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[0:00] Leah Walsh: Hi, and welcome to The Compass, the podcast documenting the struggles of life as an artist.

[0:05] Leah Walsh: I'm Leah Walsh.

[0:07] Leah Walsh: Hi everyone. My guest today is Amy Berryman.

[0:10] Leah Walsh: Amy is a playwright and actor based in New York City. She and I have known each other peripherally through the community for the last eight or nine years, I believe. We were cast in a reading together years ago, and we've kept in touch. I've been so impressed watching her develop her writing skills over the years and her persistence and groundedness as an artist is something I really admire. She had her first production of her play, Walden, earlier this year in the West End in London. It was in a socially distanced production by Sonia Friedman Productions The Reemerge Season. And it's also just finishing up a run at Theatre Works Hartford. I believe that finishes on August 29th. If you get a chance to see it in person or you can view it virtually as well. So thank you, Amy, for your time and your honesty. You can check out what Amy's up to at www.amy-berryman.com. I hope you all enjoy the 178th episode of The Compass.

[1:21] Amy Berryman: Yes, me too.

[1:24] Leah Walsh: But I'm gonna dive into the deep end with the first question, and then we'll see where it takes us.

[1:29] Amy Berryman: Okay.

[1:30] Leah Walsh: Okay. So what do you do to try to keep from going to the dark side as an artist?

[1:38] Amy Berryman: I think there's I was thinking about it, and there's like two kinds of dark sides. One that feels really productive and good, and as a writer, I need to like use it. Um, one that I you know, drawing from all of the pain and, you know, turmoil, anxiety, like putting all of it into the work. And then there's the dark side that's just um I feel like it's just the closest to meeting like a demon or pure evil or something. Cause it feels like this voice that just compares me to any person I might compare myself to, people I never would have imagined I could compare myself to. It uh tells me I'm a failure, use like it it's really intense. Uh and I think for me that one of the main ways is not avoiding it and going through it or like confronting it and dealing with it when it comes up 'cause I can really easily just avoid, avoid, avoid like, you know, pick up my Instagram numb on my phone or drink about it or um not, you know, not actually deal with it.

Um and so through actually writing or sitting and crying and feeling all the painful things I feel like is sort of how I'm able to move through it. I also do things like listen to podcasts with interviews with writers and other artists that are um inspiring and also just community I think is the big one too, like not isolating myself in it. I think that in twenty twenty I really um found myself isolating in my dark side moments. Um rather than and when I would reach out to like the writers groups that I'm in, my friends, family that's you know actually connecting about it my therapist therapy the main way to not go to the dark side um that I think just facing it is and and also knowing that it will always be a part of the journey um but when it comes up it always just feels like wait no I thought I was past this like I was I was past this um I think it's easy to forget too that most people feel it it's easy to say like I'm the only person that feels this way the only person who does the comparison or the only person who's so down on themselves.

[4:20] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[4:21] Amy Berryman: Which just is not true. And I think it also uh really comes up for me when I've done something really vulnerable or brave I it almost is like I have a vulnerability hangover or something where I I feel ultra sensitive the next day like I went and saw my play this weekend and hadn't seen it um at Theatre Hartford and hadn't seen it in a week and it was wonderful. Um but the next day I was so just like I could feel it because even though I've seen it many times over the past several months which is a whole thing we can talk about but it still is just so exposing to sit and like listen to words that you write and kind of exposing and scary to claim that space um yeah there's a lot to think yeah I definitely know that feeling you're talking about where maybe there's like adrenaline that night and then the next morning you're like, was it really what I thought it was? What it what was that feeling?

[5:18] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[5:21] Amy Berryman: It's interesting. How are you?

[5:25] Leah Walsh: Are you in New York right now?

[5:27] Amy Berryman: I'm currently in New York. Um yes. Just through Friday. Um I've been, you know, a little nomadic since April. Um I was in London and then I was in Hartford and I've been in New York for two weeks. Um I gave up my apartment before I left for London and um so I've been just sort of bouncing around. Right now I'm in my friend's apartment in the West Village, which has been really lovely. Um and how am I? I'm really how are you now? How are you now? And how have you been throughout the pandemic? I feel like um and then we can kind of talk about everything that's been happening with your play this year too, which must be like such a different kind of pandemic experience.

