Long-Lost Love of The Pepsi-Cola Addict

A twin finds a twin finding their language

I was seeking language.

While developing the short film Twinsburg — a process of a few years where the story evolved from a mockumentary’s absurd premise into a bittersweet tragicomedy — I was searching for the language to authentically depict twinship. To defy stereotype.

My brother and I were confronting possibilities of twinlessness, and while we weathered the long moment intact, I needed more language to understand it. More of the real. More of the ambivalent. And less of the bullshit. Less of the idealizations, and rosy accounts of ESP, and automatic friends solving Olsen-style mysteries.

“I always wished I had a twin,” struck me each time as a strange contortion of empathy. Was any other demographic ever substituted into this formula? Could one earnestly wish for an arranged marriage? (Note: the possessive difference between “having” and being.) (And note: in past tense, somewhere they stopped wishing.)

During that period, I was grateful to find Marjorie Wallace’s biography of June-Alison and Jennifer Gibbons from 1986, The Silent Twins. Apart from the sensational details (mostly-quiet twins! vandalism!), what spoke to me was the revelation of their complicated bond, mostly through a creative practice that showed them a path to their own voices. Though situationally-mute through adolescence, even with their family, they wrote prolifically.

As a twin who was also searching for the language with which to form an identity, the fragments of their writing spoke to me. And the daringly punk-rock title of one work in particular intrigued me.

I learned that June-Alison had managed to self-publish a novel at 16, not long before a a miscarriage of justice led to her and Jennifer’s indefinite institutionalization. Though they were finally released after 11 years, only June-Alison survived.

The novel survived too. A few of the 185 copies from the vanity press left floating decades later.

And 40 years after its initial publication, with the help of her friends and fellow artists, June-Alison Gibbons’ The Pepsi-Cola Addict was republished.

It is a staggering, bittersweet story of passion set in 1981 Malibu, from a young artist holding nothing back and finding her voice, her own language.

It took me several years to read initial excerpts of the novel, retyped and xeroxed passages downloaded from outdated websites. I searched for the copyright holder, never imagining I’d reach the author herself. The vanity press was gone. What about Wallace? No reply. I asked the screenwriter of The Silent Twins film adaptation when she guest lectured at the UCR Palm Desert MFA program. No leads.

Developing a film project without rights to the underlying material was generally — universally — considered a waste of time. Still, across a few years, I scribbled on it. As I had scribbled for years on Twinsburg. Finding language, to see what I even had to say. Something was gestating.

Then:

Just as I was sending out an initial treatment to a real Agent (no reply), June-Alison’s wonderful friends popped up online. They were helping her republish a limited run of the book. The timing — the unfolding — was impeccable.

I wrote a letter. In it I talked about Twinsburg, how instrumental June-Alison and Jennifer’s stories were to helping me create something authentic. Giving me permission to lean into the ambivalent. Graciously, her friends agreed to forward the letter. And somehow, on my birthday, I sat there on a video call looking into June-Alison’s eyes.

June-Alison Gibbons in 1981, age 16.

She said she had seen so much of her and Jennifer in Twinsburg. Of course she had: I had forgotten through the project’s long creation the inspiration for one of the key character’s names: June.

I talked about my vision for the film adaptation, said I would share an initial treatment.

She read it and approved. On one condition, we agreed:

I write, direct, and produce, retaining “final cut,” an industry term for being the final word on what stays in and goes from the picture. That means an independent production. That means a distribution strategy with festival and theatrical exhibition, intended to build real audiences, start real conversations. That means, even if, hypothetically, a Big Streamer wanted to sponsor to the project, and even indulge it with a few screenings — but compromise the condition — we would thank them and find another way. That means a European production, with the possibility but not necessity of a U.S. co-production. That means not waiting on any cavalry from California.

June-Alison and I signed a shopping agreement, granting Jog Films exclusive rights to adapt the novel into a film. With no money, no producers or distributors, but with the wind in our goddamn sails for some indie bravura filmmaking.

A film with teenagers, violence, crime, queer and age-gap intimacy, a brand-name cola, and a period soundtrack.

(Producing partners-to-be, are you sweating yet? 💌 )

In short, the condition means being the keeper of a young artist’s bold, hard-fought vision that stood against the ascendent cultural conservatism of the early 1980s. (Looking at you, 2025). Like June-Alison at 16, we will be creating it on our own terms.

“Life is a confusement.”

— June-Alison Gibbons, The Pepsi-Cola Addict

When language does not suffice, we evolve it.

When systems do not suffice, we find other ways to share and create community.

I’m interested in championing a rapturous, daring, hilarious creation — championing above all the fact that it, and its creator, survived against all odds.

I’m interested in love, its defiance and struggle. Love tainted, unrequited. Love redeemed, of-the-self. I’m interested in the things we don’t talk enough about. I’m interested in divorce, addiction and suicide, desire, queerness and loneliness. I’m interested in homes in transition, of the underage adults we make of older siblings and their friends, the tenderness and brutality. I’m interested in the journey of discovering one’s voice, of holding onto one’s dreams.

I’m interested in tragicomedy, the life genre.

If you are too, consider coming along for the ride. Pledge what you can and be a part of the unfolding.

For paid subscribers, we’ll be bringing you up to speed on the development process: adapting the screenplay, pitching the project, seeking producing partners and financing, scouting locations in Spain, and much more…

P.S.

An inspirational sizzle reel: