Today we’d like to introduce you to Ash M. Warren.
Ash Warren, or ‘Ashes’ as her nickname permit, hails from Los Angeles, CA. A child of both an immigrant mother from Ecuador and a SoCal born father with British roots, Warren was encouraged from a young age to be whoever she wanted to be. For the having grown up locally from the Burbank Studios, Warren’s first modeling campaign at age 3 was a Gerber Baby, and that progressively lead to a love of stage performance, film sets and then… music videos.
“I went to high school in Burbank, where my classmates were Mara Wilson and Blake Lively…acting and singing was always around, it’s as if we were all just art students,” Warren wonders. In high school she performed plays and was an avid sculptor and singer. It was her freshmen year of high school that she met the person who would go on to mentor her for the next 14 years of her life: Garry Marshall. She stared ushering at Marshall’s theatre, The Falcon. Eventually, she became part of the family at The Falcon and the adjacent production company that belonged to Marshall, Henderson. She watched every play and musical that would premiere at the theatre and witnessed first hand the development of productions. The most notable one being The Happy Days Musicals.
In 2006 she appeared in ‘Georgia Rule’ opposite Lindsay Lohan. Marshall cast her in the film as ‘Mormon Michelle’ as a graduation gift for her. “I think the best part about Garry was that he always teaching me. How to act, how to behave on set, how to write an essay, how to finish college. I learned so much from him, and still find myself learning from him in every show or movie he ever did. That was the magic about Garry. He was just magical in every way.” Marshall cast her again for 2010’s ‘Valentine’s Day” opposite Taylor Swift and Emma Roberts.
Warren graduated from UCLA with degrees in Forensic Anthropology, Theatre and Education. She spent a year studying Theater and English Literature at Oxford University in England, and it was here that she became a lifelong adorer of all things British, even down to their terrible taste in food and beer.
After spending the better part of the ’10’s fluttering around and deciding when she was going to make the jump (“The jump is when you leave behind the comfortable cushy life of a full-time job with benefits and PTO…I worked in Neurosurgery at a hospital and lived really well for a 25 year old fresh outta college…”). She finally jumped and started to record music, sculpt, produce, write and audition like a house on fire.
2017-2018: Ash Warren debuted her single ‘Run My Show’ off her freshman album ‘How to Survive Quicksand’ on MFK Radio. Warren began working as an on-air and on-camera host for the 501c3 organization, “Female Filmmakers Fuse and its leader Alexa Polar. Polar met Ash at their 2018 FF Film Festival and asked her to host the new show, ‘The Elevator Pitch’. It was while they were filming the trailer that she met Jayfree of MFK Radio in.. Where else? The Elevator! He found her humor spicy and asked her to come on his radio show to debut her music and do an interview with her. You can watch her debut interview on MFK Radio’s Facebook page.
Ashes continued her work with Female Filmmakers by hosting and moderating their 2019 film festival and hosting their YouTube series, ‘On Location with Ash Warren’ where she interviews female filmmakers at their premieres. As of summer 2020 she continues her projects with Female Filmmakers Fuse and Butterfly Angel Entertainment (whom is the parent production company of the in-development film of Polar’s R Culture).
Warren has also partnered up with MFK Radio now on Yoradio.com. Her new show, titled “Phoenix from the Ashes” will be debuting late July 2020 and on twice a week. Her guests and topics will include: female filmmakers, artists, sexual abuse survivors, Black Lives Matter activists, animal rights activists, Environmental experts, Anthropology scholars /Archaeologists, health and fitness gurus, mental health experts, political commenters, amid an array of other topics.
Fun facts about Ash: she volunteers with the Linda Blair Worldheart Rescue Foundation, loves dogs especially pit bulls, terriers and King Charles, sculpts, long drives along Mulholland, Malibu and is in love with her best friend. She feels lucky.
On the prettier side of things… in 2014 Ash was hand-selected by Shemar Moore to be the face of that year’s winter catalogue. In 2016 and 2017, she hair modeled for Oribé, and in 2018-2019 she worked on campaigns with OGX Beauty (hair and hand modeling).
And yet…
We all know that 2020 is a complete and utter shit show. The whole world is burning, set on fire literally and figuratively, and when a pandemic hits, all production stops.
Or does it?
With no filming occurring and all of Hollywood settling, friend Alasdair Mackay and Warren hatch a plan to write, produce, crowdfund and shoot a film in London where Mackay is based. Warren becomes international. and is the producer of the film “Anonymous” which is written and being directed by the at BAFTA award-winning Alasdair Mackay. Mackay has premiered three films at Cannes, among them being the award-winning ‘Shadows’. They are working a social media-based budget campaign to raise 22,000 dollars to shoot ‘Anonymous’ in August/September 2020, which is considered a micro-budget and almost unheard of. They plan to submit the film for film festival consideration the 2020/2021 season. Crowdfunding is underway as of July 2020, as well as the announcement and casting of characters.
Anonymous is a 21st-century exploration into the realm of addiction, the gateway to sobriety and the pathway to staying sober. The film features a seemingly average man as he navigates himself through his first AA meeting.
