Meet Olivia Simone | Actress, writer, producer, teacher, company owner.

We had the good fortune of connecting with Olivia Simone and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Olivia, what’s your definition for success?
A friend said to me the other day, ‘I couldn’t do what you are doing, it would make me really anxious. It’s not my kind of success. I need to know that I will get a pay cheque every month, health benefits and 401 k.’

I don’t have 401k. EEEK!! I have never even thought about it and to most people this is shocking. I’m not living for tomorrow and this has given me so much space in my mind and freedom to imagine what I want to create for my life. Success to me is feeling happy today, being able to walk around the world and be in a space that I can share this with others too! I don’t want to be sooooo busy that I am on edge, that I’m closed up when I see people and can’t give them time and love! It took me a long time to work it out, but success is this. It’s not the paycheck and security. Yes, we need money, but getting money doing what you love, and giving yourself enough time for your deep passions without a huge schedule is success to me.

And it took a long time, ups and downs, trials and errors, lots of meditation and therapy 🙂 but TODAY, I can say I wake up in the morning – and this is the moment you really know if you are happy – and I have a peaceful heart and a smile on my face.

Since I was a kid I wanted to be an actress. I had pictures of LA on my wall and dreamed of it day after day. But it’s a hard road doing lots of non acting jobs to pay the rent. It was really hard for my mental health after drama school, so I started dreaming of a way I can be creative and make money for myself doing something I love, not just wait for someone to say YES to me through the audition process. So in between Tv and theatre shows in Australia I started teaching acting to young people in rural communities in Australia – I found a lack of professional actors serving these areas and it was a HIT. When I moved to LA after I dreamed a greencard into reality (seriously, those vision boards help) I created the buisness here. Every type of creative class for young people from acting ,to film making, to musical theatre to comedy. Gosh, this has brought me so much happiness, being able to share what I love with young people, inspiring them and giving them confidence. That is inner success.

In recent years I have started to not teach as much, once it was up and running, I got a team of incredible professional actors going into the communities to teach young people.

And no, I still don’t put 401 k aside – why??

My 401 k goes into my creative projects. I have written films and produced them, creating roles for myself and collaborating with incredible people, telling heart felt stories, all under the banner of my company; Off the beaten track productions.

So yeah, goodbye 401 k – and hello passion projects.

Don’t tell my Dad, he is an accountant and would kill me!!

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
When I first arrived in LA, It was a bit of a shock. I had created a career in Australia and I had to start again. I was feeling a bit down one day and I asked myself, “if you could do anything at all, what would it be.’ I was wrin qa `1ting a film at the time about my Italian heritage, based on my own experience going to my mothers family village in Sicily for the first time.

In the quiet of the question I heard. MAKE THAT FILM.

So I listened, and put all my focus on this and when I did that, the whole world opened up. My mother gave me the money she had put aside for my wedding day and my whole community in Melbourne gave me donations. This allowed me to fly to the Cannes film festival, find an amazing producer, film my first short film in Italy called AZZURRO (you can find it on youtube) and that gave me confidence to create an incredible deep and heartfelt feature film script with the help of some amazing script editors. Our film Girasole, is close to coming to life.

Yesterday, I received the final cut to another short film I wrote, produced and acted in with my other production company ‘Inner light Pictures.’ It’s called ‘A Song for Gracie.’ And will be touring the festival circuit in 2024 with a feature film version close behind.

It may sounds easy on here, but it all this has taken 10 years, up and down and round and round.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
My most favourite thing in LA are the cute little hidden stairs in between the houses in the hills. There are some in beachwood Canyon, Franklin Hills and Silverlake Hills to name a few.

A sunrise walk through here is the start before we head to Maru on franklin ave for an Iced Matcha, with added sweet cream and maybe a gluten free donut for breakfast – why not!

A yoga class at Corepower yoga. lunch at Cafe Gratitude in Larchmont and then to Los Feliz cinema for an arthouse film.

Early dinner at Green Leaves on Hillhurst and then head to Kadampa Meditation Centre in Los Feliz for a meditation class to end a beautiful day.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
During the years after drama school, I was in a lot of mental pain. I would wake up in the morning and cry. I didn’t want to get out of bed. I was brought up Catholic so I would go to a little church and sit and look at Jesus and say ‘help me.’ In the thicks of these intense feelings, a distant friend told me about a meditation class as part of Kadampa Meditation Center. It took me many months to actually go, but when I finally went, the teacher was talking about where our feelings come from. That they come from inside our mind and they can be healed. There is no blame outside the mind. WHAT???? Are you saying that I can’t blame my parents, my agent, my landlord. WHAT?

After spending time going to the class every week, I started to feel better and better and better. 15 years later, I am still meditating and now teaching meditation. It has completely changed my life.

The Kadampa Meditation center has 1200 locations around the world and I personally now go to the one in Los Feliz.

I love it!!!

www.meditateinla.org

Website: www.offthebeatentrack.biz

Instagram: livsimone

Facebook: Olivia Simone

Other: Azzurro short film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt21OJPmMK8&t=699s