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Emily Coupe
211 Plays4 years ago
Emily Coupe is an Australian born Eurasian actress, singer, model, and film producer who has worked consistently in both Australia and Los Angeles. Emily's 1st acting credits include a co-star role on Channel 10's 'Offspring' and lead in short films ‘Heavy Tackle’, ‘The Story of Jack’, ‘I Remember The Future’, & ‘Cybersmart’ directed by Tropfest award winner Chris Benz. She made her theatre debut in the sold out season of 'Tales of a City by the Sea' At La Mama Courthouse. She has recently been cast as the lead in feature films 'The New Hands', 'Lilith', 'House Bound' and 'Dark Haven', as well as booked co-star roles on A&E's Cold Case Files and Netflix's Corrupt Crimes. She also appeared in the latest online McDonalds Commercial.
Emily recently completed feature film The Crossroads in Arizona, in which she played one of the leads, and is co-writing/producing the music. Emily is also developing multiple pilots/feature length projects through her company Couped Up Entertainment. She has been cast in upcoming film 'The Locket' shooting mid May 2021. She released her first album 'Revolutuon' in late 2019. In the past couple of years Emily has also played over 100 gigs at various venues around L.A, including to 3,000+ people at Warner Center Park & sold out show at The Viper Room.
She is signed with music management co. Sparam Entertainment.
http://www.emilycoupe.com/
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast
00:00:03
Speaker
You are listening to something rather than nothing. Creator and host, Ken Delante. Editor and producer, Peter Bauer.
Guest Introduction: Emily Coop
00:00:18
Speaker
This is Ken Vellante with the Something Rather Than Nothing podcast, and I'm very pleased to have the singer and actress Emily Coop on this episode. Welcome to the podcast, Emily. Oh, thanks for having me, Ken. I'm excited to be on it.
Artistic Beginnings and Beliefs
00:00:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:00:37
Speaker
I'm excited and I like that you do different types of creative work and will hear one of your songs, recent songs. But before we get into the art that you create, a little bit of a beginning question. Were you an artist when you were born? That's an interesting question because I mean, I think we're all artists when we're born in terms of we all have creative
00:01:04
Speaker
abilities and senses or whatever. But yeah, I think everybody's artistic. I think some people just choose Celine more on Twitter, you know, do less or more of it. But even like maths, even cooking, everything requires creativity, like, you know, all kinds of things. But I think I was, when I was born, I've always been inclined to do the arts and do, you know, acting, like even drawing, painting, all that kind of stuff. So yeah.
00:01:33
Speaker
Yeah, and so as I mentioned at the beginning, you do some acting, you're quite busy with that and entering film and also recording music.
Music and Pandemic Experiences
00:01:46
Speaker
And I know you've had some shows and I've heard a couple of your interviews as far as playing instruments and doing that and being the lead. What has been your recent experience playing live music, particularly with the changes in the world and the pandemic, you getting out there
00:02:03
Speaker
being right in front and putting out your own music. What's that been like? It's been, um, well, I guess the past year has been weird in the sense of most of what I've been doing has been live streams just because we couldn't meet in person. We were in lockdowns and stuff like that. Um, but the past couple, like two, three shows have been in person, which is really cool. Um, and it's, it honestly feels like nothing's changed. I mean, like it feels like it was, um, before the pandemic, like, you know, most people either,
00:02:33
Speaker
have masks on them but when I was playing those shows no one had masks really they were inside like it was packed but this is before we now have to wear masks again so it might be different I actually have a show coming up Thursday so it'd be interesting to see if we have to wear masks like what we're standing around or stuff like that but for the most part now in the past couple months it feels pretty normal so it's good but we'll see with future lockdowns and whatever if we regress backwards again
00:03:02
Speaker
Yeah, I was actually speaking to another recording artist, Dylan Jett, on a recent episode who's based in Melbourne and just having that conversation. And, you know, he had just had a show canceled and things were starting up again. So I have some international guests and it's always interesting because times are constantly changing as far as when it comes to being able to perform live.
00:03:28
Speaker
Yeah, I was just
Song Introduction: 'I See Only You'
00:03:30
Speaker
wondering about that. It was great to see you have some great shows like Famous at the Viper Room. And it's really exciting to see. And I really enjoy your music. I want to play a track for the listeners who I find when I have a musical guest. If I leave the track too long, the track is sitting out there. So it's a song I see only you. And is there any like a little bit you want to say right before I play that track?
00:03:57
Speaker
Yeah, it's um, it's a song I wrote during the pandemic. I wrote it by myself. It's actually, I was having guitar lessons about finger picking. And so I was like, Oh, I'll try to
00:04:07
Speaker
put it into one of my own songs and so struggling to finger pick and I wrote this song in like maybe 10 minutes. I was having a songwriting day where I was like, I'm just going to write two or three songs in one session just to ban them out. So banned this one out, didn't think too much of it, put it into a list of 40 songs. I collected this database and then I was trying to choose songs to record for my album and this one was one of them.
