Single Mother By Choice, now available to stream on HBO Max, is nothing short of an impressive mixture of fiction and reality. When filmmaker and actress Selina Ringel was inspired to tell the story about a single woman’s pregnancy – while pregnant herself – she had no idea that both she and her character Eva would be giving birth in the middle of a global pandemic.
Partially based on true and ever-changing events, Ringel tracks her own pregnancy through 2020 while embodying 30-year-old Eva. After setting out to have a baby regardless of who is by her side, Eva must contend with both the isolation and safety measures that come with pregnancy in a pandemic. Not only that, but she learns how to lean on loved ones even as she prizes her own independence.
Ringel spoke to Screen Rant about her personal journey from actress to producer and back again, and the impressive evolution that Single Mother By Choice went through: from conversations with her husband to HBO Max's newest film.
Screen Rant: I know that you were inspired by real events, but what inspired the character of Eva and the concept of doing it on her own?
Selina Ringel: She's an alternate version of me, and I've always been someone who is really determined. For a long period of my life, I was a very intense workaholic, almost to the point of not doing a lot of things I should be doing for myself. But I also really always wanted to be a mom.
I actually remember, when I was 15 years old, I told my dad if I hadn't found the right person by the time I was 30, I was gonna go ahead and have a baby by myself. My dad was like, "Okay, sit down, you have 15 years." But the thing is that, to me, having a baby has been something that I know is a number one priority in my life. I always figured, "I'll find a partner or I won't, but regardless, I'm going to be a mom."
When we started looking into it - my husband had actually worked at an IVF clinic, where there's a lot of women now and there's a movement that's growing. He had interviewed a lot of women who had gone through this process, and I myself being a woman who was sure I would do it whether I found a partner or not, thought that this was a really interesting theme to explore. You're making that decision and just wanting to be a mom.
Obviously, your husband Dan Levy Dagerman has been an important partner for you in life and in your career. How did you both collaborate on the story when it comes to the writing and the framing of the narrative?
Selina Ringel: We write everything together. And we've been doing this for a long time, so I usually am faster. I write everything, and then he fixes a lot of what I write because he's much more detail-oriented and much more of a perfectionist. But we're always looking at the story together. Every step of the way, we were looking at the outline.
And we had to rewrite this outline probably 30 times because the world kept changing and the movie kept changing. What we had initially thought we were filming is not the movie we made, but that's because so much happened in the process that shifted the narrative.
I actually had a miscarriage in the process; it was awful. But it was also something that we realized we had to include in the film because, again, it was something I felt people don't talk about enough. It's incredibly common, and once you do start talking about it, then everyone starts talking about it. And it turns out that there's a lot more people out there going through this than you realize. We just started shifting as things were coming in, and things were happening in my pregnancy, and the world was changing. So, it was a lot of re-outlining.
Of course, you're also telling a story about a pregnancy in the pandemic while still in the pandemic. How did those constraints change things for you when you came to filming?
Selina Ringel: First of all, we had no idea we were telling a story about the pandemic when we started it because we never thought in a million years that there was going to be a global pandemic. We had already shot a third of the film, and we had to trash a lot of it. We had to re-outline and reimagine the film. We had a crew of around 25 people, and then we paused when everything shut down. I remember everyone saying, "In two weeks, this will all be over, and you can pick up where you left off and start your production."
And then as time kept passing, we realized this is not going to end in two weeks. So, we decided to include the pandemic, and then we did everything. Dan and myself, we did every job - which was insane, because we couldn't put my baby in danger. I actually have a friend of mine who's just had a baby right now, and we were talking about how different this pregnancy in the pandemic was to my pregnancy in the pandemic. The version of the pandemic for me was so much more of a zombie apocalypse than it feels like now, even though we're still all in it. We didn't know if we were ever going to leave our house again, you know? It really felt like the end of the world.
I love that Eva starts off as a self-sufficient woman, and the film almost works "backward" to help her acknowledge that sometimes she needs help and that doesn't make her any weaker. Is that a lesson you've internalized, and why was it important to embed in her?
Selina Ringel: I think it's one of the things I've had to learn in my life. I've evolved and changed and learned, but 10 years ago, I used to really believe I had to do everything on my own. I really felt like, "You can't trust people, you have to do it by yourself. You just don't know what you get."
And it's interesting because I think with the years, one of the biggest things I've learned is that vulnerability is actually a strength and not a weakness. I think that as women, we're constantly being told, "Don't show your vulnerability. Don't say that you don't know the answer." God forbid a woman doesn't know the answer. Oh my God, you're gonna get fired. And I actually think that it's the opposite: what I've come to learn, and I think the world is coming to understand as well, is that there's so much strength in knowing when you don't know and asking for help when you need it.
I think being a good leader is taking advice, is listening, is letting other people jump on board, is collaborating - all the things that we're kind of told [not to do] as a woman. "You have to be so strong, and never cry, and never show anyone that you have feelings. God forbid they know you have feelings." And I just don't believe that's the reality of what the best boss looks like. So, I really wanted to explore this idea that vulnerability is strength. You can do anything you want in your life, but being able to ask when you need help is incredibly valuable.
You've also been very hands-on in every aspect of your career. You've done everything from acting to producing, writing, and even casting. What was your first passion, and how did it take you through this trajectory?
