Watch OMI now on Omeleto above.
Below is the trailer.

UPCOMING SCREENINGS

OMI

Logline: When he’s ready to take the next step with his shiksa girlfriend, a young Jewish man gets possessed by the spirit of his dead Yiddish grandmother, OMI, who has plans of her own.

Director’s Statement

When the pandemic hit I started doing something I had never really done before: I asked some Jews I knew what being Jewish meant to them. I spoke with friends, rabbinical students, fellow artists, and cousins and family members to get hear about their experiences, and discovered similarities that helped me to articulate things I had always thought but didn’t know the words for, and differences that I empathized with.

But, unfortunately, I was faced with the fact that the people I wanted to talk to most, the foremost Jewish presences in my life, are no longer with us. My great-grandmother Mutti, who brought our family to the US from Germany in the 1930’s, and with whom I share a birthday, passed away a long time ago. And then, so did her granddaughter, my mother, Katy. Finally, our last family matriarch, my grandma Omi, passed away as well.

It only occurred to me after she died that I wished I had had conversations with Omi about her life and experiences as a young German Jew first coming to America. What being Jewish must have meant to her during the Holocaust, and how her identity changed in this new land. I think often about how similar and different our attitudes and values might be, and where we might find middle ground.

So I wanted to make something that started to open up this conversation a little bit about where these differences in Jewishness might be, and where we might have more in common that meets the eye. I also wanted to make something fun and warm and surprising, which I very much how I remember her.

This is for Omi.

Adam Lebowitz-Lockard

CAST

Adam Lebowitz-Lockard (Matt) - Adam is an actor, writer, director, and teacher based out of Los Angeles. He can be seen on “The Shrink Next Door” on Apple TV+ on FOX’s "The Pine Tar Incident", and has sketches on Funny Or Die with his sketch group Desperate Times. On stage his work has been seen at the Whitney Museum, Primary Stages, The Flea Theater, American Repertory Theater, Williamstown Theater Festival, Smith St. Stage, and many theaters throughout Los Angeles.

He is a LA Stage Raw award winner for Best Adaptation for “How We’re Different From Animals” with the Élan Ensemble. He is represented by Nikki Dionne with CSP Management, and The Library Agency.

Ashley Eskew (Christina) - An award winning actor, Ashley has performed across the country in multiple theaters as well as on screen, understudying the role of Jenny/ Marge in the West Coast Premiere of Anne Washburn's, "Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play" and Paramount’s “The Space Between" starring Kelsey Grammer directed by Rachel Winter ( Dallas Buyer's Club). Her work has taken her as far as Qatar and Brazil, where she performed her one woman show, "Beyond the Rain" as well as taught masterclasses in acting and vocal technique.

Ashley currently resides in Los Angeles, CA with her two kittens Harlowe & Monroe (even though she swears, she's a dog person) and co-owns a feminist brewery: Girly Beer Co. (IG: @girlybeerco).