“I have become educated and inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement, because not only is racism, violence against someone because of the color of their skin, and inciting bigotry wrong; it’s downright inhumane to me. I know that some would argue that my statement is opposite of what they would consider the truth, that to be human IS to be inhumane, but I can’t accept that. Gandhi said it best, ‘Be apart of the change you want to see in the world’, and Anne Frank famously wrote that she still believes in spite of everything, that people were really good at heart. You can’t help but feel so deeply for something, that it makes you light a fire under your ass to go do something about it…so I protested, donated, share everything I can on social media and read as much material I can, to be on top of the change I want to see”.
Much like the racism incited against people of color and their communities, addiction does the same thing. It makes no difference what color of your skin is, where you were born, how much money you have saved in your bank account, or where you were educated; addiction is a bitch and will slap you in the face, unannounced at times. Addiction and racism against people of color are two unilaterally parallel lines that Warren saw, and wants to make a film that will reflect that.
Anonymous’ casting will be diverse, inclusive and showcase a cast of characters from different backgrounds that Hollywood has not seen nearly enough of. Warren and Mackay desire representation within Anonymous, and being set in a multi-cultural city like London enhances that reality.
Because if you think about it, that’s all we all want from our films: to be represented.
And here, a half Latina with a valley girl accent and an affinity for dogs who dreamed all her life to be on film like her idol Audrey Hepburn meets her crossroads.
Has it been a smooth road?
The industry loves to eat itself, and especially it’s young.
It has been far from smooth, mostly turns and dead ends, but Ash has found her right path.
‘Turn Off the Lights’ was a 2018 debut that Warren starred and produced. It was the first time that she began to experience how truly flakey and unprofessional actors behaved. If anything, the stage debut taught Warren to be careful who she surrounds with, because people in Hollywood are opportunists and will turn on you even if you tread softly and treat others with love and respect. Trust is a luxury and respect must be earned.
Modeling hasn’t always been easy, but she has preserved in both commercial and print for big beauty brands OGX and Oribé. She is also a brand ambassador with Mark Cuban’s Wild Earth (plant dog food) investment. The struggle to be seen and heard is difficult in a saturated market like LA, but that illustrates how London and the UK are more appealing to Ash.
Some challenges that Ash has faced during this journey has been those regarding her mental health. After the death of her best friend Kevin Hayes in 2010 from an overdose, Ash spiraled in and out of therapy for years. Having been diagnosed with chronic anxiety and PTSD (among other things such as an eating disorder and depression) she turned to songwriting. Over the years with intense therapy, yoga and meditation, Warren found balance within her life. It is because of Kevin Hayes that Anonymous is being produced.
The obstacles are usually found within oneself, it is what you do outward and how to turn your pain into power, that defines one’s character.
We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
Ash is a producer working with UK’s Shellout Productions and also partners with Butterfly Angel Entertainment, stateside on projects. Although known more for being in front of the camera, Warren is now seen as a burgeoning producer, whose facet for social media and interviews on her IG lives and podcasts come barreling through. It also helps that she has a dry sense of humor and is comfortable with speaking out on her anxiety and being an advocate for positive mental health in conversations.
Specializing in resourcing, education and entertainment, Ash Warren is very much a phoenix. Having come from relatively nowhere, she is burning through the female filmmaker scene. Warren advocates for female filmmakers and empowerment within the network of powerful women. She is most proud of the direction that her life and the company is taking.
“Finding genuine people who love you and who you work with is the ultimate gift a job can ever have. For me, this job is not just a job, it’s my career and my entire being and passions are devoted to it. I want this, so badly, and I love Tiffany Haddish because she speaks what she wants into existence, and so now, I do too”.
Shellout is known for being the driving, award-winning force being her good friend Alasdair Mackay. Mackay and Warren met on a Norwegian Air flight from London to LA one summer. They figured out quickly why the flight was so cheap: you had to buy your food! What airline doesn’t provide food?! WTF-seriously?
Yes, but that loophole is exactly what made Warren and Mackay bond over the course of their 12-hour flight. They kept in touch during Mackay’s LA trip and over the next several years, Warren and Mackay (alongside his darling wife, Nina) became close friends and is now the reason behind their collaboration on Anonymous.
Friendship, faith, love and hope is what sets the production company apart from others. When you have those ingredients, success will come. And once again, Warren finds herself at a crossroads.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
The music and film industries will blow up even more in the next 5-10 years, and Ash sees more female filmmakers coming into focus. Men have long carried the gauntlet of priority and maintaining positions of power, that explicitly allowed them to tell their stories and reap the rewards from it. With the emergence of MeToo and TimesUp, female filmmakers have become integral in the filmmaking process. Women, and women of color namely, are rising to desired positions of producers, directors, cinematographers, and investors, etc.
Women are also coming forward to tell their stories of sexual abuse/harassment, and this is so imperative. Ash Warren envisions her partnerships with Butterfly Angel and Shell Out as a way to be progressive and encourages their projects to be ones that address sexual abuse survivors, champions of mental health and advocating for diversity and inclusivity. With the onslaught of ‘R Culture’ by Alexa Polar and ‘Anonymous’ written by Alasdair Mackay, Warren can’t wait to help bring these imperative films into the forefront.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1966608/?ref_=nmbio_bio_nm
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: whoisashwarren
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/whoisashwarren
- Other: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1DLu4ec6wUB2cYyl3EqeYQ
shelloutproductions.com
Image Credit:
Kat Tuohy Photography, Lovely Luminance Photography, Julia Zambianco Photography, Skylar Dark Photography
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