[6:13] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[6:14] Amy Berryman: But the first question is just how are you?

[6:17] Amy Berryman: It's insane time. Um yeah I'm I'm really good overall. I mean it's the kind of thing, you know, I'm healthy, I my family's healthy. I you know there's all these very basic things that you feel so grateful for. Um and I mean my pandemic uh I I lived in a studio apartment which was such a like blessing at the time. I so I'm such a social person and it was such a haven and felt like a big achievement to like be able to rent a studio while I was working as a bartender. You know, it was just such a great thing and but then it became just this dark side place, you know, um, so isolated and um, you know, I took it all very seriously and maybe was too isolated. Like maybe I could have risked going on more walks with my friends and but you know, you just don't know.

So I feel like the first many months uh I w I was got to be pretty depressed and my brother came and rescued me and brought me to Indiana where his family and his you know my nephews uh live and so I got to be there in June and a little bit of July um and that was really really helpful. Um and then came back, started working at the bar again that I was bartending at which was like so weird to kind of go back to that service industry thing in the midst of a pandemic. There was so much we didn't know. I was really scared like being outdoors like who I who knew that you know it probably was fine. I I don't know but at the time I was really freaked out and it was sort of weird I I also just felt like there needed to be a new um like uh etiquette or something and so I made this Instagram post that went viral um like a we like a few days after I started uh working back at the bar and I was really just like trying to like figure out a way out.

I was so angry and just felt like wow this doesn't feel sustainable. I you know I've done this for ten years and I don't know if I can do this anymore and um and also I'd been so like unsure about what my theatrical career would be. I sort of felt like, okay, this production of my play um was gonna be in this theater in Philadelphia got cancelled, you know, maybe I y maybe I can I don't know what the future of theater is. I joined a group of screenwriters trying to learn how to write better for screen and TV and um was ch really trying to focus on that. And then I kind of had this miracle happen where my agents called me like maybe a week after I started working at the bar again, um, and said that Sonia Friedman, who's this huge UK and American producer and her company had read my play Walden and wanted to produce it um on the West End in this socially distance theater festival that they were forming and mine was sort of the first one that they picked.

[9:37] Leah Walsh: Oh my gosh.

[9:38] Amy Berryman: And it was just this timing is so incredible. It was so incredible and also didn't feel real. I didn't understand what they were even telling me. I I was just like, what could this call even be about? Like there's no theater.

[9:52] Leah Walsh: Yes.

[9:53] Amy Berryman: Um, so it um I didn't believe it was real until I sort of talked to Sonia and talked to the folks over there and started to kind of believe it was real. But even then, like it was supposed to happen in November, of course then it got delayed and there just been so many points in my artistic career, and I'm sure everyone's artistic career where we think this is gonna be the thing. Like, oh, things something's actually gonna change. And there were so many times that happened that um, you know, it didn't change, or it i I got close to something and didn't get it, or whatever. So I just kept feeling like knowing this would be so beyond anything I had dreamed or wished for. Like I had, you know, had a goal of, you know, I'd love to have my play open off Broadway, which I still would love that to happen, but I just never imagined the West End, this group of like legendary people that I worked with and um so then it the pandemic sort of became this like desperate anxiety and hope for many months that I, you know, I did quit my job at the bar because I thought I was going in November and wanted to give myself some time off in between and then it got pushed back and I went to Seattle where I'm from for a little while and just hung out with my parents, which I was really lucky to get to do.

Um then came back to New York and it did end up happening and I did end up going and um and it was incredible. Um but there was just I mean so many months that I just drove everyone in my life crazy because I couldn't really tell that many people and I didn't know and it just sounded so uncertain. Like it sounded bonkers that I was like yeah my play is gonna happen in a theater during this like I I just it's it was um yeah like sure it is really exactly like that's how I felt and I'm sure that's how I don't know I it it's just it's so how did it work?

[12:02] Amy Berryman: Was it just like a very limited amount of audience members or it was only about um it was about 50% capacity each night. You know, we got a really good pocket of time 'cause the UK was under lockdown for so long. So ours are it happened right as things were reopening. So like when I landed, outdoor dining had opened for the first time in like maybe four or five months, which ours was such a different level of lockdown. Like theater has been locked down, but like the producers over there very had been very determined from the get-go to make things happen. Um we caught this really lovely pocket of time where cases weren't you know, I was checking the cases every day while I was over there during rehearsal.