00:04:31
Speaker
I think with creativity in art and songwriting, sometimes the more you think about a song, you can overdo it. Sometimes you just have to put the idea out there, get into a format where you can have a recording of it, like I just do it on my voice memory, put it into a database, and then come back to it. You don't have to overthink it too much, I find, with my stuff. But anyways, this song's very romantic.
00:04:52
Speaker
It's very sweet and yeah, it's just cute. Wonderful. We're going to cut to the track right
Feature: 'I See Only You'
00:05:01
Speaker
now. This is Emily Coop and her recent single, I See Only You.
00:05:20
Speaker
You're talking to me As the days go by The reason why I know Only you I see you, I see only you As I'm walking
00:05:48
Speaker
Don't love me So much is clear in my eyes You are the rafters of the night You bring me to life You were with me, I was there Though my mind was somewhat
00:06:18
Speaker
As the days go by, the reason why I fall for you I see you, I see all of you As I'm walking around the line
00:06:44
Speaker
So much is clear in my eyes You are the brothers of the night You bring me to life
00:07:10
Speaker
I looked you from the very first moment You made me laugh now and then I see you, I see only you As I'm walking around
00:07:39
Speaker
There's so much is clear in my eyes You know all the writers of it now You bring me to life I see you, I see only you As I'm broken
00:08:30
Speaker
Thank you for that song, Emily. Oh, thanks!
Philosophy of Art and Creativity
00:08:35
Speaker
Because it was interesting hearing it again. I haven't listened to it in a while. I was like, oh, yeah. It's a beautiful song. And you're a lovely singer. So thanks for creating that. I wanted to ask one of the big questions of the show. You're an artist. You create a lot of different things. And what exactly is art?
00:09:01
Speaker
That's such a good question. I think art is our imagination.
00:09:09
Speaker
I mean, because art is something, it's like creating something that you haven't quite, you know, that doesn't previously exist. It's being creative, problem solving. And yeah, I mean, I think that's it. It's imagination. And then how you physicalize that your imagination can be, you know, writing, it can be painting, it can be songwriting, it can be songwriting with a guitar, and it can be carpentry, it can be
00:09:32
Speaker
Sewing so I think could be cooking. So yeah, I think it's physicalizing your imagination to me is is creativity Yeah, I I noticed that word physicalizing like, you know creating it that way and putting out it out into the world a related question
00:09:56
Speaker
know always so you have art and you have art objects what do you think the role of art is for us like as humans like what is art supposed to do uh for us um i think what art is meant to do for us is it's meant to create joy and it allows us to play and to you know use the right side of our brain because i feel like
00:10:21
Speaker
A lot of life can be very left sided, bills, like you have a very left sided job, accounting, whatever. And the right side play just allows you to, you know, yin and yang, like to utilize the other side. And most people resort to like, you know, creativity, fun, whatever.
00:10:38
Speaker
to counteract their day-to-day lives over nine to five. And then some of us try to do it as a living, which then becomes another whole thing, because sometimes you become a lip to make a living. Especially in music, you have to join this machine of doing it a certain way. So then you almost give up your creativity to like, you know, fit into this mold, which is interesting. But I think, yeah, art for art's sake is it's, yeah, it's playtime, it's fun. And that's, you know, with kids, it brings us back to our childlike self.
00:11:07
Speaker
And just remember who we are nightly without adulthood. Yeah. Yeah. I've had the theme come up a lot, you know, at first and start in the podcast. I mentioned this a few times during the shows is that, you know, at first it was like, you know, like philosophy and art and creativity and these bigger questions. But what it really quickly dropped into is like,
00:11:32
Speaker
creativity, health, healing, communication, just like larger things that we do as humans. I wanted to chat about acting for a moment. I listened to a quote recently.
Acting and Empathy
00:11:48
Speaker
It really struck me. It was an interview with Ethan Hawke about acting. And he was describing it as a way for him to enter into greater empathy.
00:12:02
Speaker
with other humans, right? So if you play the scoundrel, you play the lover, you play the killer, you play the, now you build an empathy for the serial killer, but you enter with an act and you enter into this mind or mindset of that character and it kind of builds a greater awareness. I want to talk about the question just for you, you know, singing, performance, and then acting.
