Ellen Shipley has been called one of popular music's most recorded songwriters with a list of successes that is endless.  One of the best known, "Body & Soul" sung by Anita Baker brought Grammy nominations that insured her fame as a talent to be reckoned with.  Other hits like "I Drive Myself Crazy, for N-Sync's 8 times certified platinum debut album 'N-Sync', "Heaven Is A Place On Earth" for Belinda Carlisle and "Yearbook" for Hanson's quadruple platinum album 'Middle of Nowhere" , have kept her in the limelight, but lest one think that music is her only forte, think again!  Ellen Shipley is directing the smash hit Desert Sunrise at the Lillian Theatre and somehow she managed to find time to chat with us about the play and other interests in her life.

RP -     I’ve heard many of your songs – it’s great music and I want to thank you for sharing it with everyone.

ES -     Thank you.  It’s a great journey being in music and being able to write and have people sing your songs.  It’s been very rewarding and I’m very grateful for having been able to experience writing.

RP -     When I heard your great song I remembered that there was a song called Body and Soul back in the ‘40’s.  I said to myself – It can’t be the same author.

ES -     (Laughing)  No – it isn’t.

RP -     I saw the titles together and I realized that your song Body & Soul is listed with an ampersand between the words and the older song has the word “and” between Body and Soul.  You have seen that difference?

ES – No!  No one has ever pointed that out. My dad first pointed out that there was a song with that title in the ‘40’s, and I pride myself in knowing a lot of music of the ‘20’s and ‘30’s, and I remember listening to old songs, but I really didn’t know that song.

RP – They’re both great songs.   I heard the older version by Ella Fitzgerald and then I listened to your song as performed by Anita Baker.  It was terrific!

ES -     Anita is an incredible singer. When I first heard my demo recorded, (we had the background music first) and she recorded her voice over it to see how it would sound, I just flipped out in my living room.  I remember jumping up and down thinking “Oh my God!  I’m crying,  - she sounds so incredible!”  and she did it!  It was great!

RP -     It’s pretty obvious that the world loved it because it has become one of the greats.

ES – People really loved it.  A lot of that had to do with the fact that at the time it was written it was very musically different from what was going on.  It was more intricate – it sounded more like a classic old song and her voice combined with that music made it fresh I think.  It was really different than what was going on.

RP -     But you have a whole string of hits other than Body & Soul.  Your music is up there as being one of the best sold.

ES -     You must have been talking to my parents! (laughing)

RP -     No.  I’ve just read a lot about you – but in fact, don’t all parents always say great things about their children?   But besides music, you are now directing.  Of course, you have directed plays before?

ES – I was in theatre before I was really full time in the music business.  I came out the theatre background, having lived in New York City my whole life – in Brooklyn .  I started singing when I was three years old and I just never stopped from that time on. I moved into musical theatre – then I moved to dramatic roles and I became a theatre major at Hunter College , which was part of the City University of New York and I loved it.  I went from studying acting to studying directing and I found that I could really utilize the gift that I’ve been given.  I love nurturing actors – reading a play – making it come to life.  The whole process of working with a team is fascinating and very rewarding for me.

RP -     Was there any reason that prompted you to come back to theatre?

ES -     Yes.  The music business was driving me crazy!

RP -     Why was it driving you crazy?

ES -     I don’t like what’s happened to music.  I think it’s and oxymoron to say “music business” to begin with.  I went into music because I loved singing and I loved writing, but because of the business aspects, it became more and more almost a hostile environment.  It became very difficult to get things done and especially difficult dealing with a lot of the people on the other side.  Not the artists so much, but the people on the business part of it.  I just saw the market for singers just shrinking and shrinking.  In one  way it’s really wonderful because having groups come out that are self-contained has always been a huge part, especially in mod music – and then rap came in.  The amount of actual artists who were recording song writer’s songs was shrinking and it was just becoming very – I’m not sure how to explain it – I guess difficult,  For me it wasn’t fun any more and I wasn’t being inspired, and if I’m not inspired to do something and it’s not truthful, I can’t just do it.  I can’t just crash into it – I can, but it’s not going to have my heart in it and if I don’t have my heart in it then I don’t think it’s going to be very good.

RP -     I understand.  What is your opinion of today’s – I guess you can call them singers?  The young kids that are coming out?