Um I mean we were in a rehearsal room without masks. I mean, some of our uh stage management team had masks and like there were moments we were masked, but we were really free to work in a really beautiful way. Um and then the audience members in the theater and everything were were masked and um but yeah, I mean it really felt although it wasn't packed or anything, it was it felt um really nice, I mean and amazing. I you know missed theater so much as everyone does or has been. Um so yeah, it was very amazing and and intense. So uh and and a sort of a strange moment to have this really huge career um thing because uh yeah, there's just a lot that comes along with that of guilt and joy and um impossible.

[13:48] Leah Walsh: Like, wasn't anyone in your family able to come see it?

[13:52] Amy Berryman: I know you had a few friends, but yes. Uh they did uh there's a lot of really intense quarantine rules, or there were, um, but my parents did quarantine and um got to see the play, which was really, really special.

[14:06] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[14:07] Amy Berryman: That's great.

[14:08] Leah Walsh: Yeah, that must be strange to be to have such a moment of joy within a time of such uncertainty and not really be able to share it with everybody in the way that you normally would.

[14:20] Amy Berryman: Yeah. Yeah. It definitely like it I, you know, there's so many more people that would have been able to come and see, but um but it at the same time it just you know, th there was one preview that we had to cancel because we had a sort of a scare that was really overblown, but we thought, okay, if someone has been exposed, then we should, you know, be overly cautious and um you know, if at that moment it just makes you realize like this is so precarious, it's so delicate, you know, there's so much I can worry about. Is that moment working? Is like i is it all like you know, there's so many little details that I worry about, but then ultimately it's like let's just do it. Like w I'm so grateful to get to like have it seen and make something. Um, so yeah, this has been a very wild um I mean entire pandemic obviously, but the past four months have been really wild.

[15:17] Leah Walsh: And now you're working on the same play in um in Connecticut, you said?

[15:22] Amy Berryman: Yes. So uh it has this outdoor production at Theatre Works Hartford, um, which has been really incredible working with um Man Teo as the director who, you know, we'd originally thought it would just be like we'd build the stage indoors and film it and be streaming, but um we kind of caught on again this really lovely moment of well, we could be together outdoors, and what if we built the plays set in a cabin, like w in the middle of the wilderness. Like, what if we built cabin? Like, what if we had the actors mic'd and have head have the audience have headphones so that it feels really intimate and not um not so this is a very intimate play, and um so you aren't projecting like Shakespeare in the Park style um for this play that should have really intimate moments.

Um so that has been really special. It was very intense to like immediately dive into another rehearsal process, having just done it. Um and so I'm very oversaturated with this play and so grateful to be oversaturated with it.

[16:32] Leah Walsh: Well, that was my question is have you had have you had that experience before of having multiple productions of the same play, or has is this the first one where you've been able to work on it so closely multiple times?

[16:43] Amy Berryman: Well, that is what is so beyond about all of it is the West End production was my first production of a play that I wrote, and so it was this very, very high level debut is the word they you know I keep using, and um it's so it was terrifying. I I I didn't have a a process, like I I've been an actor also, so I've been in obviously many productions as an actor, but I didn't have a process for I I didn't know what it was to like let go of a play and give it over to the director, give it over to the actors. That was terrifying. Um I didn't have a process for do I do I want to read reviews or not? I I didn't have I didn't know. So there's a lot of things that I did that I was just sort of like, you know, baptism by fire, learning as I go and trying to act like very calm, normal, and I was freaking out.

Um, so not only had I never experienced this, but then going to the next production. Um, I mean, I don't know, definitely in 2021, I I feel so so lucky to like have had that experience and then have this other production here. Um, you know, there were very different uh productions, very different groups of people, um, and you just learned so much from from both of them, and what's been really beautiful is that I feel that the play sort of stands on its own on both sides of the you know, on in England and then here in this production that feels so different. Um but yeah, it's been really um big learning curve, very intense. So exciting.