Selina Ringel: I actually started out as an actor 15 years ago, and I literally took myself out of the equation. I grew up in Mexico, and I remember in Mexico, I used to book everything all the time. It was a lot easier to book things. And then moving here, I remember I was in this room and this audition, and everyone looked like me. But they were more attractive, and their resume was longer, and they had been doing it for years. And all of a sudden, it just felt like, "What am I doing in this room? Clearly, I don't stand a chance."
So, I took myself out of the equation. Instead of trying and - in my mind - begging someone to give me permission to show what I can do, I was like, "I'm going to be a producer, and I'm just going to make things happen." Because I know I'm good at making things happen. I actually went to AFI as a producer, and that's where I met Dan. He was there as a director. Then I started writing.
I was in this very future-oriented moment in my life, where I had kind of hit a wall because I was constantly feeling that no matter what I did, it wasn't good enough. I was constantly looking for the results. "If I do this, then I'm worthy of this." And I just felt really exhausted with myself; I felt like nothing was ever going to be good enough. And I remember telling Dan, "I just want to play again. I want to remember what it feels like to just have fun and play, and not be so serious and worried about what happens."
At that point, I joined the Groundlings and started doing some stand-up, and I started going to some acting classes. I'm actually never gonna forget this because it was really a turning moment in my life, but I did this show for the Groundlings. A friend of mine, who at the time worked for the Duplass brothers, came to watch the show. She was like, "I'm producing this series, and I would love for you to audition for the Duplass brothers." I hadn't auditioned in 11 years, and she was like, "Yeah, but I just saw you, and you were fantastic. So, what do you lose?"
Then I booked it, which blew my mind - because as you know, I've also been doing casting for 10 years. I know what the probabilities are that I could have booked it. I was like, "Okay, universe! I will continue." It was such a weird but also amazing experience because then it opened up this door of, "Wait a minute, who said I wasn't good enough?" I did. If I decide that I am, then maybe I am you know. Then I just started incorporating all of that into everything I was doing and just writing things that I would like to play.
What are the projects that call to you and what kinds of stories do you want to tell at Two Hands?
Selina Ringel: Two Hands does a lot of different things. But me personally, I love stories about very complicated women. I love stories about women who are very strong in some ways and have huge blind spots in other ways. Because I just think that the more we can explore our flaws, the more we see what's beautiful about them but also how we want to grow. I'd much rather watch someone who's totally three-dimensional, incredibly flawed, super self-aware in some ways, and completely unaware in other ways. That, to me, feels much more real to life. Those are the kinds of people I gravitate towards, and the characters I gravitate towards.
When it came to filling in the rest of the cast for Single Mother By Choice, what were the qualities that were looking for?
Selina Ringel: Initially, it was all about people we think are really authentic and we think are really good actors. We found a lot of people we had worked with before. When we like someone and have a good dynamic with someone, we like working with them again and again.
But what was so interesting about this film was that I don't even think we realized when we cast all these people, that all these people had to be so down to be creative about how they were going to keep showing up on screen. My co-lead, Brittany Hall - she's actually my friend in real life, but she plays my best friend Skye - has been on Ballers, and she's amazing. She actually just got nominated for a Gotham Award for her new movie Test Pattern. She literally moved to Texas, and then our producer moved to Portland.
Granted, we were already working with so many constrictions. I couldn't be in a room near someone because of my pregnancy, but we still had scenes we were thinking of doing and like a socially distanced way. Ultimately, we had to really figure out how to keep the story going and work with everything that was going on with everyone's schedule - because everyone's life changed. We never anticipated that, and it would have been very easy for a lot of these actors to be like, "Yeah, I'm not doing this anymore. This is a global pandemic, and I need to go home and hang out with my mom." But it blew my mind that everyone kept showing up for this and that we kept finding ways to get their scenes and to film them in different creative ways we've never imagined.
What do you hope that audiences take away from this film, or what have you taken away now that it's all over?
Selina Ringel: What I hope audiences take away from this film is that being an empowered woman comes in many different shapes and forms. I hope that people can see this person really going through this on her own, and see this person really longing for company - see all of it as strengths [as opposed to] a sad character who had to go through this.
I don't see her as a sad character. I actually see her as someone who, against all odds, is constantly finding a way to keep going and to keep growing, and to keep making it work. I just want to empower every woman out there, because there are so many single moms - by choice or not. I now have my baby, who's 14 months old, and he's amazing - but it is a lot of work. I really want to shout out everyone who's doing parenthood in every form, because it really takes a lot.
And one of my biggest takeaways is that you have to follow your gut. If you feel like you shouldn't give up, then don't. Every single person - people who love me really dearly and really believe in me - was like, "Just shut this down." It felt like such an impossible task, and I think people felt like, "Why are you trying so hard to finish something when God knows where it's gonna go, or what it's gonna be? Just let yourself relax."
But we really wanted to keep going. We did, and we were so lost in so many moments, but we kept trying to find it again. And now it's gonna be on HBO Max. It just blows my mind, and it makes me feel for all those people who don't know, or who feel scared, or who don't have the answer. If you have the intuition to keep going, then keep going. If you don't, then don't, but don't stop for other people.
What project is next for you?
Selina Ringel: We're actually writing a script right now. We just got hired to write a script that I'm very excited about. I'm not sure if I can say exactly what it is, but it's based on a very famous Instagram character. That's been really fun.
And then we have a couple of other TV shows and movies that we're pitching, so we'll see. But good stories and strong women are what I'm into.
Single Mother By Choice is currently available to stream on HBO Max.
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