Meet Laura Cheek of MoonShine Experiential

Today we’d like to introduce you to Laura Cheek.

So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I am nothing if not a very proud Texan. I was born and raised on a little farm that isn’t there anymore, somewhere between Amarillo and Lubbock. We rode horses and played banjos and climbed windmills and raced dirt bikes while the Friday Night Lights soundtrack played softly in the background.

Much to the chagrin of my mostly conservative family, I left my small town to attend the University of Texas at Austin and Ballet Austin Academy. I graduated in 2010 with degrees in Theatre and Communications, and two weeks later I packed my truck with everything I owned and drove to Los Angeles where I knew a friend, another actress from Texas, who needed a roommate. I didn’t have a solid plan or a great job awaiting me, just a gut feeling and a pipe dream.

My first year was a doozy. I barely made ends meet with several part-time jobs, I got signed by an agent and then dropped six months later because I wasn’t booking anything (and I was one too many 20-something blondes on their roster, which is just… shocking), and I got an embarrassing number of parking tickets along the way. I really struggled to occupy space in the industry, in my own life, and it took me too long to admit that it just wasn’t right for me no matter how much I wanted to be.

One night, my roommate dragged me kicking and screaming to a local production of an original show being performed in somebody’s apartment by a company I’d never heard of. They were called the Ahimsa Collective and the show was called Birthdays, a collection of poignant and hilarious autobiographical vignettes that I wasn’t just watching from a crowd, I was witnessing and participating in them. They were refreshingly honest and delightfully messy and intimate in a way that created an immediate sense of community. I started to feel less homesick.

I joined in 2011 and we changed our name to Cartel: Collaborative Arts LA (because I guess nobody could pronounce Ahimsa). Our mission was to connect communities through art and encourage creating something from nothing. We wrote and performed original works, staged live radio plays, produced immersive art installation shows and living room plays, founded the No Budget Film Festival where we challenged new filmmakers to “beg, borrow, and shoot” (I still think about some of those films because they were genuinely fantastic) and, most notably, we founded the Broke LA Music & Arts Festival (formerly Brokechella), which started as a joke and an excuse to throw a party in a bar and ended as one of the largest independent music festivals in LA with over 6000 attendees and a roster of local artists that went on to play bigger festivals, including the behemoth in the desert.

As our own events grew, so did our business. We started producing events for Sundance, SXSW, Melia International Hotels, and dozens more. It was challenging and rewarding and scary and fun and we lost so much sleep. We grew so quickly and in so many different directions, and over time some of our founding members moved away or headed down different career paths.

Today, I’m the Creative Director of MoonShine Experiential, which I co-founded last year with my friend Anna Schumacher, another co-founder of Cartel and a total badass. I also recently co-produced my first feature film and hope to do more of that in the future. When I’m not working, you can find me at the nearest karaoke bar living out my lifelong fantasy of being a pop and/or Broadway star.

Has it been a smooth road?
Oh, it’s been an absolutely un-smooth road. I don’t know a single person in LA who hasn’t struggled, and frankly, I don’t want to know anyone like that. That sounds so boring!

I think heartbreak and disappointment are inevitable truths as an entrepreneur, especially when you go into business with your best friends, ESPECIALLY when you’re an entirely women-owned business. It can be difficult to create boundaries, and you NEED boundaries. The hardest lesson for me was to learn how to compartmentalize my relationships. Work and friendship can mix sometimes, but not all the time. As much as you try to prevent it, hard decisions will have to be made, and it will probably bleed into the personal side of things and cause damage. It’s so tricky and delicate. I’ve formed stronger bonds with some people and I’ve lost others, but ultimately every struggle has only made me stronger or smarter, and I firmly believe that everything worth having is never easy.

I also lack a certain level of patience for disrespectful or egotistical people. And we run into a lot of those! Luckily, Anna handles those situations so much better than I do, so when we run into a particularly difficult person, I go take a walk and calm down while Anna works her magic. Teamwork!

So, as you know, we’re impressed with MoonShine Experiential – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
MoonShine Experiential is a full-service event production, strategy, and consulting company, and we bring a signature grassroots spirit to our work. We have a collective 20 years of experience in the wild world of immersive and event production, and we’re especially good at diffusing inevitable challenges with fortitude and approaching the production process with an all-hands-on-deck attitude. We celebrate collaborating with our clients to produce high-end event operations and to introduce unique interactive elements for an elevated guest experience. We love bringing ideas to life and creating meaningful ways to experience art, which is especially important in this current climate.

In our short time as a company so far, we wrote and directed LA’s first “escape bar”, Dream Study 114, with Shipwreck Labs, co-produced the first annual Five07 Creative Fest in Calabasas, and produced an entire festival to celebrate chicken wings. Most recently, we were associate producers of the critically acclaimed Crimson Cabaret, an immersive spy musical!

Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
Let’s get the dislikes out of the way. Obviously, the traffic here is bonkers, and it’s clear that a lot needs to change in order to make it better. I wish we embraced public transportation more, and that it was more reliable and accessible. Secondly, I hate the way this city reacts to rain. Everyone forgets how to drive and everything floods so quickly! Lastly, and maybe it’s the Texan in me, but LA seems to lack a sense of unity and pride. That’s something I really miss. I’m sure it’s because we’re a massive cluster of small cities filled mostly with transplants, but there’s a sense of reluctance that baffles me, especially with all the diversity, beauty, and rich history this place has to offer.

There are so many things I adore about this city. I love that I can travel 1-2 hours in any direction and reach a different landscape. Desert, mountains, beach, forest. It’s a dream. The food here is incredible and reflective of the amazing diversity. I love the way people are surprised by how much they love LA when they visit because the idea they had in their head about it was totally contrary. Most of all, I really love how challenging it is to be here. LA forces you out of your comfort zone and into new and unexpected experiences. It’s here that I’ve met and formed lifelong friendships with some of the greatest people I’ll ever know, and I think it’s because living here makes you better, stronger, smarter, more creative, and more equipped to handle the hard stuff life throws at you.

Contact Info:

• Website: moonshinela.com
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: @moonshine_la

Image Credit:
Photo-baker, Lee Jameson Photo

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