Inspirational Women In Hollywood: How Jillie Simon Of Endorphin Records Is Helping To Shake Up The Entertainment Industry
An Interview With Guernslye Honoré
I wish that I’d started making my own films earlier, it’s relatively easy nowadays since everything is digital. My first film “Hungry” was quite ambitious (several locations, children and a dog) — and Oscar-nominee Eric Roberts came aboard to play the Congressman my character confronts, because he loved the script, and it all ended up being quite successful and gaining distribution, and I met so many wonderful filmmakers from the festival run. I could have attempted writing a screenplay years earlier, because the benefits are huge.
As a part of our series about Inspirational Women In Hollywood, I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Jillie Simon.
Jillie Simon is a multi-faceted talent known for her work as an actor, singer-songwriter, and filmmaker. She wrote, co-directed and played the lead role in narrative short film “Hungry”, co-starring Oscar-nominee Eric Roberts, which won win 19 awards in 35 festivals, received distribution with IndiePix Films and is currently streaming. Her second short “A Chance” won 12 awards in 26 festivals, with 3 more festivals coming up in 2023.
Classically trained, Jillie began in theater, performing Off-Broadway (N.Y. Public Theater, “Tony and Tina’s Wedding”) and regionally. Varied roles in feature films include a loving, yogini girlfriend in “The Incoherents”, a wild singer turned “collagist” in “Prince Harming” and a timid but desperate secretary in “Confess”). Television includes “As The World Turns” and “The Chris Rock Show”. She’s had the pleasure of performing with icons such as Marlo Thomas (Cleveland Playhouse), Marion Seldes (StagePlays Theater), Austin Pendleton (Cornelia St. Cafe), played Marilyn Monroe in “Marilyn” for BritFest, and Tom Wopat’s sixth and latest wife in a staged reading of Larry Beinhart (“Wag the Dog”)’s screenplay “Divorce” at The Directors Company. She’s also co-directed, co-produced and performed in multi-award-winning music videos “Legalize” and “So Many Ways (For Safe, Green, Sane Energy)”.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. Can you tell us the story of how you grew up?
Thanks so much for inviting me to do this! I grew up on Long Island, to the sounds of seagulls and airplanes taking off. It was a short drive into New York City, which was where I first saw theater; my parents were avid theater-lovers and I was lucky to get to see Off-Broadway and Broadway shows from an early age. And also to have field trips to wonderful museums while in summer art programs.
Can you share a story with us about what brought you to this specific career path?
I always loved to make up stories and play other characters as a child, playing make believe with friends, and then when I first saw live theater, it was an exciting, magical experience, I longed to be a part of it. I tried out for and was in every school play and by the time I was heading off to university, I knew for sure I wanted to be an actress.
Can you tell us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?
Hmm…I’ve had the honor of working with so many terrific people. Ron Howard is such a lovely man to be directed by, in addition to being a fantastic filmmaker and Marian Seldes was so sweet and awesome to work with… at the Chesapeake Film Festival, they screened our film “Hungry” (which is about a teacher fighting for hungry children in schools), in front of “Lean on Me”, which was screening because the director, John G. Avildsen, was there to receive a Lifetime Achievement award, so we were onstage with John at the Q&A. It was wonderful to listen to him talk about his process (and also to get to have a longer chat at the Filmmaker Gathering). I also got to play with my band Love Alien at a Woodstock Reunion show, onstage at the famed Yasgurs Farm itself, which was very exciting.
It has been said that our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
Early on, in one of the first films I was in, I was very well hydrated and therefore needed to use the bathroom — and was still miked up. The sound person told me discreetly afterwards, that I should tell them in advance and they can turn off the sound. Whenever you’re not sure of anything in a new environment, ask.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
I’m thankful to the brilliant theater and television (and Second City) director Larry Arrick, who saw my work and believed in me. He taught me a lot and cast me in my first Off-Broadway show, as well as in a major regional theater production. He also tried hard to get me into another Off-Broadway show he was directing, but the playwright (who was also the producer) was extremely adamant about wanting a tall blonde.
You have been blessed with great success in a career path that can be challenging. Do you have any words of advice for others who may want to embark on this career path, but seem daunted by the prospect of failure?
If you love acting very much — more than anything else — you owe it to your heart to try for it, because you only have one life to live and you don’t want to end up with regrets and what-ifs. Know in advance that it’s a career path where you need to audition a lot, and everyone gets rejections on the road to getting cast in projects, and often you didn’t get the role simply because they were looking for a different look, particularly in television. So you need to be able to handle rejection well, and it isn’t for those who are looking for fame or “stardom”, as opposed to wanting to work as an actor because you love acting — inhabiting other lives and other worlds. But if, when you do work, it gives you joy, you might as well give it a go! And take class, work on your craft constantly, and keep your instrument well-tuned.
Every industry iterates and seeks improvement. What changes would you like to see in the industry going forward?
Right now, SAG-AFTRA is fighting for fair wages — over 85% of union actors cannot reach the minimum earnings in order to be able to get SAG-AFTRA health insurance (which kicks in with making $26,000 a year ) — and also fighting for us to not have our images or voices taken to be replicated by AI. I hope the corporations see the light. I’d also like to see less sexism and ageism.
You have such impressive work. What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? Where do you see yourself heading from here?
