Today we’d like to introduce you to Jovian Deadees.
Hi Jovian, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I grew up in a household that prided Engineering and Science over the Arts. Even in that environment for some reason the talk of ghosts and long dead ancestors visiting us was commonplace, even personally experiencing paranormal encounters when I was very young. I began to study that phenomenon while I was still a child and found it prudent to keep many of the things I learned and experienced to myself. While a senior in high school I participated in the NASA student in space program, where students would propose experiments to be conducted on the space shuttle missions for the prospects of full scholarships. I developed an experiment to test a theory to counter the effects of long-term space flight by using weightlessness and sensory deprivation to make the mind believe it wasn’t in a confined space through the aid of ‘aromatherapy’ ( yeah, I was a geeky kid). I completed the documentation for the experiment and dropped it off at the post office (we didn’t have online anything yet) the morning of January 28, 1986 before I went to school. A few hours later my Teacher Advisor pulled me aside to tell me that the space shuttle Challenger had exploded on liftoff. In the aftermath of that accident the program was cancelled.
I started college studying Electrical Engineering but ran out of money after a year and a half and needed to find work. Because I had such a strong background in Mechanics, Science and Art I ultimately was able to work my way into an entry level position at Revlon Cosmetics. My skills took me from there. Ultimately in that industry I became a Chemist/Engineer and have worked on many products for numerous companies over the years. It’s not a boast to say many of your readers have probably worn something that I’ve worked on.
Throughout those years, I also would write my first book “The Pharaoh’s Voice” it was completed in 1989 and is a divination (tarot like) card system that was inspired by the writings of the philosopher Iamblichus. A book of poetry titled, ” From the Edge of Abyss” self published in 1993 and a Screenplay titled , “South Central Knights” in 2001, which is a reversed ‘Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court’ type story, inspired, as Mark Twain was, after reading Sir Thomas Mallory’s ‘Le Morte D’Arthur’. I wrote that screenplay with Toya Russell Hugershoff, who is a life long resident of the South Central Los Angeles region. I also had the opportunity to work as an extra in multiple roles during the filming of the motion picture, ‘Gettysburg’ in 1992 as well as in a number of Television shows after moving to Los Angeles in 2000.
After never being able to connect with any of my writings, I focused on making a living with my day job and continuing my solitary studies of Hermetics, Alchemy and the paranormal up until my death on February 13, 2021 from Sudden Cardiac Arrest, at the Trader Joes grocery store in Camarillo, California while in the checkout line.
(spoiler alert=””) I got better.
As I recovered from my short lived death; I started to try and develop my experience into something. I was only a day out of my coma when I began writing down everything I experienced and as time went on I began to take acting and scene study classes with Mary Kennedy and Paul Jacek at Mary’s ‘The Biz Studio’ (for information email [email protected] ). Mary offered classes in ‘One Person Shows’ and from that my Show ‘Intellectual Mind Candy’ was born, which I performed in it’s entirety on April 13, 2025 as part of Solofest 2025 at the Whitefire Theatre in Sherman Oaks.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Throughout my life I’ve always fought with the self-doubt demons that all creative people are familiar with. After struggling for a number of years to get traction, ending with my screenwriting. I resolved myself that it was simply not meant to be. I turned my studies inward. About a month before I died I happened upon an epiphany to questions I’ve sought the answer too throughout my life. I was content in that personal enlightenment and died without any regret of not sharing them. I took my resurrection to be that providence wasn’t letting me off the hook that easily and decided to start writing and talking about these many things that I kept completely solitary across most of my life.
As a side note, the condition of my death is idiopathic, meaning there was no warning that I was going to die, although we understand what mechanically happened in my body to bring about my death, we have no idea “WHY” it happened and less of a reason why I recovered.
After death, all the other bumps seem trivial.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
If you speak with someone who’s died- Some may call this a Near Death Experience; For me, I was near nothing, I died: People who’ve had this experience will tell you they don’t feel like the same person they were before they died. I think something absolutely occurs to us biologically which encases this feeling, for me I have rationally accepted it as, “I’ve reincarnated, but I’ve reincarnated back into the same body.” This has made it easier for me to get on with living and not dwell on the moment of my death. In my last life I was very competent at what I did as a Cosmetic Chemist/Engineer and still have access to all of those skills, but I have no passion for it. In my death I was able to apply theory to practice and upon returning, now want to continue to expand my understanding of that other world. One mystery was answered, and greater mysteries await. In this I have a renewed passion for paranormal investigation and experience. I acknowledge that you always have to be objective in your studies but now that the veil is gone so are many of the limitations I had prior to death. Over these last few years, I’ve had the opportunity to investigate more and am building on that desire with expanding into local groups for the comradery. I am first a scientist, and a good scientist is a person who never outgrew the childhood phase of asking ‘why?’. My experiences have left me humbled and unafraid to delve into the deeper mysteries that we’ve been asking for thousands of years.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
Prior to my incident, I was a person who put up a good front of being courageous, but I was really a coward hiding behind a façade of stoic strength.
There’s something about your heart shutting off, turning blue and hitting the ground as fast as gravity takes you there; then peeing and poohing on yourself (in no particular order, we’re all going to do it at death), and being stripped naked in public, that just washes away all inhibitions and fear.
I still have no desire to jump out of a perfectly good airplane, but I’ve definitely lost that fear of speaking and performing in public. I’ve absolutely found that place where I really don’t care what other people think of me and if they don’t want to hear what I have to say, screw ‘em. What’s the worst thing that’s going to happen? I’ve already died? I have respect for other people’s opinions and will return what is given to me, but my experiences are not defined by what others believe. Don’t wait until you die to live.
Pricing:
- ‘Intellectual Mind Candy’ will be available for streaming at https://whitefire.stagey.net/venues/724?tab=about hopefully by the end of May 2025. The price of the stream with be under $20
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.intellectualmindcandy.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joviandeadees/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Intellectual.Mind.Candy
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@IntellectualMindCandy-w7x
Image Credits
Charlene Ward, Mary Kennedy, Jovian Deadees
