Is Eralore Studios a Theater Company?
When we began building EraLore Studios, in February 2022, we never intended it to be a theatrical-based production studio. In fact, when Bryan and I started daydreaming about our ideal “family owned brand,” we were aiming for a lifestyle, leisure, and travel company.
Our first series took place in 1927 Atlantic City, so we dreamed up an immersive world: a professionally produced 1920s-style radio drama and a Speakeasy weekend, complete with flapper dresses, fedoras, a Model A Ford, and prohibition era cocktails (and mocktails). For our second series, we wrote a Regency era shipwreck story and hosted a group of 14 in the Dominican Republic!
So when one of our community members said he saw Eralore as a ‘theater company,’ I was actually shocked.
“I love what you’re building, but it will be slow to grow. Not everyone is into theater like us.”
“Correct, sir. "But Eralore isn’t theater,” I thought. “It’s storytelling, and travel experiences, and community, and balancing life with actual living.”
And above all things… it’s connection.
Sure, I’ve been performing off-and-on professionally for over 25 years now. But every time I make the decision to step back on stage, it isn’t without a lot of hesitation.
The truth is, the older I get, the more I don’t ‘identify’ with the things I used to believe defined me. I have been performing since I was a young child. Theatre, from an outsider’s perspective, was my world… though it has never felt that way to me.
I’ve never had serious ambitions for theater as my career. And in the many times I’ve stepped away from it, for years at a time due to health concerns and raising a family, life has moved on without any crisis, despair, or lack of passion. My life is full in so many different arenas that creating an entire business and brand around theater actually seemed pretty preposterous.
Ashley as Nellie in South Pacific, 2019 | Main Street Theatre | Picture by Kim Ramsey
So then what the hell are you doing?
Good question.
One I’ve been asking myself quite a bit since 2022 (ok, fine— 2020). And being here now… quite literally typing on my laptop, as I scrambled to find a replacement actor in the latest show I wrote… I realized something pretty damn important:
While storytelling… theater, film, podcasting, music… is a form of ‘entertainment,’ for me, it has always been about fostering connection.
Many actors seek the stage or camera as an escape: a way to disappear from their lives, even if only for a few hours. Actors are known for hiding behind masks and relishing in their ability to be anyone BUT themselves.
But that has never been true for me.
Being on stage, while during my childhood was a place to ‘belong,’ has been a place to ground myself, to connect, to find layers of myself and my life within each and every character I have ever played. It was a place to fully show up, to take up space, to shine.
When I am on stage, I am not hiding behind a costume, makeup, and a character, I am bringing to the surface the whole of my experiences, my pain, and my joy.
I am connecting to emotion. Connecting to my cast mates, and my director. I am creating connection between the story and the patrons in the audience, and giving them permission to feel beside me, with me.
Theater, storytelling, and the arts are all about SEEING authentically. They are about telling the truth about humans through the lies of fictional tales. We see ourselves in others, we see their trials, their healing, their journeys, and we cannot help but relate them back to our own experiences. It brings about acceptance, awareness, belonging, expression, and love.
So, while every layer of Eralore was created with meaning & intention, I didn’t create it with the intention of being a theatrical production company.
I created it with the intention of creating connection among humans, through art, storytelling, real life events, and collaborative experiences.
But since I have spent the last 32 years finding and building connection through my work on the stage… I naturally, without any true thought, found my way to that medium. Because it is what I know. And it is what has always come naturally to me. And it is where I have both lost and found myself, time and time again.
And truth be told… I’ve been struggling with this for some time. I didn’t want this to be a theater brand.
I have watched every theater I have worked for struggle.
They struggle to pay the bills, to fill the seats, to get the talent needed.
Social media has become the newest and latest form of entertainment and storytelling. You can get that free, anytime, at your finger tips. I don’t want a business or a brand or even a “hobby” that people “aren’t interested in.”
And I don’t want people thinking this is just a way for me to express myself, or I am sharing my need for the stage in this way. Because theater is not my life.
But connection is… feeling connected to others, to purpose, to passion. Supporting others, spotlighting artists and real, flawed, messy humans, taking a chance on someone and something new.
I want EraLore to be a stage, a platform… a place for humans to unzip their skin, share their ideas, and create for the love and joy of it. I want to give souls their chance to shine, to take up space, to live authentically in their truth, their talent, and in their natural state of flow. The way the stage has done for me, all my life.
So there it is.
Perhaps in the past when you’ve heard me talk about Eralore… you‘ve thought “Ah, Ashley created a theatre brand, because that is what she does, who she is.”
But I hope now, moving forward, when you think about us… you think… “community and collaboration … because Eralore Studios is a stage… a place for everyone to connect, to shine, to expand, to be supported, and to be celebrated.”
And I sincerely wish the stories we share — both real and fictional — touch your heart in a way that makes you feel seen. We created this brand for people like you:
The souls brave enough to expand into their full selves, to live truly elevated lives!
Ashley