We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Julia Wosiak a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Julia, thanks for joining us today. Let’s jump back to the first dollar you earned as a creative? What can you share with us about how it happened?
The first time I made money being creative was during the pandemic, I was studying acting online from my bedroom. It was a very difficult time for everyone, and I remember feeling like I had given up on trying to do anything creative. A student from one of my classes emailed me asking if I could record a voice-over for an experimental short film. The only available room was a small windowless bathroom; I recorded all of it sitting on the toilet. As weird as it sounds, I was so proud of myself, as I have been acting since I was 7 years old. And after that experience, I definitely became more confident in my acting.
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.
When I was eight, I won local poetry reciting contest. I had so much fun and that was the first time I thought about becoming an actress. As I grew up acting became a tool for understanding life. That’s what movies, theatre, and literature have always been for me. It was like someone was explaining life and giving guidance on how to do it. They inspired me to look for the beauty of the human experience. They say love is attention and that’s what acting became for me. Taking time to understand people. It felt like honoring everything that happened to me and the people around me. I come from a small town in Poland that didn’t have a lot of theatre programs so I began studying acting on my own. I remember locking myself in my bedroom and practicing monologues at night.Around this time, I discovered method acting and The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute in New York. It became my dream to one day be able to study there. I remember announcing my dream to my mother, who has been raising and financially supporting me and my sisters on her own. It was a lot of money to invest in your kid. I applied to the New York Film Academy Summer Acting Program in Paris and went there to train my acting. In order to save money, my mom and I stayed in a room in a nunnery. My final performance had gotten the attention of the program’s award-winning director, Mitko Panov. I am very grateful for all the help that he has offered me. After this, I have gotten into my dream acting school and performed in award-winning short films called “Do you still think about her” and ” Two Faces Have I”. In theatre, I played the lead in “Serenade” for a theatre festival in Poland and associate directed an off-off-Broadway play in New York. Recently I have starred in “Fortune of Chance” directed by Crawford Schafbuch and “Her” directed by Maria Del Castro. It was so much fun working on them and I learned so much. I put a lot of heart into these stories and I know that I took chances and trusted myself with my work. Honesty in performing is key and I believe that my performance was a real emotional experience and told a story. In the performance. When working on a character, I believe that everything that happened to them matters. I think humans are affected by everything. Whenever I think about the summer air in my childhood home it makes me feel a certain way, It brings back all the memories I have with that place and time, They say that growing up is just trying things out, to see who you are. And I believe in that, That’s what my job is, remembering how and why I tried and felt certain things throughout my life, This way I think I understand what the stories that I’m telling are about. Discovering what are we doing and why are we doing them. Why we are the way, we are.
What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
I just hope that my work can make people feel like they are less alone in whatever they are going through. Life is so beautiful, but also full of pain and difficulties. Art always served as a teacher to me, whenever I felt lost or alone I watched movies. Love is attention and acting is just paying attention and giving time to just stare at what happens to us. It helps us understand, and makes us better people. It requires patience and strength to share and find love even when it seems like it’s not there.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I used to believe that in order to be successful and happy with my work, I had to spend almost every minute of every day learning, reading, and rehearsing. If my body wasn’t exhausted, if I wasn’t being creative enough I would panic. My mom has raised me and my 2 sisters alone and I was always so impressed with everything she did. I was taught this and that is what I always expected from myself. But that approach does not guarantee anything other than burnout and made me forget why I do what I do. Acting requires patience and now I understand now how important it is to stop and rest. I don’t ever want my work to not be honest or feel pushed. I want it to come “from the heart”, but it is very difficult. and acting, as much as I love it, is so emotionally draining! So when I get overwhelmed I try to talk to people I love, listen to music, and rest. Focus on what is happening around me at that moment.
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Image Credits
Crawford Schafbuch Wiktoria Kasik