NYWIFT Blog

By Daryl Bright Clay

Welcome to NYWIFT, Stephanie Mishelle Ard!

Stephanie Mishelle Ard is a Texas-born, Brooklyn-based, multi-hyphenate storyteller, who works both in-front-of and behind the camera. Her work as a Director, Producer, Writer, and Actress spans narrative film, unscripted series, documentary, music videos, and branded content. Her debut short film, That Day, premiered at Berlinale 2016 and her most recent work, Shelly Belly, had its New York premiere at the Greenwich Village Film Festival this past November. In Stephanie’s branded work, she has had had the opportunity to work with major brands and entertainment clients like HBO Max, DC Comics, State Farm, Travel Channel, and Warner Bros.

Stephanie’s highest career aim is to tell impactful stories that unify us around the human spirit and spread empathy, while continuing to create opportunities for women and underrepresented groups to work in this industry and tell their stories through film and television. In addition to creating film magic, Stephanie loves to spend her time cooking, doing home-improvement DIY activities or crafts, and snuggling her cat Swayze (that is, when Swayze allows the snuggles 😼).

Get to know her in our latest interview!

(Photo Courtesy of Stephanie Ard)

You grew up in Texas and now live in Brooklyn. How have your roots in Central Texas influenced your creative voice and the kinds of stories you want to tell?

Well, first of all, I feel very lucky to have grown up in a family, community, and a school district that was heavily in support of the arts. My high school had a fantastic theater program that I was very involved in, and my teachers, both in theater, choir, and in my English and humanities classes, were all very encouraging of individual creative expression and artistic growth. So that was a boon to my creative confidence as a young person, but also I was definitely raised with the notion that the sky’s the limit—and in Texas, the skies are really big! That’s cheesy, but the sentiment is true.

I feel like there is a notion you grow up with in Texas that you can really do, be, or have anything you want, if you just work hard enough. A real “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” mentality. And growing up in the sprawling suburbs of Dallas, there was constant growth and an entrepreneurial mindset around me. I think this instilled in me that if there was something I wanted to do, I could do it. And for me, that’s storytelling.

Naturally, we’re all influenced by our environments and our upbringing, but specifically for me, I grew up in the Christian faith, in what some might call, a Baptist Mega-church. This upbringing has absolutely influenced my creative voice—at times, it was in a more limiting way. But now that I’m older and have deconstructed from my religious upbringing, I want to explore those experiences through future projects. I’m currently working on writing my first feature which is a comedic look at church camp in the early 2000s!

Still from That Day (via IMDB)

In That Day, you explored the emotional complexity of teenage grief. How do you approach telling such personal, raw stories while still making them universally relatable?

I’m not sure where this advice came from in my life, but I once heard it said: “the more specific, the more universal”… and that has stuck with me. I believe that we all have a unique story, but within those unique stories are universal themes, so I always aim to tell a story that is specific in its details, but universal in its emotion. That Day is about the most intense thing that’s ever happened to me, but I knew that meant it was my most true story to tell. And grief is definitely a universal truth.

You also recently directed Shelly Belly, a quirky exploration of body image and insecurities. How do you navigate the balance between humor and deeper emotional themes in this project, and what motivated you to tell this particular story?

The path to creating Shelly Belly has really been lifelong. But the ultimate catalyst was me finally being annoyed enough with my own negative thought patterns regarding my body, that I decided I finally needed to address them. When I began to think about the cyclical negativity I found myself in, I thought that if I’m this annoying to myself, I wonder if my own body is annoyed with me. This spawned the idea of my stomach as a thinking, feeling entity. Basically, I was lacking the ability to give myself compassion around my perceived flaws, so I thought maybe if I gave my “flaw” a voice, it could teach me compassion. And thus Shelly Belly was born … A quirky short film about a somewhat round belly trying to enjoy its life, and hoping that its owner, Shelly, will someday love it.

