Zelda Adams: Be the Representation that You Want to See.

At the Podium with Patrick Huey

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The Open Road Sings a Lullaby

Zelda is a woman on the precipice of the next chapter of her life. When we sat down to speak in the twilight of the Summer of 2022 – the summer of student loan forgiveness (kind of), the summer of Mar Lago, the summer of soaring record temperatures in the Unites States – Zelda was in a reflective state as she was preparing to head off to start her freshman year at Columbia University. For Zelda and her parents John and Toby, like so many other thousands of students and their parents, the late summer season is an especially poignant time, marking the passage of life with the start of a new academic year. New clothes are bought. Marks ticked off on doorframes to record growth spurts. New dreams emerge.

When I asked Zelda what her parents have given her this far into her life she said, “A great friendship. They treated us like equals. Straight from the beginning, especially in the film making process, they’ve allowed me and Lulu to have equal input in the storyline and what kind of film we want to make. Which has taught me that my opinion matters. It really sculpted me into the person I am now.”

That great friendship with her parents and sister Lulu was forged on the vast system of roads and highways that connect the nation like arteries of a heart; eating in the tasty diners along the open road; and camping along the coastal shores of Oregon. The landscape of America. For the last 12 years of her life, Zelda and her family have explored those highways and byways in an RV, making films along the way. Suspenseful films. Horror Films. Cinematically beautiful and award-winning films that have become cult classics and caught the attention of the New York Times and Vogue, Rotten Tomatoes, and Shudder Films. Hellbender, The Deeper You Dig, and Halfway to Zen to name a few. Zelda and her family began this unusual journey, when Zelda was six years old. When dreams of creation, agency and plain old fun and adventure led them to those beckoning roads. Her notches on the doorframe are preserved in celluloid where you see a young, tiny child become the person she is now.

Who is that person now? She is 18. She is a writer and a critically acclaimed actress. She is a musician. And like so many of her generation, Zelda is keenly aware of the dynamics of social and political change she is inheriting.

She is also that woman on the precipice. When I ask her what her biggest leap of faith in a life has been. A life that has been a mixture of saying yes and defying convention and boundaries she says simply, “My biggest leap of faith is right now. I’m about to go off to school in six days and I am feeling excited, nervous, scared. It’s a whirlwind of feelings. I think I’m just going through a really big transition right now. Going to school and not making films with my parents anymore and not having their friendship instantly, physically right by my side is going to be really really different. So, it’s a big leap right now, and I’m excited for it.”

We are too, Zelda.

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