Cousins Callie Carpinteri and Emma Parks have finished filming their coming-of-age feature, expanding their Tribeca short into a story about three generations of one family.
Oscar nominee Lesley Ann Warren stars alongside Emma Parks in Dirty Towel, which has completed filming in the Chicago area, Deadline confirmed on October 27, 2026.
Cousins Callie Carpinteri and Parks co-wrote and produced the independent coming-of-age film, which marks Carpinteri’s feature directorial debut. It expands their short of the same name, which premiered at the Tribeca Festival on June 7, 2024.
Warren received her supporting-actress Oscar nomination in 1983 for playing Norma Cassidy in Victor/Victoria. Parks, whose credits include The Short Game, leads an ensemble that also includes Kristen Connolly (The Summer I Turned Pretty), Peyton Elizabeth Lee (Prom Pact), Conor Sherry (Snack Shack) and Sandrine Holt (Your Friends and Neighbors).
The feature takes place in the weeks before high school graduation. Parks plays Charlie, who is navigating sex, independence and shame passed down through her family. Her mother, Elizabeth, must confront her own trauma while dealing with the return of her judgmental mother—Charlie’s grandmother.
The short focused on a more contained encounter between Charlie and her mother. Charlie learns at six that sex makes her dirty; twelve years later, she struggles with shame after having sex for the first time while trying to hide it from her mother during Sunday errands. The feature broadens that mother-daughter story to include Elizabeth’s relationship with her own mother.
A Film Factual interview published on July 28, 2024 said feature development was already under way following the Tribeca premiere. The short went on to screen at more than 25 festivals worldwide, win multiple awards and accumulate more than 1.4 million views on YouTube.
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Before filming, the filmmakers said on the production’s website that they had completed the feature screenplay and launched fundraising for a planned summer shoot in the Chicago area. They said the film was majority funded within one month.
Carpinteri said Dirty Towel grew from the filmmakers’ own experiences with shame and a desire to tell a story that empowers people. She said audiences’ connection with the short had been meaningful and welcomed the chance to expand it with the feature’s cast and crew.
Women made up more than 77% of the feature’s crew, including an all-female team in its leading creative and producing roles. Cassidy Campbell served as an additional producer. The feature’s distributor and release date remain unannounced.
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