Writer-director Bardia Seiri and producer Ryan Harris discuss their short film Mama Sunshine, the dangers of parents oversharing their children online, and how the project changed their own relationship with social media.
Social media can connect families, build careers, and give almost anyone a platform. However, Mama Sunshine asks what happens when maintaining that online presence becomes more important than the family being posted about.
Writer-director Bardia Seiri and co-writer, producer and assistant director Ryan Harris created the short film around a mother influencer whose constant need to share her life begins damaging her relationship with her daughter. Harris described the premise during our interview as the story of a mom who is “posting constantly” and the effect it has on the bond between mother and daughter.
The project marks another step in Seiri’s move from acting into filmmaking. When we previously spoke with him about Netflix’s Incoming, he was primarily focused on acting while making smaller projects with friends. Seiri said he has since begun taking filmmaking much more seriously.
“I was really only just an actor,” Seiri told Nerdtropolis. “I was making little tiny short films with my friends, but I really started to take it seriously.”
MAMA SUNSHINE Turns Sharenting Into A Family Conflict
At the center of Mama Sunshine is Jessica, an influencer who has built an online identity around presenting her seemingly perfect family. Her daughter, Chloe, has a very different perspective, growing increasingly frustrated that private parts of her life are being turned into content.
The filmmakers describe the practice at the center of the story as “sharenting,” the increasingly common act of parents sharing photos, videos, and personal information about their children online.
For Seiri, the concept began surprisingly small.
He and Harris were sitting in a car brainstorming possible films when Seiri looked through a collection of short loglines he had written. One stood out: “Mom influencer exploits her daughter for views.”
Ironically, it was initially their least favorite idea.
Seiri kept returning to it because of his own experiences and stories he had heard from friends. Research into sharenting convinced him there was more to explore, especially because the subject had received attention several years earlier before largely disappearing from the broader online conversation.
“I’m trying to bring that back, and I’m trying to shed light on it again because I think it is really important,” Seiri said.
The short’s official campaign describes Mama Sunshine as a drama asking what happens when someone begins caring more about the online image of their family than the family itself. The filmmakers also emphasize that their story is not intended as an attack on social media itself. Instead, it examines the contradiction of adults warning younger people about seeking validation online while becoming consumed by the same likes, comments, and views.
Social Media Addiction Is Not Just A Gen Z Problem
Harris and Seiri grew up during an era when social media became part of everyday life, giving them a firsthand perspective on how quickly online habits can cross generations.
Harris believes conversations about unhealthy social media use too often focus exclusively on younger users.
“A lot of people have the perception that social media is a problem with the youth,” Harris said. “But we wanted to share that it’s not just the youth. It’s everyone.”
Parents and even grandparents now live within many of the same digital ecosystems as younger users. Mama Sunshine takes that reality and shifts the traditional warning about teenagers spending too much time online toward the adults raising them.
The filmmakers also wanted Jessica and Chloe’s conflict to feel emotionally believable rather than reducing either character to a simple villain or victim.
Seiri sought input from women close to both filmmakers while developing the mother-daughter relationship, asking how they might respond to the situations depicted in the film. The process helped the filmmakers consider the unique friction that can exist between a mother and daughter while keeping the characters grounded.
Making MAMA SUNSHINE Became A Filmmaking Education
Seiri and Harris have collaborated since high school, but Mama Sunshine required a larger level of communication and responsibility than their earlier projects.
The production involved volunteers, friends, and crew members they had never previously met. Seiri recalled one particularly demanding 16-hour shooting day where the challenge went beyond simply completing the planned shots.
He had to consider whether the actors were comfortable, whether the crew was being taken care of, and whether the production was still moving forward.
“This specific movie took so much communication,” Seiri said.
Seiri credited his previous experience on professional sets with helping him understand set etiquette and how crews communicate when something goes wrong. His father has also served as a mentor throughout his writing and filmmaking development.
Still, Mama Sunshine showed him there was more to learn.
“Communication was something that I thought I mastered, but no,” Seiri said.
Harris faced similar challenges as their productions became more ambitious. New crew positions meant learning how to communicate responsibilities clearly and make sure everyone understood what needed to happen.
The Film Changed How Its Creators View Social Media
Making a movie criticizing unhealthy online behavior could have pushed Seiri and Harris away from social media completely.
Instead, the experience made their relationship with it more complicated. Harris said he has become more selective about what parts of his life belong online.
“I try to be more mindful about what I post,” Harris said. “I know I don’t have to share everything to social media.”
Seiri reached a similar conclusion about privacy but also gained a greater appreciation for what social media can accomplish when used intentionally.
Promoting Mama Sunshine pushed the pair to appear on camera and market something they genuinely cared about. Seiri realized the same technology capable of becoming addictive can also connect artists with audiences they may never encounter otherwise.
Someone’s immediate community might not understand the work, he explained, while a person thousands of miles away could discover it and become a passionate supporter.
It creates an interesting contradiction perfectly suited to Mama Sunshine: a film warning about the dangers of social media is also using social media to find its audience.
Bardia Seiri And Ryan Harris Want Stories With Something To Say
Mama Sunshine also establishes the type of filmmakers Seiri and Harris hope to become.
Their earlier work frequently took the form of what Seiri calls “narrative PSAs,” tackling subjects including peer pressure, underage drug use and distracted driving. Instead of abandoning those socially conscious roots, the pair wants to make those ideas increasingly cinematic and entertaining.
Their next project is expected to tackle another issue they believe deserves greater attention, while incorporating more comedy.
Seiri believes filmmakers still need to ask themselves a simple question before trying to reach any particular demographic: Would they personally want to watch the movie they are making?
“If you don’t believe in it,” Seiri said, “it’s not going to turn out good.”
Entertainment remains just as important as the lesson.
Harris pointed to Everything Everywhere All at Once as a movie he can endlessly revisit because of how wildly creative ideas still serve an emotional story. Quentin Tarantino is another major influence for him.
Seiri named Once Upon a Time in Hollywood as one of his comfort movies while highlighting Bill Hader’s work on Barry as a major creative inspiration, particularly Hader’s ability to balance acting, writing, comedy, and directing.
For two filmmakers who grew up making projects together, Mama Sunshine represents a noticeably bigger step forward. The short tackles a subject rooted directly in the generation that created it while challenging the idea that social media obsession belongs only to young people.
More importantly, Seiri and Harris are not arguing that everyone should disconnect. Their film is interested in something more personal: recognizing when sharing a life online starts replacing the experience of actually living it.
Bardia Seiri wrote and directed Mama Sunshine, and Ryan Harris co-wrote and produced it. The team plans to use the short as both a standalone film and a potential proof of concept for a future feature.
SCREAM GUY Is The Filmmakers’ Next Step
Seiri and Harris are already moving forward with their next short film, Scream Guy, a horror-comedy that continues their interest in the darker side of online culture.
The film follows Jacob, a struggling livestreamer whose biggest moment of fame came from a viral video of him screaming. A year later, viewers still only know him as the “Scream Guy.” Hoping to finally build a real streaming career, Jacob attempts a 24-hour livestream. When he begins to believe something is inside his house, his audience suddenly grows, donations increase, and viewers encourage him to keep investigating even as the situation becomes more dangerous.
The filmmakers describe the project as an examination of what happens when another person’s suffering becomes entertainment. Rather than focusing only on how far someone will go for attention, Scream Guy also questions how much an audience can influence increasingly dangerous behavior once views, donations, and engagement begin rewarding it.
The short leans heavily into the livestream experience through webcams, handheld cameras, viewer counts, chat messages, and donations. The team is also creating a fictional streaming platform called StreamHive, with its interface and notifications becoming part of the storytelling itself.
Scream Guy represents a more technically ambitious follow-up to Mama Sunshine. Seiri and Harris said their previous crowdfunding campaign surpassed its $1,000 goal, giving them the opportunity to make the film while learning lessons they are carrying into their next production. The Scream Guy screenplay is already written, development on StreamHive has begun, and the team plans to take the finished short through the festival circuit.
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Sean Tajipour
Sean Tajipour is the Founder and Editor of Nerdtropolis and the host of the Moviegoers Society and Reel Insights Podcast. He is also a member of the Critics Choice Association. You can follow on Twitter and Instagram @Seantaj.
