Mouthful of Air" and "Hesitation Wounds".