ES -     Truthfully, I haven’t listened to a lot since I’ve been involved with this project and theatre again.  I’ve been listening to a lot of middle eastern music this past year –

RP -     I can imagine

ES -     And I’ve also been learning about middle eastern culture, so I haven’t been too involved.  I don’t know much about what’s around today.  Honestly, I have not been listening too much to modern pop.  I listen a lot to classical music and to old songs.  My iPod is filled with everything but it sort of stopped at the ‘80’s.  It’s got so much stuff from the ‘60’s and ‘70’s!

RP – The good old days?

ES -   Well, I don’t know.  I guess that the music you listen to when you’re very young is the music that sticks with you when you grow up.

RP -  Well let me give you my opinion.   We seem to be on a downward ebb right now, and hopefully it will start to move up soon.  Let me ask you this.  How has your career as a musician and composer informed you or influenced you in the preparation of this play, Desert Sun.  Has any of your background been and influence or help?

ES -     Yes it did.  It definitely did.  There is a great cultural part of this play that needed to be explored and I think having a background in music and composing really enabled me to study and understand what the real ethnic music was like so I could delve into it.  Knowing composing helped, although the composition of the musical scales is very different but having that background helped me get the music for this play.  I think I have a certain sensibility that I know what people like and I know what feeling I’m going for.  At certain parts in the play I can feel the music that would be best for that.  I don’t know if it’s because I am a composer and singer, but I think that somehow it all just goes together for me.

RP -  What about the acting and the delivery by the actors.  Did music have any part in having you decide how to guide the actors?  What was your ultimate goal, for example, when the play is over you want me to feel - - - what?

ES- Ahh!  I want you to FEEL!  That’s for sure.  I want the audiences to feel moved. Maybe to take a look at some of their biases and some of the opinions that they walked in with, and because of the play, to be moved to let go of some of those biases and to start to search within themselves to see what it is they really think and what it is they really feel about certain political situations and our needs as human beings because the play deals a lot with how similar we really are, even though its easier to look at the differences.  It focuses on how similar our needs for understanding and acceptance and forgiveness and love are fundamentally inside all of us – our humanity.  Even though we are asked to separate out a lot and look at other people as “our enemies”, I don’t think that naturally we would really feel that way.  And so the play has the three characters moving away from their biases and their traditions and what they were indoctrinated with growing up.  They have been reaching out making a connection with each other and that’s what I’d love the audience to walk away with.  I hope they feel as if they want to connect in a different way and question what they have been thinking and feeling about this particular situation and others like it in the world.

RP -  So would you consider this play to be a political statement?

ES -     I don’t think it’s a political statement.  I think that beyond the overt politics that this play deals with in this particular situation, it really is much more about the fundamental message that I was talking about before.  It deals with who we really are – what we really want and how similar we are on this planet, and how if left to our own devices we would really all desire the same thing – acceptance – forgiveness – all the things I mentioned before.  It goes beyond that.  This play is one small part of the Palestinian – Israeli conflict – just a small aspect of it, but the play could take place anywhere.  It could be set anywhere in the world where you see warring factions  - the Sunnis and the Shiites, it could take place in the bayous of Louisiana – in the South in the 1860’s.  it could be anywhere in the world where people are taught by their government or by their traditions to hate each other when there’s really no reason they should, other than that’s what they’ve been let to believe is the right way to think.

RP – How did you get involved with this project?

ES – AH! – All of these years I stayed in touch with one of my mentors in theatre.  He was my directing and acting teacher at Hunter College .  It turns out that I asked him if he knew of any playwright or if he any plays around he could recommend because I wanted to go back into theatre and I wanted to direct.  As it happened, he had a student named Misha Shulman who had also studied with him, although all these years later, and he said that Shulman had a play that had been done in New York .  Michael, my teacher, thought I would enjoy it, so he sent me a copy and I read it.  I wept and laughed – it got to my heart and soul immediately, so I called Michael and said.  “OK,  This is it. I have to do this play!  What do I have to do?”  So he said he would email Misha and that when I heard from him I should call him.  The play had already been done three times in New York and in Chicago and Misha was looking for a West Coast premiere.  He had offers in San Francisco and in other places on the West, but after we spent an hour and half talking on the phone he decided to let me do it.  We just had a feeling about each other – he just trusted me and I am so grateful that he gave me the opportunity to do that.

RP -     And you also had this common link of the person who referred him to you.

