Lindsay Anne Williams [Interview]

Hello Folks! We are back with another wonderful interview with an absolutely incredible actress. It’s Lindsay Anne Williams, Everyone! Lindsay has done some amazing work, especially in the world of horror, both on and off screen alongside the likes of filmmaker Miles Doleac. Her latest venture would be a film that we discussed earlier this week with actress Alli Hart, which is the incredible film The Dinner Party. Her past work includes films we have covered here at TWS in the past such as Hallowed Ground and Demons. Both are incredible, and obviously amplified by her inclusion.

So Folks, please enjoy some wonderful words from the brilliant Lindsay Anne Williams!

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What inspired you to get into the world of entertainment? Was it something you had wanted to do since your youth? Or did you happen to find yourself in this world one day?

I can’t remember a time in my life when I wasn’t interested in performing arts of some kind.  It began with my desire to be a dancer, but we couldn’t afford dance classes so that didn’t really come about until I went to an arts high school and was able to study dance for free. But as a little kid, my dad was the principal and teacher of a small parochial school, and he was a very ambitious educator, so he had us doing plays all the time.  My first role was as a Dancing Bear in The Greatest Show on Earth (I don’t even know if that’s a real show or if my Dad just made some shit up).  I had stopped acting and was focusing on dance and trying to figure out my career path when I met Miles, and he introduced me to the New Orleans acting scene.  So I guess it’s a little bit of both, I did want to do something akin to this for my whole life, but circumstances also kind of landed me here.

What was your first paid gig in the world of entertainment? And were there any sort of lessons learned from this experience that still affects your work to date?

First paid gig, ever?  I can’t even remember.  But I would say that my first paid gig as an adult actor would probably be the Historia Films production of The Historian, for which I served as Costume Designer and played a character called Dawne. It was Miles’ first film as a director and we both learned a great deal. My lessons from that first re-entry into the world of entertainment were many, but the one I think is most important is to stick up for myself and to claim my space not just as an artist, but as a human being. It’s amazing how much more fun you have and how much more creative you can be when you’re not worried about proving you belong there.

I recently had the pleasure of seeing your incredible performance in the film The Dinner Party. It’s a truly brilliant piece of horror. Can you tell us a bit about this project? Why should people be excited to check this one out?

Thank you for saying that. A lot of work went into this and all our films, so it’s nice when they land, when someone “gets” it. The Dinner Party is a horror/black comedy film, wherein a playwright and his wife are invited to the home of a wealthy and influential doctor with the hopes that they’ll impress him and his friends enough to bankroll his next project to Broadway.  The characters, are rich (both stylistically and literally quite wealthy) and twisted.  Everyone has their own psychoses that come to light throughout the course of this ill-fated dinner party.  I play Sadie Nichols, a woman who doesn’t necessarily fit in with the rest of the group.  She’s obviously wealthy and eccentric, but we know very little of her back story and what brings her to the table, something she shares in common with the lead, Haley Duncan, the young, seemingly innocent and out-of-her-depth wife of the playwright Jeffrey. The stories, backgrounds and hidden demons of each character at the table come to the fore and intertwine in unexpected and sometimes sinister ways.

While it’s not the only genre you have worked in, you have managed to turn out some wonderful performances in one of our favorite genres of film, which would the world of horror. I am curious to know what you enjoy the most about the world of horror? What is it that sets this genre apart from others you have worked on?

Horror allows me to participate in one of my truly favorite activities: screaming at the top of my lungs. Sadie doesn’t quite have cause to scream as loudly as I would prefer, but I got some cathartic screaming off-screen done, don’t you doubt it.  I love the flexibility horror has, it can be serious or funny.  It can be surface and cheeky, or you can couch a real, even profound, message within the story.  And who doesn’t love to play in blood and fake guts?  You get to play like a kid every day on set.

If you were handed the opportunity to star in the biopic of any legendary figure in American history, who would it be?

I am great lover of history, and have a couple of degrees in it, actually.  My particular brand of history, however, is that of the ancient and early medieval variety (I’d totally want to be Honoria, the sister of Roman Emperor Valentinian III who wrote and “proposed” to Attila the Hun in order to free herself from her brother’s clutches and a disappointing engagement, thereby inviting him to come and invade Italy).

I’m not very passionate about any particular figure in American History, though I do think Carry Nation (1846-1911) is a pretty interesting character.  She was an activist and staunch supporter of the temperance movement (a movement I don’t subscribe to myself) and used to raze bars with a hatchet. She’d go in and flip tables and hack open kegs, upend cash registers and basically create total mayhem in an effort to save people from alcohol. What a trip!

What does the future hold for you? Anything you would like to share with our readers?

I’ve been taking a bit of a breather lately.  I realize many people are staying home, reflecting on a lot of things right now, big and small. And I’m doing just that and working in the house and yard, being grateful for my health, my husband, and our brood of vicious dogs. I had been the president of a community theater for several years and had just resigned my post when we began filming The Dinner Party. During this time of quarantine, Miles and I are completing the music video for “Ash Wednesday,” a song from the film that he co-wrote with our amazing composer, Clifton Hyde.  Other than that, I don’t have anything in the pipeline, but rest assured, neither Miles nor I can remain quiet for long, so we’ll undoubtedly begin writing many more projects!

What was the last thing that made you smile?

I have five dogs.  They are the biggest goofballs in the world and they all have such beautiful infectious smiles.  They love their parents a whole lot and it’s pretty hard not to smile when a 75-lb Pitbull or a 16-lb Powderpuff Chinese Crested mutt comes running to give you a kiss.