Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Natalie Singletary. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Natalie, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
In 2015-2016, I wrote a small story to cope with the emotion distress I was experiencing with my group of friends at the time. When I wrote the story, it was a way to speak to those friends of mine without having to have an actual conversation. Alas, we don’t associate much these days, but I do wish them the best in their endeavors.
I wanted to burn the hard copy and delete the files, erasing it from existence, because despite it being a coping mechanism, it was painful keeping it around when those in the pages were no where to be found at the time. Despite the wounds that it carried with it, I could not bring myself to destroy the story, and thus, I self published my first book after a self-inflicted runaround with a vanity publisher. That small story turned into The Diamond Trilogy, a published three-part mini series written in script form available on most online bookstores, as well as the local ones here in eastern North Carolina.
Fast forward, almost ten years later, we are in preproduction of a web series based on that small heartache of a story. It’s been a project that has been revisited on more than one occasion over the better part of this decade, and it wasn’t really the right time. There has been a lot of planning and writing and rewriting for the visual aspect of this narrative. There still is, but through networking, ten years worth of experience in the entertainment business, and divorcing myself from what I thought it should be and letting it be what it was meant to be, the time is now.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
When I was in elementary school, I flunked a project because I threw something together at the last minute. My teacher gave me one more chance and a couple of days, and I put together one of the best projects crafted in my fifth grade class. When I was in middle school, I decided to audition for a theatre show. The director told me that I needed to project my voice more. In middle school, I had also picked up writing. My counselor had concerns about by poetry and referred me to my youth pastor, who deemed I was alright, and encouraged me to keep writing with the promise that if I did need to talk, I would come to him.
When I was a sophomore in high school, I discovered the show So You Think You Can Dance, and I began to mimic the moves I saw on the screen diligently. When my cousins would catch me practicing, they would laugh at me.
My senior year in high school, my school had its first ever talent show. I placed second in the solos. My first year of college, I went to an audition for Chicago that the original director that I auditioned with in middle school was co-directing. I was casted as June, one of the murderesses, and at my audition, I was able to tell him that I had been working for a decade practicing my projection. I began designing graphics with lyrics around this time as well, with computers and with markers. I sketched abstract things or duplicated as best I could things that caught my attention that my friends were drawing or creating as I was surrounded by other artists and creatives in my middle and high school years. Many of them have moved on to hone their crafts as well.
It’s very interesting to me looking back at where certain seeds were planted in what I do now. On paper, I’m a traveling performer and a fiber and graphic artist. My performance life spans dance, theatre, film, and most recently, spinning fire and aerial art. I’ve been hired to write the scripts of books, my current one being The Tombstone Confessions by Casper Luna, as well as directing and producing multiple short films. I had the opportunity to audition for So You Think You Can Dance in 2019 and was asked to return the following year. Alas, the following year, I was nine months into my greatest creation, my son. I am also the Secretary of Eno River Media, a company whose goal is to provide support to filmmakers in North Carolina and beyond, as well as the Director of the North Carolina Film Festival. I have been published in multiple literary magazines, online and physically, and have three books published, one narrative, The Diamond Tragedy, a book of poetry, Dirty Laundry, and a hybrid prompted journal/book of poetry.
One of the perks to being able to build a career on creation is that I am able to show my son that his dreams aren’t out of reach or minuscule. He’s growing up with two parents that own their own businesses and are able to prioritize his upbringing and day to day life. It’s not easy by any means. I have to remind myself that it’s okay for my state of flow to be interrupted sometimes, but it’s so worth it.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I have had to unlearn not trusting people and the process. I went through a good number of years of being disappointed that people weren’t meeting the expectations that I put on them. I had to realize that I, myself, would get overwhelmed and depressed when I didn’t meet other people’s expectations and likely, others felt the same when I did such to them. Learning to accept people as they are and helping them become who they want to be, not who I think they should be, is a daily learning experience for me. If I wanted to be loved and accepted for who I am, I had to learn to trust that it was okay for other people to be themselves as well.
Setting expectations for a project is different than setting expectations for a person. When you set expectations for a project, you give the person the ability to accept those expectations or decline them and that’s where trusting the process comes in and having faith that the right people will show up to create the way it was meant to be created.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
To help the broken, not just me. My vision is to help other creatives be inspired to create in their medium. One of my long term goals is to open a creative studio in my hometown that caters to all types of art, visual and otherwise.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://obconwriting.wordpress.com
- Instagram: @themaddnatt3r @themaddnatt3rshut
- Facebook: Natalie S Woerz
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalie-singletary-801b13187/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@obsidianproductions8730
- Other: The Diamond Tragedy Web Series
-Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61563918947182
-Instagram: @thediamondtragedywebseries
-Email: [email protected]The Diamond Trilogy by Natalie Singletary: https://www.amazon.com/Diamond-Trilogy-Dramatic-Mini/dp/1792078137/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&dib_tag=se&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.7lVr6D3A2zCrZPQKs9NZMw6XFdRH6ioiPvPUaoTZUpjFTznIYqDf0u7yYQwhWyhgDE47dJ6Rn46OPu0EVdBEXyI_C_jj7MjE3C1xZp1d1NY.Hkg3KKQCYBlQ71_1iArO0TI7qvRXcTVYXyla8rVQUMg&qid=1723839318&sr=8-1
The Tombstone Confessions by Casper Luna: https://www.amazon.com/Tombstone-Confessions-Casper-Luna/dp/1641827920/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&dib_tag=se&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.ijb3v6v7J7u4-xsxLM–1_WXpg–HHYbHTX0W_FvyyKzfqHjPxrypcqteP7rawXid87saVsMQ6q0RoDujpEM1VRdk3NHbQlBw1dhVm9hX3snuGDUC2tFyAZhRkx41cg9JsYkSXuMX1clyJKDt-6hauJZl9SkcEHIZapKtq8emn28394lVkkMa18W1x1o8ectjBduVrr4KVbo9PHTFQR9v0LDjxhXN7S5rUqn0nqq2AU.3dEZoOgxRIKyMM3JYTjKZlqTrbuQ6uweyVdI2R47soo&qid=1723839452&sr=8-1
Eno River Media
-Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EnoRiverMedia
-Instagram: @enorivermedia
Image Credits
Images one and three @casperlunaart
Image four Kristen Jones
Image five @katlynwrightphoto
Image six @hawkeye.nc Hawk Eye Media LLC