[Five Cents] is a critique on current-day capitalism inspired by my own struggles with student debt, as well as my time working for the New York Federal Reserve (where I would raid the recycling for financial newspapers to use to make this film). It is about a consumer who goes in over his head after a string of purchases gets out of control.
The short was made by hand-drawing on thousands of old market data pages from the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Financial Times using ink, white-out, gouache paint, gold leaf, and other materials.
Mostly dialogue-free, the short does feature a fun cameo from Succession’s Brian Cox, which Hughes set up using the Cameo app.
