Film Screening and Guthrie Center Concert Feature Meg Hutchinson

Meg Hutchinson

Meg Hutchinson

(GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass.) – A pair of back-to-back events will showcase the sometimes difficult journey faced by Berkshire-born-and-raised singer-songwriter Meg Hutchinson, who is the subject of a documentary film screening at the Triplex on Thursday, July 16, 2015, at 7pm and who performs a solo concert at the Guthrie Center on Friday, July 17, at 8pm.

“Pack Up Your Sorrows” is a new documentary film featuring Hutchinson and exploring the realities of living a healthy life while coping with mental illness. The film follows Hutchinson as she learns to live a healthy life with bipolar disorder. Through her eyes, viewers explore different aspects of mood disorders –– how families try to deal with the illness in their midst, the biology of these diseases of the brain, and the effects of traditional and alternative therapies like medication and meditation.  Viewers learn, as Hutchinson has, that these illnesses of the brain are not a moral failing or a character weakness, and that treatment options are improving.

“Those of us who are experiencing mental illness, or are dealing with someone who is, know that it often brings with it a sense of shame and an inescapable loneliness,” Hutchinson says.  “These feelings can be exacerbated by the discrimination from a society that further marginalizes people who are most deserving of compassion.  I hope by telling my story I can help change that.”

Meg Hutchinson conducting film interview

Meg Hutchinson conducting film interview

Following two sold-out screenings in Boston and Rochester, N.Y., “Pack Up Your Sorrows” will have its Western Massachusetts premiere at the Triplex Cinema on July 16 at 7pm. Hutchinson and the filmmakers will be in attendance and participate in a post-show Q&A session. Pre-Sale tickets will be sold only online at http://packupyoursorrows.bpt.me/ and at the theater on the day of the performance, starting three hours before show time.

Other screenings are being coordinated with Active Minds chapters on college campuses later this year, as well as other mental health organizations. This year Hutchinson joined the Active Minds Speakers Bureau – working to change the conversation about mental health at colleges nationwide.

In “Pack Up Your Sorrows,” Hutchinson seeks to understand the role mental illness has played in the lives of authors and historical figures.  She explores what steps we can take as a society to reduce the epidemic of suicide, especially among young people. Throughout the film, Hutchinson has revealing conversations with some of the leading minds in the fields of mental wellness, including Kay Redfield Jamison (Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine), Nassir Ghaemi (MD, MPH, Professor of Psychiatry, Director of the Mood Disorders Program at Tufts Medical Center and author of A First-Rate Madness),  Steve McCarroll (Ph.D., Director of Genetics, Broad Institute’s Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research) and Richard J. Davidson (Ph.D., Founder of the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds; University of Wisconsin, Madison).

Scott Stossel (The Atlantic editor and author of My Age of Anxiety) talks about his own struggles with a mental disorder, and Hutchinson’s family openly discuss how they also labored in their own ways to deal with her illness. Hutchinson’s honest look at the difficult topic of suicide includes a conversation with former California Highway Patrol Sgt. Kevin Briggs, who has been instrumental in saving lives on the Golden Gate Bridge.

With Hutchinson ‘s own music and stunning images of the natural world guiding the way, this film is a unique and moving meditation on achieving wellness. Ultimately, it is a film about hope, healing, understanding, and the connection with others that positions us to live happy and productive lives.

The day after the film premieres in Great Barrington, Hutchinson will headline a solo show at the historic Guthrie Center as part of the Summer 2015 Troubadour Series, starting at 8pm. The documentary’s closing scene was filmed in the church.

A native of Berkshires, Meg Hutchinson is a nationally touring songwriter, poet and recording artist on Red House Records. She has released eight albums and won numerous songwriting awards in the US, Ireland and the UK, including recognition from the John Lennon Songwriting Contest, Billboard Song Contest and prestigious competitions at Merlefest, NewSong, Kerrville, Telluride and Rocky Mountain. She has been described as delivering “Music as powerful as it is gentle.”

Performer Magazine writes, “With a poet’s eye, Hutchinson captures so beautifully that human journey toward peace, toward forgiveness, toward acceptance.” In recent years, as a result of the messages in her songwriting and her dedication to mental health literacy, Meg has increasingly been asked to be a keynote speaker at universities, conferences and teaching hospitals around the country. Meg is a member of the Active Minds Speakers Bureau.

“Pack Up Your Sorrows” is the filmmakers’ third feature-length collaboration.  Executive Producer and Co-Director, Todd Kwait and Co-Producer and Director, Rob Stegman met Meg when she had a small part as a performer in a prior film about the Cambridge folk music scene.  Both were drawn to Meg’s story of her struggles with her mental illness and the prevalence of discrimination against people with mental illnesses opened the filmmakers’ eyes to the illness’ stigma.  They spent about 18 months working on this project, filming around Boston and Cambridge, in the Berkshires and traveling to Washington D.C., Baltimore, San Francisco and Wisconsin.

Kwait and Stegman first met as freshman at Boston University in the late 1970s and have collaborated on a number of projects. Previous productions include the award-winning “For the Love of the Music: the Club 47 Folk Revival” (2012) and last year’s “Tom Rush: No Regrets.” Kwait is President of Ezzie Films Shaker Heights OH, and previously produced and directed “Chasin’ Gus’ Ghost,” a history of jug band music, and “Vagabondo” about singer Vince Martin.  Stegman is President of BlueStar Media of Needham, MA and has been producing for corporate communications, broadcast and cable television for over 30 years; most notably “Old Ironsides Returns to Sea” for the History Channel, “Tim Allen: Just for Laughs” for TLC and “KnowTV”, a CableAce Award-winning educational program for Discovery.

Active Minds was founded by Alison Malmon when she was a junior at the University of Pennsylvania, following the suicide of her older brother, Brian. Brian, also a college student, had been experiencing depression and psychosis for three years but had concealed his symptoms.  Recognizing that few Penn students were talking about mental health issues though many were affected, Alison wanted to combat the stigma of mental illness, encourage students who needed help to seek it early, and prevent future tragedies like the one that took her brother’s life. She created Open Minds.  In 2003, a National headquarters and the new non-profit organization was established and renamed Active Minds, Inc., to reflect the progressive nature of this form of student advocacy in the mental health movement.

 

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