Meet Ashley Hartwig of Atlanta

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashley Hartwig.

Ashley, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I actually started performing as a dare! In middle school, my friend and I were bored, so she dared me to step out of my comfort zone and audition for ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’. I had grown up going to dance classes and listening to ‘Grease’ and ‘Little Shop of Horrors’ with my mom in the car, so I thought, ‘why not?’ I signed-up, was cast as an Oompa Loompa, and never looked back! It’s no joke that I was bit by the theater bug. I spent my middle and high school years auditioning and growing as a performer, basically knowing that no matter where my life led, I would always be dreaming of the stage. I spent my freshman year of college in the mountains of North Carolina studying Musical Theatre (shoutout, Lees-McRae College!) before transferring to Valdosta State University, where I graduated in 2020 with a BFA in Theatre Arts, double-emphasizing in Performance and Theater Management. And of course, since it was 2020, everything just…stopped. So I spent a year at home, slinging coffee at my local Dunkin’, until one day, at the very start of 2021, I got an email from Stone Mountain Park. I had auditioned back in 2019 on a whim with my best friend (see a trend here?) and they were reaching out to see if I was still interested in working with them over the spring and summer. I got an AirBnB, packed up my life and my cat, and made the move to Atlanta. I thought it would be a temporary move, but I’m still here!

Since the move, I have had so many amazing opportunities – I’ve done dinosaur meet n’ greets, photoshoots as iconic Disney characters, and played many silly, dancing characters at the World of Coke (yes, I’ve even been the Coca-Cola Polar Bear!). I have had the joy of bringing roles to life onstage, from the new and original, to the iconic (I’m looking at you, Poirot!). And now I find myself pursuing art in all sorts of ways! I continue to audition and perform, I take as many classes as possible, I teach theater classes at Woodstock Arts and dance classes at the Historic Canton Theater. I even recently learned how to walk on stilts! I’ve even gotten to work behind the table in a variety of facets, gaining experience as a director, choreographer, fight choreographer, and more. I pride myself on being ready to jump into any position I’m needed in, even if it means learning on the fly. I absolutely love a challenge and love getting to grow myself as a well-rounded, ready to go artist.

Theater is infused into every aspect of my life, and I wouldn’t have it any other way!

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?
Oh god, not at all. There have been so many bumps in the road, from Covid to work-life balance struggles, to constantly asking myself ‘am I even good enough to keep trying?’ The life of a performer comes with so many ups and downs – and as devastating as some of the downs can be, the ups are the reasons why we keep showing up again and again and again.

Personally, my biggest struggle was most prominent when I was still in school. I have a speech impediment! I have Rhotacism, which is the inability to say my ‘R’s. They come out as ‘W’s instead – think ‘pwincess’ instead of ‘princess’, ‘fwies’ instead of ‘fries’, or, my personal hell every time middle school me was asked my name, ‘Hawtwig’ instead of ‘Hartwig’. A lot of my friends may be finding this out from this interview, since I’ve trained and worked to minimize it, but it still slips out on occasion.

Having anything that makes you feel ‘different’ in a theatrical space can be hard. ESPECIALLY when it comes to something that affects the way you are perceived. I actually had a teacher in middle school tell me in the middle of an audition that she would never cast me because of it, and a college professor who told me to switch majors, since I’d never find work with a speech impediment. Two devastating things that a growing mind should NEVER hear, and certainly not from the people they look up to. On the other side of things, I’ve been lucky to have mentors who have taken the time to hear me out and understand the impediment before judging me for something I had little control over. Two of these influences were from Europe and deeply understood the desire to lose an accent or change the way you speak to fit was is deemed as ‘typical’. One of these mentors even told me never to lose this quirk and to keep it in my back pocket – “you’ll never know when it’ll make you stand out in the right way.”

As I’ve grown, I’ve stopped thinking of it as an impediment and have come to embrace it as a personal quirk. While I may not sound like it anymore, it still slips out when I’m tired or talking too fast, but I can laugh it off instead of shrinking back into my bubble of embarrassment. And, looking back on it, I’m grateful for the struggle. It taught me to love myself for who I am and to trust that the right people will not judge me on first impression.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
One of the things that I am most proud of in my career is my BFA’s double-emphasis in Performance and Theater Management! Since I was a transfer student at VSU, I had a bit of an atypical audition process, and that process led me to choose a second emphasis within the theater major, since I wasn’t admitting to Performance on the first go. I chose Management because I had a peaking interest in the ‘behind the scenes’ aspects of theater. I knew about the wheels in the machine that work to take a show from rehearsals to open (stage management, technicians, designers, etc), but I wanted to know more about the people who helped to build a theater company from the ground up. I got to take a variety of classes focused on what makes a theater tick and even had to opportunity to work as the Box Office Manager for both Valdosta State, as well as Peach State Summer Theater!

Now, my day job not only funds the dream job, it doubles as the dream job! I work as the Assistant Theatre Manager of the Canton Theater, where I manage our events calendar and get to talk to creatives of a variety of crafts. We have had live theater, concerts of nearly every genre, comedians, storytellers, tributes, magicians… I always joke to our patrons that ‘if you can put it onstage, we’ve probably had it at the theater!’ Having a background in Theater Management has made my job so much more interesting, and I feel so much more confident diving into problems with both feet because of the skills I developed in college.

Basically, with this double-emphasis under my belt, I can run the front of your house AND kill it onstage!

Do you have any advice for those looking to network or find a mentor?
I have found a lot of my wonderful mentors through taking classes! Especially, if possible, classes that allow you individual time with the teacher. Over the past few months I have had the immense opportunity to work with Rhyn McLemore Clark through the Alliance’s ‘Acting Through Song’ class, and Caleb Clark through his ‘Mini MFA’ program. Not only did I learn so much about myself and grow immensely as a performer in these classes, I was connected with amazing mentors that I still talk to today.

Also, never overlook your immediate community! It’s easy to think “if I want to grow, I have to aim straight to the top”, and while that’s not the wrong mindset to have, I find that making such a direct jump puts you at risk of missing out on the amazing people you can learn from that are already around you.

I currently live in Woodstock, and that is exactly where I have met a lot of the people who have made me a better artist (and person!). My voice teacher, Madison Montgomery, has been working with me for a few years now and WOOF, the growth I have seen in my voice and my confidence has only been bolstered by her overwhelming support of me. My fellow actor (and multi-hyphenate director-intimacy director-singer-friend), Delaney Circe, is a masterclass of making choices and being genuine in the room, and I am awed every time I find myself in the same space as her. I was lucky to get to work with Jodye Underwood on two TYA pieces early on after moving to GA, and now I am honored to get to continue working with her and her TYA company, Discovery Stage, as the company grows, develops new works, and teaches me the importance of connection not only as a performer, but as a company.

(I know this may come across as me name dropping, but I wouldn’t be where I am today without these amazing humans in my life and in my corner.) ((And this is only a handful of them, I could go on for days!!))

It is so much more important to walk into a space as yourself, focused on what you can bring to the table and what amazing humans you may get the chance to connect with. Don’t enter a space solely with the intention of rubbing shoulders. Be genuine, be open to anything, be YOU!!!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ashleyhartwig.com
• Instagram: @hart__ley