Thank you! I’ve been cast in an indie horror film “Ruxton Hills” by Marvalee Peart, who is a marvelous screenwriter, and we’re scheduled to shoot in April, 2024. I’ve also been cast in a powerful drama with a lot of humor in it, “The Puzzle Board” by Jon Marans, a three character play in which my character, a history professor, is trying to piece together memories of possible childhood trauma. We did a very successful reading of it at the Barrow Group, and hopefully it will be produced Off-Broadway in 2024. I’ve also been doing developmental readings of a fun screwball comedy “Hair Of the Dog” by Tim Young, in which I play a Broadway actress, caught between two rivalrous brothers. And I’m also in the last stages of development with my new feature screenplay, “Real, True 100 Percent Love — a dramedy/rock and roll spy comedy, which has been receiving wonderful feedback, and we hope to be going into pre-production in early 2024.
We are very interested in looking at diversity in the entertainment industry. Can you share three reasons with our readers why you think it’s important to have diversity represented in film and television? How can that potentially affect our culture and our youth growing up today?
It’s very important to have diversity represented in film and tv. For one thing, that is what is reflective of the world we actually live in. Also, children need to see themselves represented in the stories they read or view, it’s important for self-esteem. And it’s also important to broaden young people’s world view if they are being kept in a cocoon — to realize that there are other ways of life, all sorts of other people, other viewpoints than the ones that they’re hearing. Young people are less likely to feel isolated or to end up prejudiced, when they’re raised in a diverse community. A young woman came up to me after a festival screening of our film “A Chance” ( in which the two lead characters are gay women) at the Through Women’s Eyes Film Festival in Sarasota, Florida, and teared up, telling me how much it meant to her to see characters “like herself” onscreen. Which is why I’d felt it important to tell this relationship story, as it was representing members of a marginalized community who needed to see stories told about them, and had suggested to the playwright that the short play that I’d been cast in (which “A Chance” was based on), could make a terrific short film.
What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why?
I was so nervous when I’d audition, particularly for major casting directors. I wish I’d known very early on that the casting people are rooting for you, they want you to go in there, be your most confident self and knock their socks off. And I wish I knew that if someone is curt with you, don’t take it personally, their day has probably been going terribly, and it has nothing to do with you. And that when the audition is over, even if you’re dying to say “I didn’t feel like I quite nailed that last bit, can I do it once more?” — that can only be done in the very moment after the audition — if you’re already at the door, it’s better to just leave with a smile and a thank you. And take a negative opinion with a grain of salt, don’t take it to heart — I read somewhere that a casting director said Faye Dunaway wasn’t Hollywood material, that she looked like a frog — one person’s opinion, which didn’t stop Ms. Dunaway. And finally, I wish that I’d started making my own films earlier, it’s relatively easy nowadays since everything is digital. My first film “Hungry” was quite ambitious (several locations, children and a dog) — and Oscar-nominee Eric Roberts came aboard to play the Congressman my character confronts, because he loved the script, and it all ended up being quite successful and gaining distribution, and I met so many wonderful filmmakers from the festival run. I could have attempted writing a screenplay years earlier, because the benefits are huge.
Can you share with our readers any self-care routines, practices or treatments that you do to help your body, mind or heart to thrive?
I do yoga — the more you do it, the more your body craves it. Currently I’ve been taking classes on the Pilates reformer, which is a wonderful way to strengthen, and maintain long, lean muscles. I try to get in some massage therapy when I can, even when traveling, if at all possible. When we were at the Palm Springs ShortFest, I found a wonderful Thai yoga massage therapist in the area, helped by Yelp. And in order to keep my heart lifted, during hard and stressful times and throughout terrible and tragic news cycles, I look at Good News round-ups, positive news and adorable animal videos, like the ones on TheDodo.com — many of them are very sweet and uplifting!
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
As an optimist and a positive person, I’ve always resonated to “make lemonade” (when life gives you lemons) — but I just saw a lovely quote from Roy T. Bennett that fits with what I was talking about earlier — “Instead of worrying about what you cannot control, shift your energy to what you can create”- which I did, first as a singer-songwriter with my band, and then years later, when I began making films. And as an activist, I find Martin Luther King’s words “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter” to be a very important quote for the world. — I try to participate in protests and benefits whenever possible, so as to actively be part of the solution.
You are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?
To bring more empathy to this world, a movement to care for and about each-other — our neighbors, near and far, and animals and the natural, living world. Where we care for the children and forests and wildlife and the ocean, etc., so that they can all live and thrive on a healthy planet. Being kind and caring to others is very powerful and causes a ripple effect. When we throw kindness and love out into the world, that ripples out to people and places we may never know about. Kindness begets kindness and would create a better, happier, more just and peaceful world. And empathy for children and animals and their future would lead to solving major crises besetting the world currently, like the climate crisis and malnutrition.
Is there a person in the world whom you would love to have lunch with, and why? Maybe we can tag them and see what happens!
Susan Seidelman — I met her briefly a couple of times, and she’s a lovely person, as well as a terrific filmmaker. I think her sensibility would fit so well for my new screenplay “Real, True 100 Percent Love”, and so I’d be interested in seeing if it resonates with her and if she might be interested in directing it.
Are you on social media? How can our readers follow you online?
Yes, @JillieSimon on IG and Twitter(X), also @hungrymovie
This was so informative, thank you so much! We wish you continued success!
— Thank you so much! And all the best!
About the interviewer: Guernslye Honoré, affectionately known as “Gee-Gee”, is an amalgamation of creativity, vision, and endless enthusiasm. She has elegantly twined the worlds of writing, acting, and digital marketing into an inspiring tapestry of achievement. As the creative genius at the heart of Esma Marketing & Publishing, she leads her team to unprecedented heights with her comprehensive understanding of the industry and her innate flair for innovation. Her boundless passion and sense of purpose radiate from every endeavor she undertakes, turning ideas into reality and creating a realm of infinite possibilities. A true dynamo, Gee-Gee’s name has become synonymous with inspirational leadership and the art of creating success.
