We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Miles Levin. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Miles below.

Miles, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

Under the Lights, the short and the upcoming feature (www.underthelightsfilm.com) was by far the most meaningful project I ever did. For one simple reason: it was about something so much bigger than me.

Under the Lights is the story of 17 year old Sam, a boy with epilepsy so desperate to feel like a regular kid he goes to prom knowing that the lights will make him have a seizure. I did this because I observed something shocking happening in the epilepsy community.

Epilepsy affects 1 in 26 people. We face a 50% unemployment rate and suicide 3-5x the national average. This isn’t totally a medical problem. It’s a lack of empathy generated by years of hospital shows and horror movies that have trained people to fear this population. The first image that comes to mind is the terrifying seizure in a drama that was designed to scare us.

I wanted to put something on screen that would be different. A character with relatable feelings. It ended up sparking a movement that lead to me being a public speaker, advocate and put in a place where I could make a bigger, more prominent film.

One of the stories that hits me the hardest is a girl who saw the short and decided to speak up about her epilepsy for the first time. She had felt deep shame and finally felt ready to use her story to make a difference for others like her. She passed away shortly thereafter, but the amount of times I’ve been told of a transformation like that one has really put my goals in a whole new light. Cinema is too much work to be just for yourself. It needs to matter.

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Miles, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m Miles and I’m a filmmaker who occasionally makes cheese. I say that because most of the time that’s the thing people actually want to know about.

I sit on the board of two epilepsy foundations and I care a lot about awareness for that community, being someone who lives with it myself.

I got into film, like most people, as a means of self expression. I started out making irreverent comedies and goof ball projects that brought me a lot of joy but didn’t have much to contribute. They brought fleeting recognition from festivals but no real fulfillment.

I refused to work my medical journey into my work because I was very turned off by the suggestion that this was ‘my story’. I was more than that, and wanted to celebrate the other parts of me, and certainly not brand myself as the epilepsy filmmaker for some kind of personal leverage.

But then I became really involved in my community, working with kids at an epilepsy camp where I would hear horror stories. Kind, great, otherwise ‘normal’ kids would go their whole lives without feeling understood or even making friends. I blamed this on the typical enternatinment portrayal of people having seizures: horror films and hospital shows are the only point of reference people have.

So I went about making a film (a short and now a feature) called Under the Lights, about a boy so desperate to feel normal he goes to prom knowing the lights will make him have a seizure.

It became a global movement that inspired many to share their own stories and speak up. Fan art poured in almost daily even before the short film came out. I learned the power of cinema to not only make a difference but actually improve the way people feel about themselves and the world around them. You can see that art on the film’s instagram @underthelightsfilm

The best movies come from the journal entry you wouldn’t want anyone to read. If you are brave enough to share it, it makes it easier for the next person to do the same. I want artists to understand that power.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

Getting epilepsy empathetically seen on screen is important to me. It’s such an effective way to improve the lives of people who are struggling. I’m not asking for special treatment. I really believe that by connecting our community to the public over universal feelings we all know (loneliness, feeling left out, feeling left behind) we can integrate the lost back into a world that’s forgotten about them. Movies and TV can do this work.

But I don’t always want this to drive my whole career. I hope that the success of the Under the Lights short film and the feature extension we have in post production will drive more artists to tell these important stories. In some circles, I’ve become a sort of unlikely figure head for this movement which has been an honor but the most important thing I can do is to lift up the next generation to do the same.

Then maybe I’ll go back to making stuff that makes me laugh.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

The biggest lesson I ever learned was the difference between validation and mastery. Most people use the word ‘SUCCESS’ to describe both of these things. They are very different.

At first you desperately want that festival win, the accolade, the job title, whatever. These things are in someone else’s hands. As long as you build your sense of self worth on the hope of getting chosen you’ll be miserable. Sometimes you get a little pat on the back, sometimes a big one, but most of the time none at all. These little wins feel big for a moment, and then they pass. You can’t let that fuel you. This is why most people can’t commit to going to losing weight, most of the time there’s no reward.

Pursuing mastery means doing the work for the sake of doing the work. You do it because you want to, not because you will win or lose. When your nose is to the grindstone the milestones come when you’re not looking. The losses hurt less, and the wins don’t lift you up the way they used to – but there are more of them.

I learned this making the Under the Lights short: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfy4_mq_yX8
The work was for something bigger than me. It didn’t matter if there were golden trophies waiting for me. When there weren’t, I kept going, when there were, I kept going. It made me a much better artist.

Contact Info:

• Website: www,underthelightsfilm.com
• Instagram: @underthelightsfilm , @miles.talks
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/underthelightsfilm
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/miles-levin-38397b92/
• Twitter: @milesdlevin
• Youtube: @mileslevin1

Image Credits
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