MADDIE’S SECRET is comedian, writer, and actor John Early’s critically acclaimed directorial debut starring himself as Maddie, a plucky dishwasher who leaps to viral superstardom at a trendy food content creation company. While her life seems picturesque—complete with an adoring husband (Eric Rahill), ride-or-die best friend (Kate Berlant) and a cupboard full of ethically-sourced chili crisp—mounting professional pressures threaten to reawaken a hidden secret from her past. Maddie’s Secret is a love letter to the eating disorder TV-movie-of-the-week which in its time was already a lo-fi, tawdry love letter to the lush melodramas of a once thriving studio system. It uses the cinematic language and emotional expressiveness of this bygone genre to explore our very strange, food-obsessed moment. But it is also just a fairy tale. Maddie is a blonde in trouble, lost in the dark forest of content. A pitch-perfect blend of satire, melodrama, daring tonal shifts this film marks Early as a promising new voice in comedic cinema.