2017 Recap / 2018 Reset

Hey Shining Starrs!!!

It’s been FOREVER, I know. And I am so sorry about that. But Miss O has been out here living, learning, growing and strategizing for 2018.

This year has been one for the books. It’s almost as if I have had the best and the worst year of my life.  But with all the ups and downs, the changes and the set backs, I feel more prepared for the New Year and the new levels. So here is a recap of the year's highlights and some reset affirmations for 2018...

Some highlights included the successful film festival premiere of my short Mars & Venus: Operation Equilibrium. It was my final work under Boxed Out Productions and it was one hell of a way to close that chapter.  Then there was the amazing success of the Shauntay Cherry short Silent Cries: The Prelude. I was the 1st AD and a Producer on the project. Thus far, the film has won four awards after being nominated for seven, and it has been accepted to 19 film festivals nationally (and counting), with several screenings in addition to that. I am also a producer and the lead actress in her most recent short Stalk His A**, releasing in 2018. A huge personal accomplishment this year was that, I wrote and shot my first solo-written short film Shhh… The film stars Lamar K. Cheston, and myself. It was directed by one of my mentors, Patrick Coker (who co-wrote the season finale of BET's Tales) and produced by Lamar Mackson of Nonstop Showgroup, as well as myself. I directed a staged reading of the amazing play You Wouldn’t Expect by Marilynn Barner Anselmi at the Smithsonian Anocostia Museum in DC and then starred in a staged-reading here this fall, as it was picked up by NY’s American Bard Theatre.  And I am super proud of being a producer on the upcoming series Little Apple, Executive Produced by the EP of Precious, Ms. Lisa Cortes. And last but not least, our season of Oprah’s Master Class on OWN is up for an NAACP Image Award!

As an actress, aside from the above-mentioned projects that I starred in, I also secured my Actor’s Equity card for the Broadway union to accompany my SAG-AFTRA card. I landed roles in the web series Dekalog – A Finding Me Series and Makeup X Breakup as well, all to release in Q1 of 2018. I am still actively auditioning and plan to take my acting to a new level this coming year.  As a writer, I have several projects in the works and am creating my own writer’s room for a new digital series I am putting together!

That is all the “best year” stuff.  The worst year stuff I won’t get into, as I don’t want to re-release that energy. I’ll just say some hard lessons, some heartbreak and a lot of re-learning myself were involved. However, I’m blessed to say “Lord, I got the message and the lessons and don’t plan to relive this stuff again.”

As we walk into this New Year, I want to leave you with my chosen word for 2018.  The 2017 word of the year that meditated a lot on was momentum. For this coming year the word is “LISTEN.” Listen to my spirit, my heart, my instincts, my gut, my mentors, my supporters, my TRIBE! Listen to what is unsaid. Listen to hear, not to just respond. Listen to advance not just my own agenda but to bless another’s. However, self is serviced first in this New Year for sure. NO is a complete sentence, it’s okay to change my mind and reconnecting in person and voice-to-voice will refill a lot of what is empty in my heart space, along with strengthening my spiritual connection to the Creator.

I am so wired about this New Year fam!

On deck this first quarter are a series of mini-docs for my mentor’s new imprint – companyX – that I just produced out in Atlanta, the short pscho-thriller RUNNERS (which we are presently seeking final donations for…you can do that by clicking HERE), performing in Chicago this January with sketch comedy troupe American Candy for the Chicago Sketch Comedy Festival, functioning as a new host for the Twitter talk show #BlerdDating (starting January 1st…just look up the hashtag #BlerdDating at 9pm EDT to join us), the completion of my mini-doc Conversations with Black Women, with my partner Krishna Davenport. The completion of my children’s book “Mommy is My Date,” is in process as I lock in an editor. And the biggest news for me thus far, the launch of the virtual assistant company Binary Brown, co-owned by me and Krishna as well. See below for our services and to contact us for your administrative and/or project management needs!!!

I encourage you to take stock of your 2017, find the holes and figure out how to fill them for 2018 and also love up on yourself and your tribe.  It will be a challenging year, I feel that already. But if you rise to the challenges, it will also be transformative and PROGRESSIVE.

Let’s do the work and win in the New Year #ShingingStarrs!!!!

Yours in anticipation and audacity…

~ Miss O