By Jessica Herndon
One of the most exciting things about the Sundance Film Festival is having a front-row seat for the bright future of independent filmmaking. While we can learn a lot about the filmmakers from the 2025 Sundance Film Festival through the art that these storytellers share with us, there’s always more we can learn about them as people. We decided to get to the bottom of those artistic wells with our ongoing series: Give Me the Backstory!
When awful things happen to us, we’re often expected to put on that “everything is fine” face and keep pushing through life. We’re supposed to pretend to be okay until time hopefully heals our wounds. But that journey can feel so stagnant. In her first feature, Sorry, Baby, writer-director Eva Victor explores this stage of recovery, which can occur after experiencing trauma. The film stars Victor as Agnes, a woman sorting out how to move through life and navigate young adulthood following a traumatic experience. For the filmmaker, it’s an incredibly personal story.
“I wrote this film because there’s a part of my experience of trauma that I haven’t seen on-screen often: the part where you’re confused,” she says. “Where you wonder, ‘Did that really happen to me?’ I spent years floating, just trying to accept that I went through something bad. Sorry, Baby honors those years lost — the years where everyone goes back to their lives, but you are stunted, forced to reckon with a body that is suddenly divorced from your spirit. The quiet years where you still have to go to work surrounded by constant reminders, reminders that are invisible to others, that you’re not like everyone else. The years where your friend’s support can save your life, and where strangers can often make you feel safer than the people you’re told to trust.”
Though the serious subject matter of Victor’s directorial debut — which also stars Naomie Ackie and Lucas Hedges — anchors the film, Victor weaves offbeat humor throughout, making it both thoughtful and witty.
Below, Victor discusses how she prepared to direct Sorry, Baby (Hint: She shadowed filmmaker Jane Schoenbrun as they directed I Saw the TV Glow), which movies inspired her approach to making her film, and whom she was trying to impress when she broke her elbow.
Describe who you want this film to reach.
Sorry, Baby is a story for those who want to see that it’s actually possible for a person to emerge from trauma and someday want to be alive again, to someday unfreeze enough to feel optimistic about things ahead. Well, maybe not optimistic, that’s a stretch. But at least curious about the possibility of stuff happening at some point in their lives that isn’t horrible. This film is for those who survive every day, quietly.
Tell us an anecdote about working with one of your actors?
I want to take a moment to severely sing Naomi Ackie’s praises. When I met her, it was no joke, like meeting the sun. She is so warm, so funny, deeply emotionally intelligent, and so completely present with you when she talks to you. Then, we read together, and it felt so easy. I felt like I’d known her for years. I felt, and still feel, so very lucky we found her and that she felt connected to the film when she read it. I think everyone released a big exhale after our read together, we found this friendship.
There’s a scene in the film, it’s really the first scene, where Naomi and I are laughing on a couch together. We did it maybe six times, and by the end, we were having full weeping-laughing mental breakdowns. In the middle of intense, painful, silent laughter, Naomi took a sip of tea and choked on it while laughing. Someone could blackmail us with that take someday.
What was your favorite part of making Sorry, Baby? Memories from the process?
Making this film has felt like pulling off the heist of the century. I have convinced mad geniuses to help me make this movie happen. I’m legitimately in a cape in a dark shadow going, “Muahaha.” The smartest, most passionate, supportive producers; genius department heads; a legendary Boston crew; a cast of the finest actors in the land; a post team of complete megastars — I have been completely spoiled by the company I’ve been able to keep while making Sorry, Baby. That’s definitely a favorite part: the heist.
What was a big challenge you faced while making this film?
Boston in the winter is very cold.
Tell us why and how you got into filmmaking.
During the lockdown, I made my way through a bulleted list of probably 100 films I’d never seen — things like Persona, In the Mood for Love, The Spirit of the Beehive, Burning, Margaret, Losing Ground. Curled up in my comforter, in my dark Brooklyn apartment, I fell in love with how much these films made me feel. The ones that stuck with me and perhaps altered my brain chemistry were the films that were made with a great deal of care and love. I knew that was how I wanted to approach making a film of my own.
The filmmaking came organically after that. I sequestered myself in Maine in the dead of winter with my cat and many cans of split pea soup and wrote the script for Sorry, Baby. I sent it to [production company] Pastel, and they understood what I was doing and why I needed to do it. After that, it took a few months for me to realize that, yes, I need to direct and act in this. Then it took about a year and a half for me to feel I had the skills to fully do the job of director in the way I felt the film deserved. Thank you to Pastel, who supported me to test-shoot scenes before the real deal. And thank you to Jane Schoenbrun, who let me sit really close to them and watch their every move as they shot I Saw the TV Glow.
Why is filmmaking important to you? Why is it important to the world?
Watching films makes me feel less lonely. Making a film has made me feel less lonely, too. Feeling lonely is sad. Films are good.
One thing people don’t know about me is _____.
I broke my elbow trying to learn to skateboard [as an] adult. I only really jumped on the skateboard in the first place to impress a tattooed couple walking by, and when I fell they were like, “Oh man, you went down hard!” That was a very humbling time.
Which of your personal characteristics contributes most to your success as a storyteller?
Severe anxiety? Intense delusion? Feeling weird in high school?
Who was the first person you told when you learned you got into the Sundance Film Festival?
I was in Japan and was 16 hours ahead of my producers, so I was deeply asleep and they had to wait five hours for me to wake up to see the email and the calls and the texts. So, I was kind of the last person to find out. But then I called my parents. They were excited for me. My dad, in true dad fashion, went on for a while about Robert Redford.
What’s your favorite film that has come from the Sundance Institute or Festival?
Certain Women was a big inspiration for Sorry, Baby, and a film I love very much. And, of course, a forever favorite is Y tu mamá también. Now that’s a movie.