[18:31] Leah Walsh: Um when did you start writing?

[18:33] Amy Berryman: Um, I think I guess in I mean, I've always been a writer, but was so focused on acting for so long and had never tried playwriting, but as a kid I like wrote a novel when I was like six or something, you know, I was very creative and um into writing. But in 2015 I was in a play in the Humana Festival, and I think just like that exposure to like the world of new plays and um and playwriting was really exciting to me, and I was really depressed uh right after it was over and like put myself into a playwriting class and sort of put that into the work and kind of just never looked back. I mean, I I think that it's just been it's been a really great feeling of agency as an artist, whereas, you know, you know, as a actor, we have to ask to do anything, it feels like.

So um that has been really empowering and um and it's just felt like with acting there's been a lot of doors that have that I've knocked on for a long time that have never opened and with writing it's like they just swung open, swung open.

[19:51] Leah Walsh: So yeah, I and you know um I think we know each other, my friend Liva Vainberg and I or not no we know each other much further back, but you came to Libas and Red Walden once.

[20:02] Amy Berryman: I did, yeah. Very early, which was so kind and um that was very, very early um it was probably like 2017 or something.

[20:11] Leah Walsh: Yeah, I started writing it in 2016 and I think yeah it was probably 2017. Um and we were you know both always going out for the same roles me and my friend Libra and we sort of started writing together and having these readings at her house to kind of um to kind of give each other deadlines and actually make things happen and so yeah it um it's kind of just um I've ki just started focusing on that because that's where all the doors have opened and it's just been um yeah it's been really great.

[20:48] Leah Walsh: I love that you've found a way to have community like within your writing.

[20:51] Amy Berryman: Yes. 'Cause it can seem like such a solo thing which is amazing in some ways like it gives you that agency like you said but the fact that you and Libra were giving each other accountability or the writing classes or writing groups that you're a part of. I think that's really lovely.

[21:05] Amy Berryman: I think that's what I like best about it is that I do have this introverted side that feels fulfilled by that actual sometimes horrible and really hard uh writing process but then getting to be in community with the writing and get to be working with actors and directors and or just other writers in a writing class. But I do think that that is so important for me and you know going back to not going to the dark side I feel like that is kind of the only way to but then that comes with such vulnerability and fear by just like having to actually share the work. Um so but the reward is to me huge.

[21:46] Leah Walsh: Do you feel any sort of pressure to go down this new road as a writer and kind of close the door on acting or are you at peace with kind of pursuing both at the same time and accepting like that they're both an active part of your artistry right now?

[22:02] Amy Berryman: I really despise the pursuit of acting. I just find it so awful and so um disheartening and I just so I like the right I hate that it's so different from actually doing the work. I know it really for me it's I I don't enjoy you know having to watch myself when I'm learning to get when I've been in classes to learn to audition for on camera. I I d you know I I just it gets it's like unhealthy for me almost and maybe I'll get to a place where that's not the case. I think when I've made a short film that I was in or was part of the process of making something, it's a little easier because it feels like you have more control. Maybe it's just about control that I really hate not having any control as an actor.

I don't know. Um but I think that so for now I I am I am actually going to be in a film that this writer's group that formed in COVID. We like wrote a series of shorts that kind of all form a short feature and we're gonna shoot it in October um in LA and I am gonna be a small part in that. So that will be great, but I think I'm not doing anything like pursuing acting right now. I don't know. Sometimes I feel like I should be or but what is should you know I feel like I'm just I continue I I really love the role of writer at the moment um and creating the world and creating the opportunities.

[23:43] Amy Berryman: You still get to be in communion with actors and people that you know are just so thrilling to be around and interesting, and there's something about just like being, having your work not be dependent on your corporeal body that is really freeing to me. And I so respect actors; I think actors are heroes and so generous to put their bodies out on the line, and I know actors that get so much from that. But to me, it's been really freeing to sort of divorce myself from that through writing. And yeah, it's just something that I think for a long time, I think that comes along with the dark side of being an actor for me is the comparison and the, "Oh, I'll never be, you know, this movie star type of actor," or like this, you know, XYZ person I could compare myself to.

And it just feels there's such high pressure from like, there's already so much pressure on women about how you look, and then to add being an actor on top of it and having gone to conservatory. And yeah, it's really freeing to have my art divorced from that. So I enjoy that.

