We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Adrienne Visnic A.j. Helfet. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Adrienne Visnic below.
Adrienne Visnic, thank you so much for joining us and offering your lessons and wisdom for our readers. One of the things we most admire about you is your generosity and so we’d love if you could talk to us about where you think your generosity comes from.
Calling ourselves generous feels a little indulgent, but “generosity” is a foundational pillar of what we’re building. On the surface, REVEL is a live show where we stage read unproduced scripts. But at its core, REVEL gives writers and actors a place to succeed. To celebrate their tremendous talent and hard work outside of an industry that can be extremely withholding. That space would be empty if our incredible community didn’t give in return. Writers, performers, audience members. Everyone donates their time, their creativity, and their support. They have shown remarkable generosity, and our show has grown more than we possibly could have imagined. Giving is cyclical. Everything we put in, we have received back a thousand times over in fantastic work and wonderful people. Why would we ever want to stop?
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
Between quarantine, strikes, and corporate belt tightening, the past few years have been particularly difficult for the entertainment industry. We know so many writers who have what we call “invisible resumes.” Portfolios filled with excellent scripts that have never been heard out loud for a myriad of reasons. Maybe it’s a brand new script. Maybe they’re looking for funding. Or maybe they did sell but it’s been stuck in development limbo. Whatever the reason is, they deserve a platform. So we created REVEL. A live show designed to celebrate writers and progress their work forward. Giving writers the feeling of accomplishment they have earned but haven’t been given.
Throughout the night, a group of writers debut pieces they are currently working on. These can be short films, one-act plays, or excerpts from television pilots and feature films. Actors then perform these pieces live as a staged reading. When the performance is over, there’s a party at the bar next door, where everyone can meet other creative professionals and build connections to keep their projects moving.
We started REVEL this year, and it’s already wild to look back and see how much it has grown. We’re in a larger theater. We have significantly more submissions. More and more extraordinary people resonate with our mission and ask how they can be involved. We begin each performance by saying, “Every person in our show is not only doing great work but is actively making the industry better just by being in it.” And we always mean it.
Since our first show, we’ve also been lucky to see exciting developments in several scripts. One feature is set to film next year, two plays have been selected for the IAMA New Works Festival, and one short film is going into production at the end of the year. And those are just the publicly announced projects. We want to be clear and say these piece’s successes are their own. Many of these developments were in the works long before they were read at REVEL. But we do think it’s a barometer of quality of work we’re promoting. And we are so so so excited for all of them.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
First and foremost is collaboration. When developing any skill, people often quote the “10,000 hours rule.” The idea that you can master anything with 10,000 hours of practice. But there’s an important caveat: you also need to have a support structure that enables you to practice a skill for that long. And that comes from strong relationships. We both work extremely hard but our work goes much further with the encouragement of our friends and family.
The second is initiative. We started REVEL because it is a space we were looking for in our lives. We wanted a community where actors and writers support each other and champion terrific new scripts. So, we created it ourselves. It didn’t happen overnight, and we’re still learning with every show. But the journey has been amazing and keeps inspiring us to take more chances.
And finally. We deliberated this point for a while. Trying to find a more…delicate way to convey this. One that is more appropriate for a professional article. And we settled on: “Don’t be a jerk.” (We revised that last word a couple of times.) If you want a job, be lucky. If you want a career, be talented. If you want to make a difference, be kind.
It’s not the whole package. But if you collaborate well, take initiative, and people like working with you, the journey will be easier and significantly more fun.
One of our goals is to help like-minded folks with similar goals connect and so before we go we want to ask if you are looking to partner or collab with others – and if so, what would make the ideal collaborator or partner?
Of course!! Always. If you are an actor or writer, we would love to hear from you. Come see a show! Maybe we can stage your script or cast you in one. If you like the sound of our mission, we would love for you to be there in any capacity.
We are also open to sponsorships and corporate collaborations. We are donation based, so any help goes a long way. We also work with companies from many industries. In this endeavor, we’ve some phenomenal entrepreneurs who have nothing to do with the entertainment industry but still believe in our cause. As long as you want to support great artists and contribute to the creation of brilliant new work, then we’re open! We offer many types of partnerships but one of the easiest is to donate a raffle prize. We’ve given movie tickets, board games, gift cards, a crocheted Billy Wilder doll (that one was hard to let go.) No surprise, they’ve been a huge hit.
If you would like to know more or work with us in any way, please email revelreadings@gmail.com
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.revelreadings.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/revelreadings/
Image Credits
Jill Petracek
@jill.petracek
jillpetracek.com
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
