'Breaking Upwards' explores a young, real-life New York couple who, four years in and battling codependency, decide to intricately strategize their own break up. Based on an actual experiment devised by director/actor Daryl Wein and actress Zoe Lister-Jones, the film loosely interprets a year in their lives exploring alternatives to monogamy, and the madness that ensues. An uncensored look at young love, lust, and the pangs of codependency, 'Breaking Upwards' follows its characters as they navigate each others' emotions across the city they love. It begs the question: is it ever possible to grow apart together?
Acting
Zoe Lister-Jones steals every scene with chaotic comic precision.
Writing
Real couple wrote their own breakup—meta doesn't get messier.
Production
$15K budget, actual apartment locations, gloriously unpolished.
Director
Daryl Wein
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Wein and Lister-Jones shot this between their actual day jobs, using friends' apartments and guerrilla locations.
This premiered at SXSM 2009 right as mumblecore peaked—it's a time capsule of Brooklyn before it was fully gentrified.
US