[25:07] Leah Walsh: That's wonderful.

[25:08] Amy Berryman: Yeah, I was gonna say, even for female actors, it's like so much even more intense. And I love like a really good, like physical theater. Like that's a different thing, but just yes, the pressure that's put on the observation of your body as a woman in general is just so intense. Yeah, and even like actors have to break their hearts every night on stage. Like you have to just, it's so intense and so beautiful. But I think, and there is part of me that I am a really emotional person, and I wonder if I do need that outlet, but it's just been interesting to kind of, you know, in some ways, okay. I've in like this rehearsal process in Hartford, it's like I'd done a lot of the work already. There's still so many challenges, but it's so, and so many things to figure out as a team and tweaks to make and everything, but it's kind of nice to have been like, "Oh, yep, I broke my heart when I wrote this.

Here you go." Like I already did it. Now you, yeah, you all do it. Your turn. Your turn. Uh, so yeah, it's interesting. But I do think being an actor so informed my writing and just wanting to give actors really great roles to chew on and kind of knowing the sort of roles that I was attracted to and sort of writing from there.

[26:33] Leah Walsh: So how has your family taken in your choice to be an artist for your living and then now this kind of pivot to writing?

[26:43] Amy Berryman: Well, my father is an actor, writer, director, um, jack of all trades artist. So I grew up mostly in Seattle, but from ages one to seven, we lived in Texas where he taught theater at a university, and um, so I kind of grew up like have early memories of him doing Suzuki and you know, like it's all been kind of, I've known theater from a young age. And I think my mom did at some point have sort of a, "Are you serious? Like our kids are gonna be actors? Are you joking?" Like moment. But I think he was like, what my dad was like, "What do you want her to do? Like this is what she wants to do," and they have, I've been so lucky that they have been very supportive of me.

[27:27] Leah Walsh: Um, just what does your mom do?

[27:29] Amy Berryman: My mom's a speech pathologist. So she's like very emotional. Our whole family is very emotional, like breeds good actors, I think.

[27:41] Leah Walsh: But that's not so foreign to what you're doing either.

[27:44] Amy Berryman: Totally. Yeah, so um, but they've just been sort of thrilled by the pivot to writing. Like I think they can see that I am happier overall. So that's good.

[27:59] Leah Walsh: Do you have any mentors who have been helpful to you in this process of finding this part of your artistic life?

[28:07] Amy Berryman: Yes. Um, Jessica Dickey, who I think you know. Um, Jessie, I took her writing classes maybe I, too, so many times. Like, I just maybe am the most repeat offender of her writing classes. I don't know if she'll be doing them in again anytime soon, but that's where I wrote my first play through your summer. It's where I sort of finished writing Walden. I did a revision of Walden in that class. So I feel like she has been, and she was my acting coach before that. Um, so I feel like, and she's an amazing actor, writer, and sort of following her journey as an artist has been so inspiring, and um, she's such a huge part of me continuing to be an artist at all. I got to be in her play, The Convent, um, that was off-Broadway that like directed by Daniel Talbot, who I ended up being like very close with him and his wife, and kind of finding a new group of artists through getting to do that show.

Um, so she has been a huge amazing mentor. Um, Erin Courtney, who wrote the play I was in in the Humana Festival, is also like such an important playwright to me, an incredible writer, and um, has just been so supportive of me, you know, throughout all of it. And um, yeah, and then Daniel Talbot, Addie Talbot, like those folks. I feel like all my friends are my mentors because they also just have to deal with all my anxieties and kind of guide me through all of it. Um, but I think mentors are so important. When your best friends are people that you admire, they do turn into mentors kind of, yeah, your peers and your mentors.

[29:49] Leah Walsh: Yeah, so true. Do you ever find yourself like, I don't know how, what I'm saying here? I want to ask you about like giving yourself permission. Like do you ever find that you have a hard time giving yourself permission to take a risk or permission to take up space in the room? That kind of like, uh, yeah, imposter syndrome issue that everyone talks about. How do you deal with feelings like that?

