We recently connected with Amy Dellagiarino and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Amy, thanks for joining us today. Are you happier as a creative? Do you sometimes think about what it would be like to just have a regular job? Can you talk to us about how you think through these emotions?

So this is a question I have been mulling over a lot recently, and the answer is both yes and no. The arts certainly took a hit during the pandemic, but let’s face it, the landscape has been shifting and changing for a while.

Am I happy? Ultimately, yes. Yes when I am in the act of “doing”, when there is a story that is tapping at my brain and I get to feel the rush of setting it free.

But am I happy? No, not really, not when I look ahead at the future and wonder what everything will be like. It’s no secret the path of an artist is hard, and long, and honestly usually on fire, but it feels like lately that perilous road has also now shrunk to the width of a balance beam. I don’t know if you have ever attempted to walk across a balance beam that is surrounded by roaring flames, but I imagine it’s not great. Of course I think about having a regular job. I think about it all the time… all the time, that is, until that little kernel of a story comes tapping at my brain again. And then I realize I could never. I prefer the burning balance beam.

I will take the burning balance beam every time.

Amy, 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 got into writing through acting. I studied at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and thought I would be an actor forever, until I got out into the real world and found the numbers and kinds of roles for women were… let’s say limiting. I found it really frustrating that in the majority of plays and movies it was the guys who got to do the cool stuff: go on the journey, commit the murder, have the breakdown, etc, while the women were relegated to “wife” or “girlfriend” or “mistress” or “mother”, if that. “This is boring” I would think, over and over again, as I prepared sides or a monologue for an audition. I longed to do something fun, to flex my acting muscles, but I rarely got to do anything other than make eyes at some character I was supposed to be in love with.

Writing started, for me, as a way to control the narrative. I wanted to write something that I would find fun and challenging to work on as an actor, and along the way I discovered I got way more fulfillment out of writing than I did out of acting. When you’re acting, you see one piece of the story, the character you are bringing to life, and you see that piece SO CLEARLY, but it’s still just one piece. When you are the one actually crafting the story, you get to see ALL the pieces. You love and care for them all, and you hate them all a little too, you move them around, throw them into situations, wind them up and watch them go. Picking apart the thread of a story and watching it unwind is one of the most thrilling experiences I’ve ever had.

I’ve been writing now for about 8 or 9 years and have been lucky to garner some productions, workshops, and awards, including the Playwriting Award at The Austin Film Festival. I love comedies, especially dark ones, and that beautiful mixture that is the dramedy. If there’s a layered question or a complicated issue rolling around in my brain, you bet I have to explore it. I’m fascinated by humans, by life, and by death. Isn’t everyone?

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

I think the biggest thing we as a society can do for artists is to provide them with more opportunities for funding. There are so many developmental opportunities that are shutting down, and it’s getting harder and harder for artists to do what they do best… make art. You can’t be as open and vulnerable as you need to be when you’re constantly working a million side jobs, or struggling to pay bills, or wondering how you’re going to make the last check stretch for as long as possible. There has got to be a better endowment for the arts, better grants available and easier ways to obtain them. The arts are something that we as a society collectively consume for entertainment, and yet we treat them so poorly when we talk about terms of actual funding.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

Writing can be a solitary process, and there’s so much to be said about people who see your work and feel seen by it in some way. I have saved notes, texts, and emails from people explaining how a certain piece made them feel less alone in what they were dealing with. I think that’s the most beautiful thing about art, the way it can make us understand each other.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.amydell.com
• Instagram: @amydee116

Image Credits
Brad C. Light Matt Kamimura