Oklahoma teens bring personal story to the screen in award-winning short film

"Self-Reflecting," an award-winning short film created by three Oklahoma teens at Quartz Mountain, explores anxiety through the lens of a young man confronting his intrusive thoughts in a bathroom mirror.

Wednesday, July 9th 2025, 8:30 am

By: Brooke Cox

TULSA, Okla. -

A bathroom mirror becomes the stage for a mental battle in Self-Reflecting, a short film written and directed by Tulsa's Lucas J. Jackson. The 4-minute film follows a young man coping with a panic attack and confronting a version of himself—his intrusive thoughts personified in the reflection.

Shot in just six days during the 2024 Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute (OSAI) at Quartz Mountain, the project turned a deeply personal experience into a powerful piece of storytelling.

Jackson said he wrote the script during a summer of emotional turbulence after graduating from high school, drawing from feelings of isolation and the need to process them through art. The result was a script he describes as a manifestation of everything swirling in his head at the time.

Creative Collaboration at Quartz Mountain

Jackson wasn't alone in bringing Self-Reflecting to life. The film was created with the help of cinematographer and assistant director Will Renner of Broken Arrow, and actor Griffin Edge of Oklahoma City. Together, the trio faced significant scheduling hurdles—Jackson and Renner were enrolled in OSAI's Film and Video discipline, while Edge was part of the Acting discipline. Their class times conflicted, leaving only lunch breaks and late nights to film.

"The acting discipline, which I was a part of, and Lucas and Will's film discipline schedules didn't line up," Edge said. "So we had to shoot during lunch breaks and late into the night, long past when we were allowed to."

The tight timeline nearly derailed the project entirely. They lost valuable filming hours searching for a borrowed pair of glasses—a key wardrobe piece—which had to be replaced mid-shoot.

Despite the chaos, Jackson said, "We got it done, and I couldn't be happier with what the finished project was."

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A Dual Role and a Technical Challenge

Edge took on the challenge of portraying both the anxious protagonist, Leigh, and the sardonic, belittling Reflection. The two characters are philosophical opposites—one vulnerable and fragile, the other brutally critical but oddly nurturing. Edge said the script's depth drew him in immediately.

"Being able to display two sides of oneself with no subtlety is an acting dream," he said. "Like, imagine a Shakespearean soliloquy where the audience gets to talk back."

The technical complexity of filming a character interacting with his own reflection was one of the draws for Renner.

"I had a ton of fun figuring out weird ways to film the mirror," Renner said. "We would often adjust things 'til the moment we hit record, finding new ways to visually tell the story."

Renner also played a minor role in the film and handled co-editing duties alongside Jackson. The pair pulled an all-nighter to finalize the project just before the deadline.