Devising the Dark Comedy of TWINLESS with James Sweeney
About this Spotlight
Spotlights feature conversations with high-profile film and television industry professionals who share helpful advice and insights on their career experiences and creative process. You do not need to have seen the work to participate.
This exclusive Spotlight features James Sweeney, the writer, director, and star of the dark comedy film Twinless. The film premiered to wide acclaim at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the U.S. Dramatic Audience Award and Special Jury Award for Acting.
In Twinless, two young men meet in a twin support group and form an unlikely friendship. Roman (Dylan O'Brien) and Dennis (Sweeney) both search for solace and an identity without their other halves and soon become inseparable outside the group. But when Roman meets Dennis’ ebullient co-worker, Marcie (Aisling Franciosi), all is revealed to be not what it seems, as each man harbors secrets that could unravel everything.
In this session, Sweeney discusses working as a multi-hyphenate, finding the right tone when writing across multiple genres, and the challenges of making the second feature.
SpotlightTeam
James Sweeney
James Sweeney is a multihyphenate filmmaker from Alaska. His debut feature, STRAIGHT UP, earned acclaim as the Breakthrough Centerpiece at 2019 Outfest and received a nomination for Best First Screenplay at the 2021 Film Independent Spirit Awards. Sweeney’s follow-up feature, TWINLESS, premiered this year at the Sundance Film Festival where it was awarded the US Dramatic Special Jury Award for Acting as well as the Audience Award.
Erica Elson
Moderator | Digital Course & Event Producer
Erica Elson is a Producer, Writer and Educator based in the mountains outside Los Angeles. Her short film, WING NIGHT, premiered at Method Fest in Los Angeles. She is the co-author of the book THE AWKWARD HUMAN SURVIVAL GUIDE and co-hosted a podcast by the same name on the 5by5 network for five years. Elson's articles have been published by HuffPost, Lifehacker, and Reader's Digest. Prior to working in education, she worked in television development and writers’ rooms such as VH1’s HINDSIGHT, where she had the chance to write for the spinoff web series PLANET SEBASTIAN.
Elson joined the Sundance Collab team in October 2021 and produces courses, Master Classes, and events in the areas of screenwriting, television writing, directing, producing, and documentary filmmaking. She has moderated conversations with Sofia Coppola, Richard Linklater, Alexander Payne, and Susannah Grant, among others.
Prior to Sundance, Elson was the Thesis Production Supervisor at the American Film Institute for five years. She oversaw several award-winning graduate thesis films, notably the 2021 BAFTA student film winner APART, TOGETHER and the 2023 Sundance Film Festival short WE WERE MEANT TO. While at AFI, Elson developed a passion for sustainable production and created the Green Film School Alliance, which includes forty schools on four continents. She holds a BA in Communication and Film Studies from Concordia University and an MFA in Screenwriting from the American Film Institute.