Interview: Elizabeth Swados of HBO's Documentary: MY DEPRESSION (THE UP AND DOWN AND UP OF IT)

Famed Broadway writer, director and composer Elizabeth Swados has struggled with depression her whole life. In this animated musical documentary based on Swados' graphic memoir, "My Depression: A Picture Book," she shares her experiences with this often-misunderstood condition to make a difficult and sometimes taboo topic more accessible and understandable.

Perhaps best known for her Broadway and international smash hit Runaways, Elizabeth Swados has composed, written and directed for over thirty years. Ms. Swados has been creating issue-oriented theater with young people for her entire career. Her latest musical, Kaspar Hauser: a foundling's opera premiered at the Flea Theater in Manhattan in the Spring of 2009. In conjunction with Forward Face, Ms. Swados recently released a children's CD called Everyone is Different that has been distributed to three thousand schools around the country. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux published Ms. Swados' book At Play: Teaching Teenagers Theater. She has published novels, non-fiction books, and children's books to great acclaim and received the Ken Award as well as a New York Public Library Award for her book My Depression: A Picture Book. She has just released her first collection of poems through Hanging Loose Press, The One and Only Human Galaxy explores the life of Harry Houdini and experiments with the idea of escapism. Her most recent book, Waiting was published by Hanging Loose press in Fall 2011. Other awards include five Tony nominations, three Obie Awards, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Ford Grant, a Helen Hayes Award, a Lila Acheson Wallace Grant, a PEN Citation and others.

I had the chance to speak to Elizabeth about HBO bringing her film to life. The choice to use graphics and animation to illustrate this dilapidating disease was the best way she could ever think to describe it. Breaking it down to its most basic level and explaining to the reader/viewer through this format is meant to take the audience back to a time when things were easier to understand, breaking it down as simply as possible. In the documentary, there is a scene where Elizabeth walks through a supermarket seeing all the varieties of depression that are "available" much like groceries would be. Depression is a blanket word, but it can be broken down into many different forms and victims can suffer from one or multiple aspects of Depression. When I asked Elizabeth about describing it this way, she told me that this is just the way she had always pictured in her head. As if she were walking through a store and seeing all of these different ailments as if they were on shelves and in bins. Not that she had a choice in which ones she would suffer from, but she could definitely relate to all the options as she suffered herself.

The documentary is a musical with original music written by Elizabeth as well as her writing partner, David Nelson. At Elizabeth's lowest moments, she has always turned to music so why not incorporate this into her film? While there isn't a particular type of music that always seems to be the go-to-cure all, she can always seem to find something, which is why in the film, there are a few different genres of music performed by the voice actors.

When asked what she wanted viewers to take away from this project, her answer had two parts. First, she wanted victims to know that they were not alone and this was how she could explain the disease to people. She really does hope that sufferers of depression would be able to relate to one or many aspects of her story and know that there is someone else (many, actually) going through the same thing. And second, she wanted viewers to understand just how complicated this disease can be. It is not a choice, it is not as simple as choosing to be in a good mood or a bad mood, it is a disease. Having a family member or loved one that is afflicted with this disease can be incredibly frustrating and difficult, but patience and support are always key. Elizabeth is adamant that this message is important to get out into the world as depression has always been a part of hers and her family's life for generations.

Sigourney Weaver plays the character of Liz in the documentary. Sigourney and Elizabeth became friends when they worked together at The Flea Theater in New York. Elizabeth asked Sigourney to voice the part knowing Sigourney understood the work and she agreed. Other voices include veteran stage and screen actors, Steve Buscemi, Fred Armisen and Dan Fogler.

MY DEPRESSION: (THE UP AND DOWN AND UP OF IT) is directed by David Wachtenheim, Robert Marianetti and Elizabeth Swados; produced by Roz Lichter; producer, Josh Hetzler; screenplay, Robert Marianetti, David Wachtenheim and Elizabeth Swados; musical score, David Nelson and Elizabeth Swados. For HBO: supervising producer, Sara Bernstein; executive producer, Sheila Nevins. It premieres MONDAY, JULY 13 (9:00-9:30 p.m. ET/PT), exclusively on HBO.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of HBO

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