We recently had the chance to connect with Molly Quinlan Artwick and have shared our conversation below.
Good morning Molly Quinlan, we’re so happy to have you here with us and we’d love to explore your story and how you think about life and legacy and so much more. So let’s start with a question we often ask: What is something outside of work that is bringing you joy lately?
Paint by numbers!
I have never been a visually artistic person. I’m a writer, I used to do music, but never sketched or sculpted or painted. My therapist was encouraging me to carve out some time for self-care, and around the same time I went to a bachelorette weekend where the host brought arts and crafts for us to do. I had such a blast just painting a plant pot for the hell of it that when I saw an ad for a paint-by-numbers of Joshua Tree National Park, I bought it on impulse. Now after stressful days I take an hour and sit and watch some silly TV and paint my desert landscape. I’m almost done and need to start thinking about the next one–or maybe trying to paint something myself!
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
Hi!
My name is Molly Quinlan Artwick. I’m a writer, editor, audio producer, and all-around storyteller. I have a background in film & TV but have found that what I enjoy most is wearing multiple hats to tell stories. My day job is as an audio producer, where I write, research, edit scripts and audio, and occasionally lend my voice to podcasts. But I also like having a hand in other sorts of creative work and types of writing, from nonfiction memoir to romance novellas. My biggest focus outside of my audio work right now is a short dramady I wrote about grief and family relationships, called Nearly Departed. We’re currently in preproduction, slated to shoot in just a few weeks in Montana.
Okay, so here’s a deep one: Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
I think I was always a very playful and imaginative kid. I loved fantasy and I was constantly making up these incredibly complex imaginary worlds, with characters and quests and politics and relationships. I would make my older sister and her best friend act out elaborate scenes with me in these worlds, usually inspired by whatever I was reading at the time. I loved anything with a lady knight or a princess who saved herself–apparently I was a feminist from an early age. But I think I really liked the idea of someone like me being able to have an adventure and save the kingdom.
Part of growing up and fitting in, especially as a child in school, felt a little like I had to tamp down my imagination. When I was about 8 or 9, I had a neighbor my age who would call everything she didn’t like or was unfamiliar with “weird”–and I desperately didn’t want to be weird too. So probably around then I really stopped that kind of imaginative play that was such a huge part of my childhood.
I feel like even then, I still found ways to foster that creativity. I started doing theatre and then film projects, often forcibly casting my friends in documentaries about dance or music videos. I started carrying around a notebook I called my Shitbook–something I still do today, in a digital format–where I wrote down thoughts and ideas and would “word doodle,” AKA freewrite, when I was bored in class. I think these days I’m a lot more confident in the parts of me my neighbor might have called weird back then, and I like to foster them through my film and writing projects.
When did you stop hiding your pain and start using it as power?
Man, these are some deep questions!
I think for me, putting some of the stuff I was processing into a story, and connecting with other people about that story. I lost both my parents at a young age; my mother when I was 16, and my father when I was 23. Losing a parent is never easy, but I think where I was at in life, transitioning between adolescence and adulthood, really complicated matters. I had a lot of surprising emotions come out in the aftermath, so I simply chose not to deal with them. Very healthy, I know.
Years later I tried to write a piece about loss, and about how different it is on a personal level for the people left behind. This ended up being a short film script called Nearly Departed. I drew a lot from my experiences with my siblings after our parents died, and how I found myself both laughing and arguing a lot more than I expected. As part of the journey in bringing this piece to the screen, I’ve had to talk about grief a lot, and I’ve loved finding connection with people through it. I feel like most people I tell about the process of making this project quickly jump in with their own story of something ridiculous, or unexpected, or life-changing that happened when they lost a loved one. I hope that this short film can continue to inspire these kinds of discussions among people, and make grief feel less lonely.
I think that’s what I needed, and I want to create that for the next person who needs it.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. Whom do you admire for their character, not their power?
Oh, my gosh. Dolly Parton.
I feel like she is who I hold up as the model of who we all should strive to be in the world. She seems like someone who truly values connection, community, and service. She grew up very poor, seeing her parents and people around her struggle. She’s someone who wholeheartedly pursued her passions and talents, and became very successful doing so. People felt seen in her songs about love and breakups and even just getting through the workday (gotta love 9 to 5). But I feel like what I really appreciate Dolly Parton for is everything she’s done to help kids like her. She runs a nonprofit that sends books to kids across the country, and her organization has all kinds of programs and incentives aimed at decreasing the dropout rate in Tennessee schools. She frequently speaks out in support of her LGBTQ+ fans, and has donated to disaster relief to help families in her community affected by wildfires and hurricanes. She seems like someone who once she had money, immediately turned it around to help her community–and continues to do so. I feel like that’s the best thing any of us can strive for. To me, being a successful human means being part of the greater good.
Okay, so let’s keep going with one more question that means a lot to us: What will you regret not doing?
Not trying my hardest!
I feel like I’m someone who’s usually got a few irons in the fire. Sometimes, it can get overwhelming! I feel like giving up, like abandoning things, like it’s too hard to keep going. When moods like this happen, I try to think several years in the future. In a year, will I be happy I gave up, or regretful? Do I really think I tried as hard as I could to make a project happen? Roadblocks inevitably come up, and sometimes things I try will fall apart. But I feel like I can’t throw in the towel on anything until I’m satisfied I gave it my best shot.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://mollyartwick.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mollyartwick?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mollyartwick/
