B WORD | Omeleto Comedy

Omeleto Comedy
Omeleto Comedy
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Published 2024-07-09
A woman is left out as her friends get baby fever.


B WORD is used with permission from Honora Talbott. Learn more at honoratalbott.com/.


Leah is a 30-something woman who doesn't want kids. Though she's happily married to Kevin, she's fulfilled by her work and her art and has no interest in babies. But as she gets older, her friend circle is changing. As more of her friends become parents, Leah has less in common with them than she used to.

At a baby shower, she discovers her best friend Deena is pregnant, and Leah is crushed. She decides to make new friends -- only to discover she's stumbled into a cringeworthy misunderstanding.

Directed by lead actor Honora Talbott from a script co-written with Bill Posley, this witty, warmly awkward short comedy is, at first glance, a snapshot skewering "baby fever" among a group of friends in Los Angeles through the lens of someone who has made a different choice for her life. As the storytelling progresses, though, it honors and explores Leah's feelings of sadness, uncertainty and doubt as her friends' paths begin to diverge from hers, adding a layer of emotional resonance to the buoyant satire.

Shot with a mellow Californian warmth in the visuals, the cheeky opening scenes show Leah secretly celebrating a negative pregnancy test and then dealing with a zealous mom at her job as a children's photographer. They form a solid starting point for understanding Leah's character and world. She doesn't want to become a mother, and yet she exists in a world -- portrayed with punchy, sharp humor -- that says her ultimate fulfillment as a woman is through becoming one.

This coalesces when Leah attends a baby shower, which is a prime opportunity to poke fun at the modern rituals and mores surrounding pregnancy, birth and motherhood, as seen via Leah's skeptical eyes. From obsessive preening on social media to the lunacy of shower games to the absurdly infantile merch and decorations, it's all too much for Leah. But what stings most is when Leah discovers her seemingly like-minded best friend Deena is now pregnant, too.

As an actor, Talbott conveys Leah's feelings of abandonment with a deftly understated poignancy that gives the film an emotional grounding, even amidst the wisecracks and the flourishes of satire. When Dee is claimed by the moms at the shower as one of their own, Leah decides she needs to expand her social circle. How Leah goes about finding more like-minded new friends and what she discovers about them forms the last part of the narrative, as well as its final, witty zinger, which is both deliciously awkward but also points out how deep-seated the assumption of motherhood is for women.

Though it lands its comedic jabs with aplomb, what lingers in B WORD is Leah's sadness at not being seen as a valid, complete human being for wanting something different, as well as some keen observations of how such social isolation happens: the careless assumptions underlying her conversations in the name of "sisterhood," the self-absorbed disinterest in realms of experience outside of being a mom. Certain aspects of the story could fruitfully be explored in a longer format -- husband Kevin's desire for a baby, for instance, and how it might change a happy relationship -- but there's a sense at the end that Leah is the last one standing against an onslaught, set on another path into uncharted territory.
All Comments (11)
  • @nancyr3810
    Thank you. From a 65 year old God bless be free always love comes first.
  • @Ribberflavenous
    Nicely done, great twist at the end. I am a hubby 'who gets it'. On a personal side, my wife has no children by choice, and I concur it is a good decision. Motherhood is a wonderful thing, nurturing a newborn is a gift many women are born with, and some grow into it. There are also those who would list motherhood somewhere in Dante's rings. For my wife, a crying child is slinging knives into her ears. I guarantee that if you forced her to cohabitate with an infant, bad things would happen. She is not a bad person, but enduring children is simply something she cannot do and she wisely avoids them. Sadly there are such tremendous societal pressures toward motherhood that some women, who should never be mothers, deliver and keep their children out of shame or guilt, and these situations rarely end well. Please try and recognize motherhood is not for everyone.
  • @sugarsnap1000
    The decision of not having kids doesn’t need to be over emphasized or become a social debate. There are women who know they’re not made for motherhood and shouldn’t feel the need to explain but if the partner thinks it’s gonna happen it should be explicitly stated, it’s not.
  • @crystalweible152
    Motherhood is NOT for everyone. I am the oldest of four, I was 9 when my sister was born. I remember being expected to go googoogaga when she was born. I am menopausal now and still do NOT regret it. Been married to a man I've known since high school and wouldn't change a thing!😂