Ashley Zachary is making her fairytale come true.
Along with fulfilling a dream of creating and releasing her own web series, Zachary’s queer, Black love story “Meant To Be” is inspired by her own dreams, loves and losses—the way she wanted it to be.
The witty series of 12-minute episodes follows two women, Amora and Shay, who meet, fall in love and decide to have a baby—and the emotional and financial challenges that come with it all. The women rely on advice from their best friends and of course, the internet to navigate the journey.
Zachary not only produced the series and co-wrote it with Brianam Hempill, she’s also one of the main characters and narrator of the story.
“At first, I didn’t want to have a screening, I was just going to shelve it and never let it see the light of day,” Zachary said. “My mentor pushed me…and to see it all come together I was like, ‘This is something good.’ I’m nervous about releasing my baby, my web series, into the world. Once it’s out there, that means it’s real.”
The series pilot will be premiering at the Aurora Theater in Long Beach on Dec. 3 at 4 p.m., with four consecutive screenings and then will continue on YouTube.
“I’m thankful that I have the drive to make my dreams come true, that I have the stamina and determination, the perseverance to continue to push through all my insecurities, my humble beginnings and just my life,” Zachary said.
Zachary is no stranger to heartbreak. She’s had past series, projects and relationships fail, all of which have led her to creating “Meant To Be.” A past relationship which fell apart due to the “financial burden of reality” as a struggling artist was a huge inspiration for the story of “Meant To Be.”
Main characters, Amora and Shay, meet through unlikely circumstances, and from the beginning, struggling artist Amora must figure out how to deal with the insecurities that come from being financially unstable.
“I felt the need to rewrite this the way that I would have wanted the love of my life to understand the creative process,” Zachary said. “When you’re financially unstable you have insecurities. You want to be able to take your partner out to lunch, to hold up your end of the bargain, to buy her flowers, and that was the biggest issue for my real life Shay; I didn’t make enough money.”
The struggles that follow Amora and Shay are “plucked” from Zachary’s experiences, and sprinkled with the different ways she would “rebuild it.”
“This is my fairytale,” Zachary said. “I hope to meet the love of my life on a whim.”
Zachary commended her leading lady Rhyan Michele for the energy she brought to the set of “Meant To Be.” The two would make trips to the beach and read their lines to each other to “build a close bond,” Zachary said.
“Meant To Be” is nearly a five-year culmination of writing, grant applying, casting, producing, filming, editing and post-production. It was made by Zachary and Tahirih Moeller’s own nonprofit Up & Coming Actors in association with the Signal Hill Sandbox, Inc. and A2TheZShow. The series also received a grant from the Arts Council for Long Beach.
Less than 20 days away from the premiere, Zachary says they’re “down to the needle” putting finishing touches on aspects such as the theme song and composing background music.
“What I learned is that I have to go with my gut, and whatever that looks like, you have to take your time,” Zachary said.
The journey began in Los Angeles in 2018, when Zachary shared her idea for a series on a whim and received overwhelming encouragement at a Seed&Spark storytelling and filming event. She pitched her idea quickly and saw almost every hand in the room went up when the class was asked, “Who would watch this show?”
“This is what really got the ball rolling, when I knew I had an idea that could possibly change media, and could possibly change the way people look at lesbians or queers,” Zachary said. “Because it’s more than that. It’s about two women going through the process of having a baby…we’re identifying with a lot of different people that want to be parents and possibly can’t have children.”
With newfound motivation, she filmed the trailer for her series and launched a campaign through Seed&Spark for her vision with hopes of getting investors. Unfortunately, her campaign launched at the same time the pandemic began.
“This is where I failed,” Zachary said. She wasn’t able to raise the 85% of funds necessary for the production and had to return all of the donations. She decided her journey wasn’t over, and poured her savings and funds from Up & Coming Actors into hiring people for “Meant To Be.”
Up & Coming Actors was born out of “frustration” in 2014 when Zachary and current playwright Tahirih Moeller were both theater students at Cal State Long Beach. They found it nearly impossible to find a space for themselves as Black actors in the department, and created Up & Coming to “help underrepresented artists,” according to Zachary.
Their first attempt at a web series was when they were still students at Cal State Long Beach. Her business partner and playwright Moeller worked with her to create “Party At The House,” about a large group of friends and their relationships over the course of multiple seasons.
Although the series never made it off the ground, Zachary took away valuable lessons from the experience: smaller casts are easier to work with, and the need for grant funding would be critical if her next series were to be successful.
She took these lessons into “Meant To Be,” which boasts a cast of just four people: Amora, Shay and their best friends. The amount of people behind the scenes who helped the series come together is far greater.
Zachary handed out her virtual flowers to those who were most influential: her acting coach Anna Steers who was able to get Zachary “over the finish line” in particular with the voiceover aspects of the series as well as Ebony Lanet and Malik Proctor who helped create the characters and whom Zachary said, “without them I definitely would have given up a long time ago.”
She applauded actress, mentor and founder of Signal Hill Sandbox Karole Foreman, who “wanted to invest her time and energy into me and I’m extremely blessed to have a mentor who wants to go down the rabbit hole of my imagination,” Zachary said.
Zachary also thanked her mother Desota Johnson and reminisced on what her mother used to tell her as a child: “I covered the whole alphabet when I made you from A to Z. That’s why your name is Ashley Zachary. I want you to reach for the galaxy and you will land on the stars. Whatever you want, you will get.”
“Meant To Be” will be premiering at the Aurora Theater at 4412 E Village Rd. on Dec. 3 beginning at 4 p.m. Screenings will occur at 4:15 p.m., 4:30 p.m., 4:45 p.m. and 5 p.m. There is a $10 suggested minimum donation for entry. Tickets can be purchased on Eventbrite.