MARBLEHEAD — “Growing Pains,” an entirely independent film featuring scenes shot in Marblehead, made its community premiere Tuesday evening at the Somerville Theater.
Directed by Catherine Argyrople, the movie is a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age story that follows the main character as she navigates her identity, sexuality, and fight against cancer, inspired by Argyrople’s own experience of battling and surviving cancer during her childhood.
“Growing Pains” made its world premiere at the Boston International Film Festival on April 14 before Tuesday’s community premiere.
A number of creative team members working on the film were Marblehead natives. Bianca Vranceanu was one of them, working as the script supervisor to track the accuracy and continuity of each scene.
Vranceanu was connected with Argyrople through a professor at Northeastern University, where both are graduates. She said she was extremely happy to see the town featured.
“As a Marblehead local, I was thrilled that some of the film was shot in our town,” Vranceanu said. “I really appreciated just being in Marblehead and getting to see our town on screen is really exciting.”
Argyrople, a Massachusetts native, selected a “wide range of locations that highlight the state’s natural beauty,” according to Vranceanu. The scenes in Marblehead were shot during summer 2022. A house, located near Beacon Street, was used as the main character’s home.
Struggling with her body image, the main character becomes obsessed with exercising. Scenes of her jogging were shot along Grace Oliver Beach.
Not only was the entire crew from Massachusetts, but the crew was majority female-led.
“Catherine was really thoughtful in assembling her team from behind the camera as well as in front of the camera, providing a lot of opportunities for women in film, which is so important,” Vranceanu said.
