There Are Two Powerful True Stories Behind the Movie ‘Suncoast’

After a limited theatrical run, Suncoast arrived on Hulu on February 9. As viewers watch the deeply moving coming-of-age dramedy, they will likely be curious if it is based on a true story.

The movie follows Doris (Nico Parker), a high school student whose brother, Max (Cree Kawa), is terminally ill. After Doris and her mother, Kristine (Laura Linney), move Max into a hospice care facility, Doris is determined to lead a “normal” high school life. However, while she goes through the motions of high school friendships, parties, and prom, she continues struggling to understand what her true feelings are about her brother’s terminal diagnosis. Although her mother is frequently too focused on Max to pay much attention to her, Doris soon forms an unlikely friendship with Paul (Woody Harrelson), an activist drawn to the hospice due to the ongoing case of Terri Schiavo.

In my opinion, Suncoast is one of the best and most underrated films of the year. It’s a wonderful depiction of life and death and the complicated feelings that arise when one’s family member is terminally ill. Despite dealing with such heavy topics, the film is rarely grim as it is laced with dark humor, capturing the sometimes odd ways families learn to cope with their situation. Additionally, it validates the very different views, beliefs, and behaviors of all three lead characters, acknowledging that there’s no right way to grieve or perceive death. There is an especially moving sense of rawness and realness in scenes of the Schiavo protests and Doris’ grief, raising the question of whether the story is based on truth.

The true stories behind Suncoast

The opening credits of Suncoast confirm that the movie is a semi-autobiographical tale, as it draws details from two true stories. The central story arc draws from the life of Suncoast writer and director Laura Chinn. Like Doris, Chinn navigated loss at a very young age. When she was a teenager, her brother Max Chinn, to whom the film is dedicated, was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. She and her family spent six years caring for Max at home before he entered hospice in 2005. As a result, Max’s and Doris’ storyline in Suncoast follows Chinn’s experiences quite closely.

She explained to TIME, “My brother was sick for six years, and there were so many feelings, so many times I was taking care of him, pushing his wheelchair around the neighborhood, taking him to get a portrait taken at Sears and he’s blind and deaf but I’m telling him, ‘You have to sit here, we’re doing this for mom.'” Of course, given the time limits of the film, she couldn’t fully convey every experience, which is why it’s more condensed and, as she says, “extreme.” However, she did take creative liberties with the story, especially regarding Kristine.

In the film, Kristine is one of the most complicated characters. Audiences want to feel sympathy for her, given that her child is terminally ill, but, at the same time, will be horrified by her treatment of Doris. For the vast majority of Suncoast, she acts as if Max is her only child and tries to force Doris not to have any livelihood and to be buried in grief as she is. Chinn explained that “Kristine is not my mother,” but she still wanted to convey poignantly to viewers how she sometimes felt forgotten and like she wasn’t grieving correctly. Other details, such as Doris having to choose between prom and being with her brother, were also creative liberties.

However, the friendships Doris strikes up reflected how Chinn was treated in real life. Despite admitting that her situation made her “feel like a freak,” she also acknowledged that no one ever treated her terribly or rudely over her situation, which is reflected in how surprisingly kind and wonderful Doris’ high school friends are. Additionally, Harrelson’s character is loosely based on screenwriter Anthony Tambakis, a close friend who made Chinn “feel like there were good men in the world.” While Paul’s activist activities and backstory are fictional, the friendly and warm presence he gives off was inspired by Tambakis.

The story of Terri Schiavo

There’s also a second true story hidden in Suncoast. Throughout the film, Schiavo’s story sort of plays out in the background. Every time Doris and Kristine arrive at the hospice facility, it is surrounded by a large crowd of protestors. As the film proceeds, viewers learn that the crowds are protesting the removal of life support from a patient at the facility, Schiavo. Paul is staunchly against the removal of life support for Schiavo due to the passing of his own wife.

Schiavo is a real-life woman who happened to be staying at the same hospice center where Chinn’s brother was staying. During this time, her case was ongoing, taking the world by storm. In 1990, Schiavo was a 26-year-old insurance broker who suffered cardiac arrest. Although she was resuscitated, she suffered severe brain damage due to prolonged loss of oxygen. As a result, she was left in a vegetative state that numerous doctors ruled was irreversible. Ultimately, she would spend 15 years in this state, kept alive by a feeding tube.

The removal of her feeding tube was delayed by many years due to her parent’s refusal to remove it, despite her husband’s insistence that she would not have wanted to be kept alive in this state. Her parents’ and husband’s dispute would go through court, all the way up to the federal level, before the courts finally ruled in her husband’s favor in 2005, permitting end-of-life care to be withdrawn from Schiavo. To this day, Schiavo remains an icon of the right-to-die movement, and it’s quite powerful to see pieces of her story play out from the perspective of those with terminally ill family members at the time.

(featured image: Hulu)