Amy Heidish | Author | Screenwriter

Tell us a little bit about who you are and how you first got involved with Epiphany Space.

I’m Amy Heidish and I’m a writer of all kinds - playwright, screenwriter, fiction, and nonfiction.

I first got involved with Epiphany Space in 2017. I had heard about it for a long time but as I had a day job with the studios, I couldn’t ever make it work with my schedule.

But then I left my job to write full time and wandered into Epiphany Space looking for a co-working space. Melissa Smith immediately enlisted me to get involved in the community as a manager on Fridays, which introduced me to the Epiphany community at large.

Who inspires you? What creative people or creative work makes you say I want to do that?

Anybody who world builds and since everyone says J. R. R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, I’m not saying them. I’m saying L. Frank Baum, Lloyd Alexander, Neil Gaiman, and Christopher Nolan’s puzzle movies (Memento, Inception).

Any storyteller who can surprise me, since as a pop culture audience we get wiser with the more content we consume. Stories I’ve seen lately that did that were Barbarian, Leigh Whannell’s The Invisible Man, Mike Flanagan's Midnight Mass, and Hulu's tv series The Bear.

What are some of the challenges you faced along the way and how did you deal with them?

Completing your work is one thing. Getting your work to an audience is one thing. Getting your audience to pay attention is the hardest thing of all, and that’s what I’m wrestling with.

Are you working on anything cool or interesting right now? Anything you’d like to tell us about?

I’m entering the world of self-publishing! My first book - The Pocket Guide To Sluts, Schemers and other Shockingly Interesting Women Of The Bible debuts on Amazon on December 1st. It’s the first in a series of three books examining women of the Bible and telling familiar stories from their POV with humor, questions, and a generous dash of profanity.

Where do you see your creative journey taking you? What would you like to be doing five years from now? 

I was voice dictating this question to myself so I could write on my iPad and “creative journey” came out as “cute attorney” so I'm answering this question through that lens.

My creative journey/cute attorney is going to take me to the self-publishing world, as I have another series of books planned. I’ve also started a monthly newsletter to try and grow a community who are interested in my writing, looking at things from a different POV and more than a fair share of dog content, you can sign up for it here: https://www.amyheidish.com/my-newsletter 

My cute attorney will be advising me on how to share things in this newsletter without violating copyright laws.

What advice would you give to other artists? any words of wisdom for those looking to follow in your footsteps?

I’ve often said that nobody gets anywhere by giving up. Whatever you’re doing - art, music, writing, etc. - make sure the joy is in the doing of it, not in the approval of others receiving it.