Debra Eisenstadt is a writer, director, producer, and editor. She wrote, produced, directed, shot, and edited the feature film “Daydream Believer,” which won a 2002 Independent Spirit Award and The Grand Jury Prize at Slamdance Film Festival. She also wrote, produced, directed, and edited the award-winning films “The Limbo Room” and “Before The Sun Explodes,” which premiered in competition at South by Southwest in 2016.

“Imaginary Order” will premiere at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival on January 26.

W&H: Describe the film for us in your own words.

DE: “Imaginary Order” is about Cathy, a woman who abandoned her career for motherhood and is now suffering the consequences of that decision. With her husband working all the time and her 13-year-old daughter suddenly pushing her away, Cathy feels at once obsolete, invisible, and consumed with the need to be needed—a desire as potent as any addiction.

Encountering a family other than her own who needs her as much as she needs to be needed seems like the ideal escape—only it’s a trap. By actively avoiding her fears, she manages to manifest them, and this bizarre family ultimately unravels her.

W&H: What drew you to this story?

DE: Soon after I had my first child, I joined a parenting group. It began as a very benign situation for all of us new parents. However, over time the group really bonded. We continued getting together weekly, and as the years went by and life happened, these weekly get-togethers grew darker, more intimate, and more intense—some of the marriages and lives began falling apart.

What transpired in that group became the seeds for this story, and what this script became was a sublimation of my own worst fears.

W&H: What do you want people to think about when they are leaving the theater?

DE: I hope audiences find something relatable in this story and these characters. I would love the audience to leave the theater having experienced something they were not expecting. I hope it provokes, humors, and entertains the audience and makes them consider their own family, relationships, and dysfunction.

Ultimately, I would like the film to communicate and articulate something very specific and personal about the ebb and flow of marriage, parenthood, and family that is both universal and unique.

W&H: What was the biggest challenge in making the film?

DE: The biggest challenge making this film was making this film. It took many years for the stars to align—finishing the script, casting the film, finding locations, finding the money, shooting 200 scenes in 15 days, editing, and overseeing the post-production.

Multi-tasking to this degree really tests one’s sanity, but it seems that now, for all the impossibilities I was confronted with, a light at the end of the tunnel exists, which I am extremely grateful for.

W&H: How did you get your film funded? Share some insights into how you got the film made.

DE: I created a pitch deck, sent it out to many people and places, and finally got funding from the film production company ACE Pictures, which was looking for films to fund and responded to the script.

W&H: What inspired you to become a filmmaker?

DE: Since I was a little kid, I’ve been drawn to theater and plays. I wrote my first play in sixth grade—I even secretly cast people in my class, despite the fact the play was never actualized. I started taking acting very seriously when I was about 14, traveling solo from my home in Queens, New York to an acting class in Times Square. Eventually, I went to a liberal arts college that really indulged my interests, and I majored in both visual and performing arts.

After graduating from college, I pursued acting and started going to open calls in the newspaper. I started getting work immediately. I was a professional actor in my 20s, but ultimately found the business of acting really depressing and unfulfilling.

There was a film school down the block from my apartment, so I took a class, made a short, and it got into SXSW. The school offered me a scholarship to get my master’s degree there and I just went for it. That was when I decided to stop acting and focus all my energy into learning everything about filmmaking, which really combines all of my interests. I’ve been making films ever since.

W&H: What’s the best and worst advice you’ve received?

DE: Best: Set a date, don’t wait.
Worst: Wait.

W&H: What advice do you have for other female directors?

DE: This advice applies to anyone—not just females, not just filmmakers. Don’t wait for someone to give you permission to do what it is you want to do. If you want something to happen you have to really focus and work hard. The truth is that no one cares as much as you do—in fact, no one really cares about what you want or wish for at all. So if you want something badly enough, you simply have to take charge and do it yourself.

W&H: Name your favorite woman-directed film and why?

DE: There are a lot. But the film that first comes to mind is Jane Campion’s “An Angel at My Table.” I saw it when it first came out in 1990. At the age I saw it, it had a huge impact on me because it was about a very smart, creative, shy woman who was terribly misunderstood at a time when women were pegged as insane for having a brilliant mind, being unique, or not fitting into the clean, cookie-cutter image women were expected—or demanded—to slip into.

Other films I absolutely love that come to mind include Sofia Coppola’s “Lost In Translation,” Kimberly Peirce’s “Boys Don’t Cry,” and Amy Heckerling’s “Fast Times At Ridgemont High.”

W&H: It’s been a little over a year since the reckoning in Hollywood and the global film industry began. What differences have you noticed since the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements launched?

DE: Hopefully this movement goes beyond Hollywood and the film industry. Right now, the only real difference I notice is that people are taking notice and recognizing something that has been as there as the air and, unfortunately, as invisible. Chauvinism is so deeply ingrained in our culture it’s hard to see. What I notice is that people are finally starting to actually see it.

I hope things will change, but I even had to deal with [sexism] in subtle and not so subtle ways while making of this film. I hope things will be different for my daughter.