[29:59] Amy Berryman: I mean, I do not know how I deal with it, like, but I just do, I guess. I feel it all the time. I felt it so intensely in London, you know? I'm working, I was working with Ian Rickson, who's this legendary director and incredible actors, and I remember at some of the final runs in the rehearsal room, it's a very emotional piece, but Ian had sort of like injected it with like all this ferocity and emotion, and it was just like, "This is so big. This is so, this is too much." I just kept thinking that and telling like my friends that I think it's too much. Like I think, I think it's too big. It's all these things. I, I was panicking. And I think, and Ian was sort of like, "You're gonna want this in the big theater.

Like you're gonna want, you know, just stay the course. You're gonna, that you're gonna be grateful for this." Even in the theater, I was like, "It's too big. It's too much." But what I have processed as a result, because I kind of eventually calmed down and was able to see it for what it was, but I was just afraid of this thing I had written. I was afraid of like my voice taking up all of this space and caught it being the sort of cause of these giant performances. You know, I was, I was so scared of that more than anything, I think.

[31:48] Amy Berryman: Um, and so to move, and I think then it became a fear of letting go of the play. It was just like new fear after new fear as soon as I got over the one. Um, but I think that with the imposter syndrome, I mean, I'm a big fan of like The Artist's Way and the um, affirmations in The Artist's Way. I do those a lot. Like I do, you know, I am willing to be seen and all these things. I just like repeat writing these things over and over just to kind of center me. I mean, I have to work really hard to not kind of go to a place that's in the imposter syndrome world, and I think that, but I think moving through that experience in London was able to made me better able to also like sit more calmly and with more ease in the rehearsal room in Hartford, and I think we'll continue to. It just was such a, like, yeah, high intensity experience.

[32:53] Leah Walsh: That's such a big jump from being used to like doing readings in living rooms and on Zoom to suddenly being like, "No, this is the venue that we've always been aiming for."

[33:02] Amy Berryman: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was very, um, incredible, and it was just interesting that the words "too much" were the things that just kept coming up for me, and I think that that was actually more about me and more, and I think as women, or me, I should can also just speak for my experience, like it's taken a long time to really be able to own my voice and own the fact that I have things to say and um, yeah.

[33:33] Leah Walsh: Yeah. Are there any lessons that you've learned over the last couple of years that you're really proud of that you wouldn't mind sharing?

[33:42] Amy Berryman: Lessons that I am proud of.

[33:45] Leah Walsh: Give me something small.

[33:51] Amy Berryman: Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I feel like yes, I mean, I'm sure there's so many. I, I think, um, I don't know if I still, if I have achieved this, but a step in the right direction as far as trusting in the right timing of like the universe and not my timing. Um, just, you know, if the play had happened in November, it would have been shut down. If we caught this beautiful moment in time where we were able to do it safely, and um, I think also just trusting in myself that there will be more work that like I'm sort of struggling right now with, I think I'm sort of desperate to write something else so that I can just move past this giant thing that just happened and um, be able to move and be like, "Okay, I did it.

I wrote another play." Like I've been working on a pilot and, you know, working on projects, but I kind of feel the need to just write any other play so that I can move past um, the fear. Um, and so I think I'm learning right now, trusting that there will be more there. There will be more ideas, there will be more, and that I can have give myself permission to take the time for it to come. Um, what sorts of things do you like to do to kind of refill your creative cup?

[35:06] Amy Berryman: Um, I think reading. I guess they might, it might be kind of different right now in the pandemic than it normally is. I know, right? Like normally I mean, I am gonna go see Passover tonight, which I'm really excited about.

[35:37] Amy Berryman: Um, but I think seeing other plays, seeing other, you know, reading novels, seeing other pieces of art that don't have to do with, um, necessarily playwriting, but, um, I guess also just taking, and as I'm saying it, I'm like, yeah, Amy, take time off and hang out with your friends, like fill your, you know, fill your, like chill out. Um, yeah, I mean, I think for me just connection with other people that I love and more important to me is a huge way of refilling. And I guess seriously, as I'm saying this, I am just laughing at myself that I'm like, yeah, not put so much pressure on myself that helps fill my pep up. And like, that's what I've been doing for like the past two, however, and plus weeks.