Now, once you give a voice to a body part, I think it automatically lends itself to humor! There’s no real way around that. But also, I find that I deal with difficult subjects by using humor. Call it a coping mechanism if you’d like (maybe it is), but I think incorporating humor into the heaviest subject matters is a way to navigate through those matters, and  the ability to find lightness amongst the dark is one of the things that makes us human. Just when the subject gets too dark or too real, I like to inject a tiny joke or moment of physical comedy, to keep the audience engaged and on their toes, but also to make the message more palatable. A spoonful of sugar, if you will.

(via IMDB)

You co-developed and directed the comedy reality competition show Last Laugh, which became one of Rooster Teeth’s most-watched series. What was it like working on a comedy reality series, and what did you learn from that experience?

Working on a comedy reality series was so fun! I got to lead two seasons of Last Laugh, and the whole experience was so full of joy and collaboration, and a lot of hard work. When developing that show with creator Elyse Willems, I learned basically what it takes to make a game show from scratch. Elyse is a genius so I had a great collaborator in her, and I also worked with an amazing team of talented professionals at Rooster Teeth.

I learned how to run a live taping and watch 16-camera feeds at once (NOT easy!), how to quickly pivot and inject humor into a dying room, and how to keep a crew and cast of 30+ people inspired and happy! It was a huge undertaking but one of the most fun projects I’ve ever done.

What brought you to NYWIFT?

My roommate Jessica Lund is a NYWIFT member and she brought me to a mixer, which I thoroughly enjoyed! I’ve been wanting to get involved in an organization here in New York that brings together like-minded artists, and I’m excited to be a part of this organization.

Stephanie Ard on set (via LinkedIn)

When you’re developing a project, whether it’s a short film like That Day or a commercial campaign, what’s your creative process for finding the heart of the story and translating that into a compelling visual experience?

It’s interesting – even after almost ten years of directing, I still feel like with each project I’m rediscovering my creative process. And I love this discovery process, because each project is unique and deserves its own unique level of care. But I do tend to come to a project with some sort of visual already stuck in mind, that inspires the rest of the piece.

Like with That Day, even though that film was a lived experience for me, the image I couldn’t get out of my head was the specks of dust floating in front of my eyes, while the rest of the world was blurred behind it. That image in my mind encapsulated the feeling I wanted to convey in that film and everything else spawned from there.

Whichever way I “enter” the project, I do tend to have a strong emphasis on character in my creative process. I come from an acting background and I think the thing I learned most from being an actor is that every character should have a strong want or desire that fuels their decisions, actions, and behaviors.

With a narrative piece I generally come to it with a theme that I want to explore first, and then start to flesh out the characters that are going to be the conduit for the story. I literally sit down and journal from the character’s POV, which is something I would do if I were going to portray a character as an actor. But I find that in doing a deep dive on the personal histories, ideologies, and deepest darkest desires of my characters, I can often find new truths, nuggets of comedy, or interesting ideas that can be explored in the overall story. It’s a really helpful exercise!

(image from www.stephaniemishelleard.com/)

You’ve expressed a desire to run a company that operates on a four-day work week, which speaks to your interest in creating a healthy work-life balance. How do you envision creating a more sustainable and fulfilling environment for both yourself and your collaborators? 

That is something I’m continually trying to figure out! In fact, I’m open to ideas if anyone wants to start a dialogue [laughs]. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love this business and all of the hours I’ve put into it are not hours I regret. But I have seen how brutal filmmaking can be on people’s mental, physical and emotional states, and I would like to envision a future where the practice of filmmaking can be more manageable and efficient, and allow for a better work life balance for all involved.

On future projects, I’d love to explore French hours, and/or a four day pre-production week. I’m a very big proponent of boundaries—and though I’m not always the best at keeping them, I think they are extremely important to a healthy work / life balance and should be respected in the workplace. Of course there are times in film production where boundaries (like no emailing after 7pm) go out the window, but I’d like to dream of a world where they don’t have to, and we can all be in bed by 9pm.

Connect with Stephanie Mishelle Ard at stephaniemishelleard.com. You can also catch her on Instagram at @stephaniemishelle, on LinkedIn and can check out her directing reel HERE.