ES -     Exactly.  He trusted Michael and Michael told him that I would do a good job with the play and I guess I convinced him, because when I want to do something badly I just jump right in saying – “I need to do this!  I want to do this!”  and I try to make it happen.  Luckily most of the times I do.

RP -     How much time has you spent in the preparation of this show?

ES -     Well, I worked on it by myself first.  I was reading plays, reading stories and articles, watching videos about the Israeli – Palestinian conflict.  I spent time reading about some of the peace organizations and of course, reading the play.  I read it many times over to see what Misha’s vision was, and what I could add to it – to bring to audience.  We worked on that for awhile and then we rehearsed – actually rehearsed about five weeks.  We have a great team, producers, set designers, costume people - - - every was very professional and it came out really well.  It’s been beyond my dreams, the audiences have been so great and they give the cast standing ovations and come back bringing friends.  So many people cry at the end – and they laugh.

RP -     Did you select the actors?  Were you involved in the audition process?

ES – I was involved in the auditions.  I hired a casting director, who then became the assistant director for the whole play.  He’s incredible.  We had hundreds of people who wanted the roles because they liked the play.  From those hundreds, he narrowed it down to about sixty people for me select the different roles.  So from those sixty, I saw the actors and then made a decision.

RP -     You saw sixty people 

ES -     Oh, at least!

RP -     And from those you picked three,

ES -     Yes

RP – My gosh!

ES -     Yes, it’s part of the process!  It’s hard because if you’re at all sensitive to what these actors go through and when they come in and really want the part, you, know that many have been beaten up a lot.  A lot of people are not very sensitive about what they go through, so I try to be cognizant of that.  I tried to treat them with the respect they deserved, and from that picked the three that I thought were perfect.

RP -     You’re mounting this at the Lillian Theatre , which is a very nice space.  How did you approach the design or the blocking using their wide stage?

ES -     It’s a wonderful space. David Fofi is great to work with.  He designed the set, you know.  It was like working with a little family there.

RP – Did you envision certain things right away when you first went in the theatre and saw the stage, or did it take time to get the vision to come into place?

ES – I think both.  There were certain things that I saw immediately would work, and then there were other aspects that took time in seeing how they would evolve.  Especially in blocking the play.  I wanted to see where my actors would go naturally and what actions they would take naturally before I would set everything. I think that when they finally got on the set they began to move in areas and in places where it made a lot of sense, and that was really helpful in deciding where to put things.  The set is very beautiful and visual and very representational.

RP -     I read in the press release that one critic who saw the New York show said it was a little like Waiting for Godot.  Does that put any pressure on you as a director?  Is that like an onus you must bear?

ES -  There are some who might say that, but it’s not really Godot.  It does have this feeling of the eternal endlessness because it’s set in a barren area – but it’s not Becket.

RP -     You’ll be going through August 9^th (2008)

ES -     Yes, but we might extend. It depends how many people we can get into the seats.  We are emailing and trying to get as many people in to see the play.  I think it’s an important play, especially in the times we’re living in right now, It presents hope, with the tragedy and I think we need that.  Without hope and without a desire for dialog bringing change we don’t really have anything.  There’s a saying that I really like – “If you do what you did – you get what you got.”  I think that what we are doing as a nation is not working anywhere.  We have a world at war, basically – an economy that’s falling apart – it’s a mess everywhere and certainly violence doesn’t do anything and cynicism doesn’t help either, so I feel that it’s only through connecting with other people with dialog – with real dialog that we have possibilities for peace.

RP -     Well, thank you for those thoughts and I’m going to see your play this week, but remember – your promised that I would laugh –

ES -     You will

RP -     And you said I would cry –

ES – I promise you – you will laugh and you will cry!

 We chatted a bit about music, about life and things that make you feel satisfied and the one thing that is evident about Ellen Shipley is that she has a zest for sharing her many talents with the world.  Not sure of what projects will be next, she feels that a musical might come her way soon, and given her track record in music if it comes to pass you can bet it will be a blockbuster.

Desert Sunrise continues at the Lillian Theatre through August 9 and possibly beyond.  You could be instrumental in extending its run if you visit the theatre and encourage your friends to attend.

The Lillian Theatre is located at 1076 Lillian Way , Hollywood , CA   90038 - Ample Street Parking. Reservations  (323) 960-7784.

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