Oh my God. So it's funny. It's like a constant reminder. Yeah. Yes. Um, I know we talked a little bit earlier about, um, how you bartended for a long time and you're not currently, but how do, how are you feeling about that kind of balance of art and commerce? What are some of the things over the years that kind of helped you figure that quilt out, figure out how to deal with, you know, not necessarily making your living from your artistic work.

[35:37] Amy Berryman: I mean, I think writing really helped me balance it because it felt like I was getting to pursue something that felt like an investment in myself. Um, and acting, I, I guess maybe that's just me figuring out aligning like what I actually want or something, but, um, okay, I might have to go back and answer this a different way because I'm not totally sure. I mean, it's so hard to make a living as an artist, and it's so hard to make a living living in New York City. Um, so I think, you know, that's sort of the first step is being able to feed yourself and being able to pay your rent. And I think however you can cobble that together is amazing and brilliant, and you've achieved so much when you can just do that, like so much.

And I think for me it was, it took a long time to sort of find the job that allowed me to make the right amount of money and have the right amount of space for my art, um, which I kind of finally found in the final five years that I was doing it. Um, and but I also, you know, when I first moved to New York, I did a lot of temp work. I did, I I've done a lot of kind of random stuff to kind of cobble it all together, and I think that I think finding, I don't know what I want to say about it. I just want to acknowledge that like it's so hard. It's so hard.

[38:42] Amy Berryman: And, um, and right now I'm still cobbling all that together. Like I am teaching a playwriting class on Zoom that's mainly geared towards actors. Um, I feel like even if actors, like for me, I find that when I commit to something or do something, all these other things happen in the universe. Like there's some quote that sticks with me that's like when you move, the universe moves too. And I, I, so I find that even if you aren't gonna become a playwright, if as an actor you want to like commit to taking a class in playwriting and just sort of seeing what that level of agency and creativity outside of your acting world can do, uh, you know, I think something tends to happen, whatever that something may be, I really believe in that, which is woo-woo or whatever, but, um, I think it can just kind of break open, um, something inside.

I just really believe that even if people don't think they're writers, like everyone has so much inside them and so I've just found in these classes like, oh my gosh, this person that never even thought about writing before has this beautiful family story to tell or whatever it may be.

[39:58] Amy Berryman: And, um, so I, I just, I totally encourage people to even if it's not writing, maybe it's painting or sort of doing something outside of your chosen form, I think can be really helpful. Is this class you're teaching now, is that something that you organized on your own, or was it through, uh, another organization?

[40:19] Amy Berryman: It's something I organized on my own. Um, yeah, it's something I wanted, I've been wanting to do for a while, and then once Zoom became such a thing, I was like, well, this seems like a way to reach and connect with people that, um, I wanna see if I enjoy this, and I, I just sort of felt like I have an angle with just having been an actor who kind of transitioned to writing that maybe I could share with other people and maybe that would be helpful. Um, yeah, so we're about to start a new session of it in like a week or two. Um, and I'm gonna do it intermittently. So yeah.

[41:02] Leah Walsh: Um, just for anyone who's listening, would you like post about that on Instagram or something and you have this coming?

[41:08] Amy Berryman: I usually post about it on Instagram. Also, you know, I think my email is still on my website. Like people could email me to ask about it or, um, yeah, I would love that.

[41:20] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[41:21] Amy Berryman: Okay, great. If you are feeling, um, like you're in the dark side or really feeling stuck, are there any tangible things that you reach for again and again, like a book that you reread or music you listen to?

[41:37] Amy Berryman: I mean, you already spoke about reaching out to friends, but something like that. The War of Art by Stephen Pressfield.

[41:44] Leah Walsh: Do you know this book?

[41:45] Amy Berryman: I've heard of it. I don't think I've ever read it.

[41:48] Amy Berryman: It's so good and it's so tiny. It's like n it's the kind of thing you'll pick it up and read like five pages and want to start making something. Because it's so, it talks about resistance and this sort of unseen force that's out to get all of us and stop us from doing our artistic work, anything good for you. But it just, it's so weirdly practical, even though it's sort of like metaphysical. Um, but I, you know, sometimes I replay the same podcast interviews over and over. Sometimes I watch Elizabeth Gilbert's talk about creativity. I think that just the way she frames creativity as something outside of yourself and something you can, um, you know, that doesn't, it's not all dependent on you as the artist, that you can show up and there's something outside of you that has to show up too.

