Joan Holden
Nickel and Dimed
February 13, 2009-March 8, 2009

based on Barbara Ehrenreichs bestselling book Nickel and Dimed, on (Not) Getting by in America.

Barbara Ehrenreich sets out to experience how one third of Americas working class survives on low wage jobs. She crosses the country performing double shifts as a chambermaid and waitress. She lives in tiny rooms, begs from food pantries, and suffers humiliation from young supervisors at Mall-mart. She learns humility from her gallant co-workers. They are the homeless waitress pushing fifty, the hotel maid who eats empty hotdog rolls, the nursing home cook who retreats into fantasy, and a house maid who is terrified her pregnancy will end her job and a 50-cent raise. This true-to-life odyssey is real, provocative, funny, maddening, full of attitude and all American.

Directed by Denise Dillard