In these hyper partisan times, Americans of all political stripes too often share one thing: the economic pinch of paycheck-to-paycheck. It’s that all-too-common life that CT-based director Justin Liberman focuses on in his forthcoming film, An Ode to Mary Jo.

Folk singer Rhiannon Giddens plays the titular Mary Jo, a woman fighting the odds, and family drama, to make it to a life-changing job interview.

Sitting in a Manchester coffee shop, Liberman explained his motivation, “Mary Jo came out of this idea creating a portrait of today’s working class. There’s a whole swath of us – and frankly, I’m part of this demographic, too – where we’re one catastrophe away if one paycheck doesn’t come through.” 

But this movie is not here to depress.

“I didn’t want this to be poverty porn,” said Liberman. “It’s about the person who’s just working, working, working and struggling, but not letting the struggle define their predisposition.” It’s about finding joy and family and connection even when your bank account is overdrawn.

Liberman pulled from his own life to write this movie. His father, “a born salesman” moved his young family from Miami to Colorado to sell t-shirts on the rodeo circuit. After they settled in South Windsor, Justin joined his dad on China Town jaunts to stock up on counterfeit designer bags his father resold to New England gas stations.

“I’ve been in places where they would shut the gates and be like, ‘Don’t say a word, everybody be quiet,’ and we would hear the FBI raid the next stall; after, we’d get pizza and listen to the game driving home.”

These experiences gave Liberman a healthy survival instinct. He takes chances to provide for himself and his family, like when he cold-called director Michael Mann and scored a job on the movie Collateral, or when Liberman applied for a sports reporter job on Craigslist that was at ESPN and led him to win a regional Emmy.

Enlisting Giddens as Mary Jo was also a swing. Liberman and his wife met her Carolina Chocolate Drops bandmates after a show and the movie maker took his shot: he got the script in Giddens hands and made his ask. She accepted immediately, though it was a decade before the financing came together for the five-week shoot.

Co-written by Liberman and Erik Christian Hanson, the film, being an ode, will feature a killer soundtrack from Nonesuch Records featuring Giddens, and co-stars Ed Helms, Steve Earle, and Jason Isbell – and the banjo.

“A big part of the movie was redefining this sense of Americana for today’s culture, and it doesn’t get more Americana than a banjo,” said Liberman. “Americana is probably the thing about America that I truly, in my heart and soul, admire and love. But Americana today has been painted with this Republican right-wing brush that infuriates me.”

He hopes Mary Jo the movie and Mary Jo the archetype help viewers reclaim American music and an inclusive patriotism – and each other. “Mary Jo transcends politics and truly represents what we always hear is like the best of our country: the people.”