[42:48] Amy Berryman: And I really, um, enjoy the way that she frames that. Um, yeah, I love that. Yeah, because it is, it is easy to, um, to get down on yourself about like, oh, I'm not, yes, the idea isn't coming, the creative, like I be creative, you know, it's so funny. And that is a good way to think about it.

[43:09] Leah Walsh: Yeah, it's really nice to just not all free yourself a bit.

[43:11] Amy Berryman: Yeah, yeah. Um, those are two big ones. And then the final question is, have you seen or taken in any piece of art recently that you want to recommend? I know you said you're seeing Passover, which I recommend everyone see this production yet.

[43:40] Amy Berryman: Yeah, I've read it, but I haven't, um, actually seen it, but I know it's gonna be amazing. Um, well, I'm watching Succession.

[43:51] Leah Walsh: Oh yeah.

[43:52] Amy Berryman: I'm so behind.

[43:54] Leah Walsh: I'm so behind the world on Succession.

[43:56] Amy Berryman: I recommend it to everyone.

[43:58] Amy Berryman: Um, I was like, I don't think I want to watch people be mean to each other for this long. Um, but it's fascinating and it's really good.

[44:06] Leah Walsh: Right.

[44:07] Amy Berryman: I feel like we've been holding it. Just like another show about rich white people, but I've heard it's really absolutely.

[44:13] Leah Walsh: But it's a little satirical.

[44:15] Amy Berryman: I mean, it's quite satirical about like pointing at that.

[44:19] Amy Berryman: It's so absurd. It's like Shakespeare in a way to me. Like just the structure and whatever. I, I've deep in it, so I'm obviously, um, it's not the be all and all art for sure, but it is pretty great.

[44:36] Amy Berryman: Um, yeah.

[44:39] Amy Berryman: Oh God. I'm trying to think if there's anything else.

[44:44] Amy Berryman: But I mean, mostly I've just been, you know.

[44:50] Amy Berryman: I feel like I watched a movie recently.

[44:52] Amy Berryman: Well, I can't.

[44:53] Amy Berryman: I all the things I'm recommending are like so dark and so not recent.

[44:58] Amy Berryman: Like Midsommar, the film.

[45:01] Amy Berryman: I can't really recommend that to anyone.

[45:02] Amy Berryman: It's so dark and that I can't stop thinking about it.

[45:05] Amy Berryman: So there's just like I, I've been, you know, um, never rarely, sometimes always incredible film.

[45:10] Amy Berryman: Anyway, those are all things that I've just been kind of swirling around in my mind.

[45:17] Amy Berryman: Also, you can stream my play Walden at Theodorex Hartford starting in like four days, August 15th.

[45:25] Amy Berryman: Um, so that's a piece of art, but this production is so stunning.

[45:29] Amy Berryman: Like the design is stunning, the cast is amazing, um, and I just watched a cut of the streaming version that's, um, very good.

[45:38] Leah Walsh: So is it gonna be up for very long?

[45:41] Amy Berryman: I think it's through the twenty-ninth, which is when the play in person closes also.

[45:46] Leah Walsh: Okay, great.

[45:46] Leah Walsh: Amy, thank you, thank you, thank you.

[45:48] Amy Berryman: It's been such a pleasure.

[45:50] Leah Walsh: And long more due.

[45:51] Amy Berryman: Yes, really nice to help you.

[46:00] Leah Walsh: Thank you for listening to the Compass Podcast.

[46:03] Leah Walsh: If you find these conversations valuable to your life as an artist and would like to support the ongoing production of the Compass, please consider becoming a patron at Patreon.com slash the Compass Podcast.

[46:13] Leah Walsh: Pledges start at as little as one dollar a month, and anything you can give would be greatly appreciated.

[46:19] Leah Walsh: Also, if you have a moment, please review and follow in iTunes.

[46:23] Leah Walsh: Every little bit helps other listeners to find the podcast.

[46:33] Leah Walsh: Audio assistance from Monica Choxie, and a special thanks to Frankie J. Alvarez.

[46:38] Leah Walsh: See you next time.