Adelle Drahos
@adelledrahos leaning against her glass door.
-Film/Tv-
Yes, I make the distinction between the two because they are such different monsters.
It was a hot day. I was running ultra behind on the schedule I had totally messed up for myself. And who’s door should I knock on but Adelle’s. What a calm spirit. And we were at SCAD at the same time! Who knew!?
Her chat was so refreshing. It gave me the energy to keep going. And who doesn’t need that right now.
Interviewed 6.6.20
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Casey: So, first and foremost, how are you holding up?
Adelle: Well, May was tough. All things considered, I'm hanging in there, but I think this is the first time in my life that I've experienced the level of depression that I have. On top of the pandemic, I lost my grandfather. I had to give up my foster dog. I had this big bash that I'd been planning since January for my birthday, but then the protests and the riots happened. My birthday was actually this week. So a month of all of that accumulating. I've cried a lot in the last month, to be honest. But I've also reached out a lot on Facebook and people have been there.
My mom's worried because I'm always posting depressing stuff, but I'm like, "No, no, no. This is how I'm coping. I'm going to be fine. I know, Mom, you're reading this and it looks bad, but I know me and I'll be fine in a few days, maybe a few hours." But right now I'm just over everything and I hate everyone.
Casey: Would you say there have been more good days or hard days?
Adelle: I would say through March and April there were more good days. I would have one tough day like once a week or so, which is unusual. I'm generally a pretty glass-half-full, chill person. I've probably cried almost every day in May. I think there was almost a full week where I cried because my grandfather passed away, and then we had the funeral, and I didn't really have a private moment to process because it was closed. It was all tight-knit family, only 10 of us. Then, as soon as I got back, I had to give up the foster dog who I'd had for two months and had been kind of my crutch through all of this. And then my birthday was coming up and then the protests and George Floyd and all of that happened and so it was just like, "Well, this sucks. Man, what's next?"
It won't be this way forever, but this is new for me. I've never felt this kind of heartbreak before on multiple levels. It's exhausting.
Casey: That's a thoughtful way to put it. It does feel like heartbreak. A lot. I get that. How is your family holding up? Obviously, with your grandfather passing, but how have they been, generally, in quarantine?
Adelle: I think, all things considered, the majority of the family is doing OK. I mean, losing my grandpa was hard because we were all pretty close to him. We're not a huge family. Like I said, 10, including kids and grandkids that were able to make it. And that was hard for everyone and weird. To me, it was very tragic because he only had like two people come to the funeral, understandably so. We're in a pandemic. Not everyone is going to turn out. But it feels like he deserved more, and because he was buried in a veteran's cemetery, we couldn't even watch him be put in the ground. But they're going to do a proper veteran's ceremony, where they shoot off the guns and stuff, when this passes, whatever that means.
I feel fortunate to have been able to be with my family in that time and that we could be with my grandma and help her transition, whereas a lot of people have lost family members and they couldn't even travel home to do that. I can't imagine that. You mourn them, but then you have to go, and it's a wound that never heals because you never get that closure, I can imagine. I feel like I, at least, have some closure.
Casey: Sure. So what have you been doing in quarantine?
Adelle: I love to sit in my chair and spin in circles. The bulk of quarantine was really taking care of the foster pup. I went to three shelters before I found her because I wanted one that was under 30 pounds, which was hard. … She went to Alabama with me (to) my grandfather's funeral. Then she got spayed and then she got adopted. She's with a cute retired couple now. So a lot of it was me managing a foster dog.
I've been sleeping a lot. I've been eating a lot of pizza. Finally, about four weeks in, I finally found the creative stimulation to write. I've been working on a feature script. I finally was able to sit down and do that. I've done a couple of monologue challenges. I did an online acting workshop just to keep a little bit in gear, but that wasn't until May. I intentionally signed myself up to say, "No. I'm going to make myself do something." And I'm really glad. I really enjoyed it. It was fun to dive into the scene work since most of the stuff I get are just day-player one-liners. It was nice to sink my teeth into characters and be like, "Oh yeah, I do like acting. Actually, a lot."
Casey: How have you been finding the motivation to work and create in quarantine?
Adelle: With writing, a friend suggested a podcast on screenwriting called (“The Screenwriting Life with Meg LeFauve and Lorien McKenna”), who are two screenwriters for “Inside Out,” among other big projects that you recognize. So they were doing a podcast and I started listening to that and hearing people talk about writing and screenwriting, kind of got the juices going in me and thinking about my script. Then the same friend told me about an app, which is basically just — it's the stupidest thing— The Little Tree Grows and it's an accountability timer. … Those two things, I think, finally helped get me creatively stimulated once the rhythm of the quarantine was established.
If I spend a day in my room not doing anything then I know, "OK, tomorrow you have to accomplish one thing. You just have to," because otherwise I would go crazy.
Casey: What do you miss?
Adelle: Ooh. Everything. Happiness? I miss work. I miss the industry. I miss auditioning and feeling like there's an opportunity to perform. I miss the possibility of being on set, which right now they are slowly transitioning back into that. That's a big thing, because if that was a little more normalized than I think that a routine would kick back in where you're doing something a little more proactively, whether it be going to events and socializing or going to the movie theater. Just getting out of the house pretty much.
