A man in recovery plays basketball as an outlet to help him stay sober. A musician turns to drinking to cope with his mother’s cancer diagnosis. A teacher faces a moral dilemma: Should she punish a student caught cheating, knowing the student comes from an abusive home?
These are The North End Stories, a trilogy of short films set in Burlington’s Old and New North Ends, inspired by the real struggles of people with whom filmmaker Adam Benay grew up in Vermont. At Cinema for Change — a free event on Wednesday, March 26, at Main Street Landing’s Film House in Burlington — Benay will screen the short films and participate in a discussion with several leaders of local recovery and social services organizations.
“People put such a stigma on addiction, as though we can’t all relate.” Adam Benay
Benay, who splits his time between Brooklyn and his hometown of Fairfax, started producing the films after graduating from Middlebury College in 2014 with a degree in film and media culture. The 33-year-old hopes that, by presenting stories that are both uplifting and realistic, the event will foster empathy for those battling addiction.
“People put such a stigma on addiction, as though we all can’t relate,” Benay said. “Just because someone has never shot heroin doesn’t mean that someone has not said, ‘Gosh, it’s hard to just drink one tonight.'”
The first film, “Pomeroy,” intersperses scenes of the main character, Trevor, attending therapy with clips of him playing basketball at Pomeroy Park. Trevor, played by Middlebury College grad Luke Smith-Stevens, is participating in a program that allows him to avoid jail time by staying clean. Benay said he based the plot on a 2016 Wall Street Journal article about a Vermont program that sends low-level offenders with drug addictions to treatment instead of prison. The article focused on program enrollee Todd Popovitch, who had been a standout high school basketball player before he began using heroin.
Benay, who has obsessive-compulsive disorder, said he drew on his many years in therapy to write authentic dialogue between the protagonist and his psychiatrist. “I’m finally being, like, not a piece of shit,” Trevor says during his appointment, drawing a laugh.
The film resonated with Cameron Lauf, executive director of Turning Point Center of Chittenden County, which offers coaching and support groups for people in recovery. Lauf played basketball in college and dreamed of going pro, but a heroin addiction derailed those plans. He sought treatment in Vermont and, like the character in the film, found solace in sports — Lauf took up ice hockey during his recovery.
“It really is identical to my story,” Lauf said. “It put me right back in my own counseling and treatment.”
Lauf will join the post-screening discussion alongside Chris Smith, chief clinical officer of Spectrum Youth & Family Services; Bethany Mahler, an alcohol and substance abuse counselor at the University of Vermont Medical Center; and Carolyn Millham, principal of Porters Point School.
The second short film, “Blue in Green,” follows two storylines: that of a couple who use drugs and steal catalytic converters from cars, and that of a musician — played by Benay — who abuses alcohol. The parallel narratives highlight the different sides of substance use, Benay said, emphasizing that addiction can affect anyone.
The film includes moments of levity, too, such as the musician cracking jokes about Phish during a performance. Those local references help make the movie feel distinctly Vermont, though the location is never directly stated.
“Anyone watching from Vermont would know it’s Vermont,” Benay said.
Viewers may also recognize familiar faces on-screen, including local comedian Jared Hall, who plays the boyfriend in “Blue in Green”; and Middlebury Acting Company artistic director Melissa Lourie, who plays the psychiatrist in “Pomeroy.”
The trilogy concludes with “Petal Fall,” which won the Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival award for Best Vermont-Made Film last August. The storyline follows a teacher who catches a student cheating. Knowing he comes from a troubled home, she grapples with whether to allow the student to go on the school field trip to Montréal.
The film is partly based on Benay’s memories of a sixth-grade classmate who was so excited for a school trip to Montréal that “all of a sudden he wasn’t this hard-shell exterior, pissed off all the time,” the filmmaker recalled. “He was giddy.” Benay imagined how crushing it would have been for his classmate to miss the trip.
Benay also drew inspiration from his day job as a third-grade teacher in New York City. He related to the idea of wanting to go above and beyond for students facing hardship but also recognizing his limits.
“At a certain point, you realize that it is a job that you go home from and there’s only so much you can do for another person,” Benay said. “You can’t fix everything for them, and that’s really hard to deal with.”
“Petal Fall” intentionally shifts the trilogy’s focus from individuals directly struggling with substance abuse to those affected by the addiction of others, Benay explained, demonstrating the ripple effects of addiction within a community.
According to Lauf, these kinds of local stories are desperately needed.
“It’s hard to find film and other art that’s showing real stories about the pains and struggles of recovery and mental health, specific to Vermonters,” Lauf said. Benay’s stories, he added, “are really the same stories I hear from all my friends.”
March 19, 2025: This story was updated to reflect shifts in the speaker lineup for Cinema for Change.
The original print version of this article was headlined “Based on a True Story | Real struggles with addiction and recovery inspire a trilogy of films set in Burlington’s North End”
This article appears in Mar 19-25, 2025.
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