Meet Ximena Uribe

We recently connected with Ximena Uribe and have shared our conversation below.

Ximena, looking forward to learning from your journey. You’ve got an amazing story and before we dive into that, let’s start with an important building block. Where do you get your work ethic from?
My work ethic comes from my family, no doubt. I was born and raised in Guatemala City by two parents that had very different backgrounds.

My mom grew up in Rio Hondo, Zacapa. Imagine a small village… Now make it smaller, and that’s where she is from. She had to fight for every single thing she wanted. When I was little I used to be so curious about those stories and I would make my mom repeat them to me all the time. She would tell me the story of how she had to fight her dad to wear jeans, how she sneaked out to play basketball, how she fought to keep her elementary education and so many more. She never told those stories to teach us a lesson or to beg for pity, it just was part of her life and she never questioned why she had to work so hard.

My dad on the other hand, grew up all over Guatemala . From the coast, to the city, to small villages. Grew up around two difficult parents and had to take matters into his own hands quite early in his life. He joined the military because he yearned to be an educated man. His lack of resources led him there. He learned life lessons the hardest way possible and after he retired from the military he decided he wanted to be a business owner. And without a college or university degree he tried and failed and tried and failed and tried and failed until he did it. We saw him go through the growing pains of trial and error. Saw him pick himself back up after he would fail. He never saw failure as the end of it all, he saw it as a lesson of what didn’t work, so he would try something new every single time. A never ending curiosity.

That was the tone that was set for me. Both of them fought for what they wanted and both of them preached that hard work beats anything. They would both often dream together while on the dinner table and months later, what they talked about one night was no longer just words but in full existence. I owe not only my work ethic to the both of them I also owe them my story telling and my passion.

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?
Hello! I’m Ximena Uribe and I’m an actor, director and writer. As a young creative I’m in the process of finding my voice in story telling. It’s extremely important to me to stay curious, which has led me to carry the last three title with me. It’s hard to stay only in “one lane” when story telling feels like a circle and every job connects to the next, giving me a better understanding of story telling in general.

Recently I have been working on my first short film in New York city. It is directed, written and edited by me. It’s called “Wilder Greene”. It’s the story of a girl who goes on a journey to build up the courage to confront her unusual abuser. Any project I work I try to alway have something I explore. On the directing aspect of things I’m exploring the sue of blocking to create different shots within one set up. On the writing side of things I am exploring my first chronological narrative, starting and ending a full story. And through the editing I’m not only finalizing the thing I tried to explore through directing and writing but I am also exploring cutting with movement and rythm.

The process of bringing “Wilder Greene” to life has been one of the most rewarding yet difficult things I have created. I owe to the friends that are backing me up, like our lead actress Chandia Chansrisuriyawong who plays two characters on this and our supporting cast, Jeremy Thompson and Mia Ventura Lucas. My executive producer and friend Sofia Campanella. Our DP, Noelle Ramsay and the crew that went beyond to support me through the hardships of creating.

The script for “Wilder Greene” has also had its own achievements. It won Quarter Finalist at the Art of Brooklyn Film Festival Screenplay Contest and is now in the running on other film festivals. If you wanna check the script out you can look me up (Ximena Uribe) on Coverfly!

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Curiosity is always at the top of my list. This quality takes courage and I have learned that not everyone possesses it. My own curiosity has opened doors and it keeps me interested in the things I love.

I also think confidence is a skill that is essential to creativity. Sometimes creativity can be about making a choice, a decision that you don’t know if it’ll work or even stick. A lot of the time confidence is what is missing from creative choices. Having the courage to be confident in your choices let’s you lean into the full throttle making it land no matter what. And if doesn’t land having the confidence that you’ll learn from that and eventually stick to a choice that will work.

Curiosity and confidence are a mix that I have learned are not easy to own. There will always be people that will read this mix as arrogance or delusion. Understanding that you can’t control the way people react to you is vital to both of these qualities/skills. These two have been the anchors to my journey.

Awesome, really appreciate you opening up with us today and before we close maybe you can share a book recommendation with us. Has there been a book that’s been impactful in your growth and development?
I used to hate reading. School made me do it, therefore the thought of doing it on my down time never appealed to me. After Covid hit, all of a sudden I was met with my own time and a hunger to learn. I picked up the first book I ever really read until I was 18 years old. Better late than never. Adults would always emphasize how important reading was and I never paid any mind. I understood that you can really learn anything through books. An obvious lesson I refused to take in when I was younger.

After I became a sort of book worm I found I was extremely interested in myths and history. Historical fictions became so fun for me and myths have always made my head itch. Someone recommended me Joseph Campbell, “The Hero with a Thousand Faces”. I did not know what I was in for but when I started every page, every chapter blew my mind.

It was a book that helped me in so many ways, from understanding why religion doesn’t speak to me all the way to how to tell a story.

Joseph Campbell goes into extreme depth into myths from all over the world and compares them to essentially explain that no matter where or when we, as humans, have been telling the same story over and over again, we’ve just been changing the names and situations. This made so much sense in my head it inspired me greatly to write my first full linear short film “Wilder Greene”.

This book not only took my fear of a thick book away from me but it also taught me patience, consistency and how to take what I learn and apply it to my art.

Contact Info:

Image Credits
Max Olivieri, Riley Ater, Noelle Ramsay, Jeremy Thompson

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