I do miss the gym. I'm probably gonna wait another month, but home workouts are so tough for me. I miss going to the gym because that's where you get the release of the endorphins, and I just feel like I'm making healthier choices. I'm not a huge gym buff, you know, like "I have to get my gym today." But it is nice going. And I do always feel better when I leave the gym, despite how much I hate going to the gym, I do miss having that focus on a workout and feeling like I am more productive.
Casey: So you'll wait a month, you think, before you feel comfortable going to the gym. What about what about other things? Stuff is opening up. How do you feel?
Adelle: Ever since my grandpa passed away, I got a little more lax. I had a lot of anxiety. I had a roommate that was leaving the house every day for work and didn't have the same level of anxiety that I did, which only made mine worse. And then the other two roommates left so I was pretty much by myself in the house and I kind of enjoyed that. I realized, "OK, I have a 10-year goal. I want to get a house. I want to get my own place."
Honestly, I don't know what I would do differently. I am planning a social gathering, an event-based thing where I'm gonna sit in my driveway and people — kind of like the drive-by thing, only people can come up and perform or do something. I wanted to do this for my birthday, but it didn't feel right with the social climate. So I'm letting it breathe for a week before it feels like, "Oh, we are allowed to celebrate something again. It doesn't feel taboo to smile."
Casey: I think that idea of it being taboo to smile right now is a real thing.
Adelle: Yeah. I was very much struggling and I'm trying to have conversations with people about it like, "OK, here's how I'm feeling now. How do I recognize what is white privilege? And what I am allowed to feel? And what's not taboo?" I mean, you're allowed to feel anything, I guess.
But I love dress-up. I'm an actor. Originally, about six months ago, I started planning a big masquerade that we were gonna do. It was a big 30, I had a friend who's turning 50. I had two other friends that had birthdays and were going in on this group thing. We'd sell tickets. We had a venue locked. Big old masquerade. And, in the spirit of that, I was gonna do a fun little "Day in the Court. Come perform for the queen!" I've also been watching “The Great,” binged that show and loved it. I'm very much like "Yeah! Historical fiction! Let's do it!"
Then the idea of putting a crown on myself and asking people to perform, although in the spirit of a masquerade … just didn't feel right in the shadow of the political climate right now. I was like, "Oh, this can be very twisted into a white privilege concept." So we're waiting until it feels a little better, and maybe the spirit of the event won't be misconstrued with what is happening and people don't get the wrong idea about where I stand in all of this. Because I'm 100% in support of the protests. 150% I really do think that things need to change.
God willing, I hope we actually get a sufficient change. It's a really good, worthy, big step in the right direction, which I think we haven't had in a while. It's been very interesting navigating feelings the last two weeks.
Casey: Yeah, pandemic and then major social upheaval altogether is definitely something I was not prepared for this year.
Adelle: Yeah. Yeah.
Casey: Do you have any self-care practices that you've started that you want to keep doing?
Adelle: If anything I've gotten a little lazier with my health because I haven't been eating as well and I haven't been working out the way I normally do. If anything, I would like this to pass so I could get back. I've said goodbye to my grandfather. I've said goodbye to the dog. I'm finding my stability again. The next thing on the list is to get back into the writing … and then to attempt some more in-home workouts just to get the blood flowing.
I wish I could have planted a garden and a whole bed of vegetables and fruits. I wish that I could lessen my carbon footprint a little bit, get a little greener, but that just didn't happen.
Casey: What do you think you'll take away from this? What do you think you'll look back on this time in your life, like 20 years from now, and be like, "Oh, man. Let me tell you about it?"
Adelle: It's not anything like a new epiphany, but I was reminded of the things that I have sacrificed for my career, and I'd still do it again. So I kind of stand where I've always stood. I am very passionate about acting and the film industry and I love it.
I did realize I have put relationships and I've put career first and I've put it ahead of finances because it's not the most well-paid (career). I've turned down jobs to be available for my career, and that makes it hard to live by myself. I would love to have my own house. To find somebody, a partner to live with and to get a fenced-in backyard for a dog. But knowing this, would I still take the same path that I've taken up to this point? And the answer is yes, because I still love this career.
I wish that the world would pay attention to the environmental changes and the good things that have come from us not destroying the earth. But I just don't think it's really going to make a long-term difference. I think people are going to pick up their rhythm again and stuff's going to continue. The environmentalists will continue to fight to raise awareness. But in the long term of, "Oh, look, the dolphins are back in the canals," it's just gonna be brushed aside again.
I really I wonder if the whole quarantine is actually going to have a long-term impact on us as a society. I feel like once we find a vaccine and we figure out how to move forward from the virus, things will just continue moving forward the way they always have been, which is kind of tragic to say. But I think, realistically, that will be the case. Because people will find their rhythms and in two years we'll forget we felt this way. Some people. I think I might get that way.
…
I don't know that anything drastic will change. I just don't see that happening as much as I wish it would. It's just the way society is now.
