Genre
Synopsis
Deep in rural Louisiana on a Choctaw Reservation, Toulouse Swanton, an agoraphobic intensely afraid of open spaces and crowds, has found punk-rock coping methods which convince everyone she’s “owning her illness.” Secretly, Toulouse desperately wants to cure herself of her condition.
Overwhelmed by the bills piling up for her mother’s care and with limited income options, Toulouse wrote a “travel” article on her hometown. Wildly imaginative and searingly funny, the piece sells to a major publication and goes viral. The editor invites Toulouse to meet to discuss further paid work... but in New Orleans where Toulouse said she was based. Toulouse agrees.
From the moment Toulouse agrees to Madison’s offer to write a regular travel column, she seals her fate. Suddenly her huge life force comes crashing up against the hugely crippling resistance within – her condition. Facing an impossible situation, she finds the solution in Sofiya. With her help, Toulouse writes “Destination Ukraine;” Sofiya promotes it; the piece goes viral; Madison wants more of the same. Toulouse knows to do that, she needs primary sources. She has to stay in New Orleans and milk the guests for the travel stories she can’t experience herself, and keep her agoraphobia a secret from everyone.
ON THE OUTS is an edgy irreverent character-driven “traumedy” with the deflected desperation of Fleabag and the radical self-examination of I May Destroy You, with a punk vibe. The show revels in the freedom that desperation unleashes.
Bio
Catherine Eaton’s feature debut as a director and writer, The Sounding, starring Harris Yulin (Training Day, Ozark) and Frankie Faison (The Wire, Silence of the Lambs), has won two-dozen awards on the festival circuit (including four Festival Grand Prizes) and was acquired or North American theatrical release prior to the pandemic. Catherine and The Sounding are the subject of a branded mini-doc by Stella Artois currently running on Hulu. Catherine was chosen for Tribeca's "Through Her Lens" Lab and Grant, and was selected as a Shadowing Director for Show Runner Ryan Murphy's Half Program on the hit Fox show 9-1-1. Her newest series "Breaking News" – based on her personal experience working with freelance news crews in conflict zones – was selected for IFP's Independent Film Week Project Forum. Catherine shares an Emmy with the production team on "The Human Toll of Ethanol" for Bloomberg TV, and did freelance production work for various news crews for five years. As an actor, she's been seen on Broadway, TV and film, and is currently nominated for a Helen Hayes Award. Catherine teaches Screenwriting, Screen Directing and The Art of the Pitch at Harvard University, and coaches clients privately on pitching and pitch packages. She has an undergraduate degree in International Law from Cornell University and an MFA from the Univ of MN / Guthrie. Her father is from Paraguay, and her mother is French-American.
Awards History
Tribeca Film Festival Through Her Lens Lab 2019 - Grant Recipient
Avalon Story Center Fellow 2021
Statera Mentee 2020
