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

Alright, Joe thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

Every single project is meaningful to me in some way or another, but some future projects are coming up that I think will be the most meaningful I’ll have ever worked on. Shakespeare is always meaningful in some way because for me that’s where it all started. When I was 10 years old, my teacher in school introduced my class to A Midsummer Night’s Dream; ever since then, I’ve been obsessed with Shakespeare. That’s also when I learned my first Shakespeare monologue. In a funny twist of fate, a few months before I graduated from drama school in New York, I was cast in my first ever paid Shakespeare production – and amazingly it was A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It was like fate. I had to message my teacher and tell her, it was a really special moment.

Soon I’m going to be starting a brand new Shakespeare company with the view of helping immigrant actors, such as myself, get their chance in classical roles. I’ve got a specific and very ambitious project in mind but I don’t want to say too much about it yet. But it will hopefully be amazing.

Right now, I’m producing and acting in a show called KNOCK KNOCK, which was written by my friend Floyd Toulet and is going to the New York Theatre Festival. This project is incredibly meaningful to me because it’s about mental health, something that I think really needs to be talked about. I also have an incredible team behind me, Chloe Champken being my first choice of director (she is fantastic, I’m so happy with the work that she’s doing), assisted by Addi Bjäringer who is also an incredible director, and Adele Batchelder, an actress I’m delighted to have working beside me. Projects with amazing people like this could not be more meaningful to me.

Finally, there is another project I’m hoping to work on in the future (I know, I really need to slow down!) that really does hold a serious place in my heart. My parents were real entrepreneurs who created an amazing brand – Snazaroo face paints, which is now sold worldwide. My father passed away when I was two, but my mum currently lives in Spain and she wrote a book called A Snazzy Tale which basically outlines how she met my father and how they created this amazing business. It’s a wonderful book, but it’s also a fascinating tale. Obviously, me being me, combined with the pride I feel for my family’s legacy, I’m hoping in the future that I’ll be able to turn that book into a film/series. It’s a story that I think is worth telling.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

I’m a British actor, director, and producer currently based in New York City. I moved to New York when I was just turning twenty-two to study at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting, after living and pursuing the dream in London for three years prior. I fell madly in love with the city and decided that I wanted to stay, so I worked incredibly hard to be able to. Since then, I’ve worked in classical and contemporary theatre in New York, Texas, Vermont, Maryland, London, and Spain. I love traveling, and I’m trying to do as much as I possibly can through the work I do. I also founded my own theatre group – The Blind Cupid Shakespeare Company – which has done a lot of work doing projects that are inclusive and as multicultural as possible! We did a bi-lingual production of The Comedy of Errors which was in both English and Italian, and we also produced a sold-out, incredibly acclaimed production of Romeo and Juliet that featured actors from eight different countries. Currently, I’m producing and acting in a two-person show at the New York Theatre Festival, and I’m working on creating more opportunities for myself and for other actors from all over the world.

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

The people. I love working with people, I love meeting people, and I love people in general. Moreover, I love creating opportunities for people. Nothing brings me more joy than creating a network of artists, each with their own talent and creativity, and bringing them together to create something. I obviously love it when I achieve my own success, but there is something incredibly rewarding about giving other people a platform to be successful as well.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

I think it all comes down to education. Picasso once said, “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” I can’t claim expertise in every area of this, but I do know that I’ve heard many stories from actors, artists, and creatives about how their high schools/parents/society pressured them into going down life roads that they didn’t want to go down, instead of encouraging and nurturing that need to pursue a creative career. There are far too many people who put too much stock in finding a backup career, or a “safe” career (whatever that means) than focusing on what makes them happy. I think that we, as a society, need to recognize that artists are what make the world worth living in. I’m reminded of that quote from Dead Poet’s Society: “Medicine, law, business, engineering, these are all noble pursuits, and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.” I can’t tell you how many times someone has asked me, or asked a friend of mine when we are going to get a “real job”. It’s one of the reasons I love living in New York – this city is so full of life and artists, and I’ve met so many people over here that support that. I’m not sure I’d have been able to create work as much in London as I do here.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.joestaton.net
• Instagram: @staton_the_facts
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joesprog/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ndu9rX8koEU

Image Credits
Wolf Marloh Siggi Ragnar Perk Hull Design Bubble and Squeak Productions