#FIRSTLOOK: “THE SNAKE” TO PREMIERE AT SXSW ’26

P.E.I.’s award-winning producer Jenna MacMillan launches her directorial debut at SXSW with THE SNAKE. An off-beat comedy written by and starring Susan Kent (Who’s Yer Father?, This Hour Has 22 Minutes), THE SNAKE follows Jamie, an unlikely hero, who just can’t seem to get her life together. Stacked with a stellar Canadian cast including Robin Duke (Saturday Night Live), Emma Hunter (Slo Pitch), Dan Petronijevic (The Trades, Letterkenny), Jimbo (RuPaul’s Drag Race), and comedy legend Jonathan Torrens (I Kill the Bear, Letterkenny), THE SNAKE re-teams MacMillan and Kent after their success collaborating on Jeremy Larter’s Who’s Yer Father? which broke box office records in Charlottetown. THE SNAKE will have its World Premiere at SXSW in March 2026 where it is one of 8 titles selected for the Narrative Feature Competition.

“SXSW was the festival that inspired me to tell stories like this.” says director and award-winning producer Jenna MacMillan. “We’ve always seen it as the dream festival for THE SNAKE to have its world premiere. To be the first film shot in Prince Edward Island to screen there, and to share my home with SXSW audiences is a real honour.”

Despite her best attempts, Jamie just can’t get it together. THE SNAKE brings us along for a wild ride as Jamie navigates a rocky relationship, a few tussles with her venomous mother, and a recent eviction from her rightful inheritance, her late-Nana’s bright-pink house. THE SNAKE brings a new kind of heroine to the screen in this off-beat, dark comedy.

“I started THE SNAKE wanting to write about ungovernable women, bad girls,” says writer and star Susan Kent, “but not the fantasy of the hot crazy demon-in-the-sack girl trope created by dudes. I wanted to make a story of a woman who came out of the rubble of reality, and so Jamie came into focus, inspired by my life, friends’s lives and women around me, and became an unlikely hero. I have a deep attraction to people who carry on swinging in the face of shitty circumstances. We’ve all been scarred and dented up by our childhood, by life, unintentionally damaged by the people around us, and it felt like a privilege to write a woman who makes everything worse in a sort of fiery crash-course self education in how to be your own home.”

A Club Red Production, THE SNAKE is produced by Sharlene Kelly and Melani Wood and executive produced by Jenna MacMillan, Susan Kent, and Bill Lundy. Club Red Productions is founded by Jenna MacMillan (Playback ‘10 to Watch in 2025’) and behind the films Who’s Yer Father?, Back For The Holidays, Tracy & Martina: Goin’ Out West and more.

THE SNAKE will have its World Premiere at SXSW in March 2026. THE SNAKE is part of the Narrative Feature Competition.

Support for THE SNAKE provided by Telefilm Canada and the Prince Edward Island Film Fund.

Follow THE SNAKE:
IG: @thesnakefilm
IG: @clubredproductions

About Club Red Productions
Club Red Productions is Prince Edward Island’s flagship film and television company. Founded by award-winning producer/director Jenna MacMillan, Club Red is committed to bold, creator-driven storytelling with a distinctly East Coast edge. With a growing slate of premium features and series, the company is helping put PEI on the map as the next must-watch hub for Canadian production.

Learn more about Club Red Productions here.