00:12:28
Speaker
And a lot of folks do that. But how is it for you to perform on film as a creative outlet? Yeah, I love what you said about Ethan Hogue. I think it really does allow you to
00:12:45
Speaker
find empathy of that character and like one thing that Meryl Streep says comes to mind is when she plays a character that's different to her she doesn't look at what's different between her and the character she tries to find all the ways she's similar to that character so you know you could play a serial killer but I think the whole point of us or number one if someone chooses us to play the character it's like okay they see we have traits that the person has anyway even if it's physically whatever
00:13:12
Speaker
and then we need to find how we are similar to these characters and I think it's scary. There probably are a lot of things we have in common with serial killers like we were bullied or we had heartbroken or we, you know, were
00:13:26
Speaker
uh depressed or we were like fired from our jobs or rejected and it's just that they ended up going down path B instead of path A which is like you know expressing their anger in a very violent way so it's like but that's how I think you could relate to that character like you felt all things leading up to them making that decision but then it's like then the whatever view made that decision in that role because I mean we we all have the potential to be serial killers we all can get enough and stab somebody so I think it's like interesting
00:13:56
Speaker
getting into that mindset. But when I have ever done character research of a dark nature of death and whatever, vibrationally, energetically, you do feel a little icky because if you try to stay very clean and not do anything immoral, whatever, you feel that difference. That's why it's like if I were to play a character that
00:14:17
Speaker
is more icky. I probably almost have to do this visualization of I'm stepping into that character now and the space of research in the character then step out of it and do some kind of like energetic cleansing because I'm very sensitive like if I watch a horror movie or a negative film like I feel really crap after I feel like off. So it's like um is that so yeah and you don't want to have to find empathy between you and you and the other character
00:14:44
Speaker
And then put yourself in those shoes and go, what if? What if you go into that situation? And then one thing I love about acting is you get to play different characters. You get to experience different lives. Like, oh, he's a cowgirl on a ranch living in the middle of nowhere and involved in this gang shootout or whatever. And it's like, I would never get to live that life. Or, I mean, Greece.
00:15:12
Speaker
on a boat in the Caribbean or whatever like you know and it's I think that's for me the most exciting thing about acting uh one of them that you can you to travel and you get to be in different different situations you never get to live it like you could live a hundred lives in one by just playing them out and then I also love with acting the connection you have with the other character like I just did a film um
00:15:36
Speaker
the crossroads and it was really great because my co-actor Nick was so great and we like built the connection as as the characters and we I think if you're very empathetic people like you really connect to each other and just very um you know you just watch each other and it's just reacting and I think it felt so effortless to act opposite him because he gave a lot for me to like work with instead of just whatever and I think um
00:16:02
Speaker
When you have the situation, it's really beautiful. You have a lot to work with and it makes it easy. I think acting in its purest form is easy. Everyone's doing their job. Acting is just listening and responding, really. Anyway, at its purest form, yeah. Yeah, thank you. I'm deeply fascinated by acting and the magic that's around it when people transform themselves into somebody else. Yeah.
00:16:31
Speaker
document that. A couple more questions,
Influences and Self-Development
00:16:36
Speaker
Emily. One is another kind of one going back maybe about you. Who or what made you who you are? Just as a human or like as an artist? Both. I mean, I think it's a combination of like your family, your school environment, your role models, what country you grew up in.
00:17:02
Speaker
My parents had a big influence on that. Both of my parents and my dad pushed me into doing arts and stuff like violin lessons, singing lessons, gave me a guitar book, took me to dance lessons and gave me so many opportunities. I think he really helped shape who I am today and then having my mum as a great woman, loving wife.
00:17:26
Speaker
person. As a role model, I think it was really important as a stable family. And then I watched movies. It's funny because it wasn't the great acting that wanted me to get into acting. I really loved Tomb Raider. Angelina Jolie's Tomb Raider. And I remember as a kid going,
00:17:45
Speaker
god like I just want to be her like she's so cool I just I remember going you know what I'm gonna embody the character Lara Croft like I want to be more like her so I remember I was like I'm like I was always playing a character like I'm gonna be like Lara Croft even though that is a character and Angelina Jolie is like not like her in real life but yeah like that almost had an influence of like female role model but um yeah I just I
00:18:08
Speaker
Um, and then did improv classes in high school. And that I think made me find a love for acting of that feeling of maybe being the center of attention to make people laugh. That was like the best feeling ever. So that, but, um, yeah, family environment. I think just reading a lot of, I'm big into self-development. So I've read a lot of like self-development books and, um, just listening to people who have
00:18:32
Speaker
have great minds or whatever and just you can learn from their structure and how they live their life. So I think that's really important too, just to always have mentors, teachers who are better than you, who are, you know, way ahead of you. I'm always like trying to, you know, guitar lessons, singing lessons, accent lessons, I'm always reading, studying new things. Like just, I just want to be around people who are better than me. So always, so I think that's a big part too. Yeah. I, uh,
00:19:00
Speaker
the curiosity to learn from others. It's one of the traits I enjoy about myself. And I hear that and what you're saying of just like, how did you do this? You're great at doing this and observe and learn. And I thank you for your comments around the process of creating, because I can feel that energy and how you're thinking about it.
00:19:24
Speaker
Speaking speaking of thinking prior to you letting Myself and listeners know, you know, like where to find you and
Existential Thoughts on Creativity
00:19:32
Speaker
all that type of thing. There is the big question I have to throw at you before we depart and it is Why is there something rather than nothing? Why is there something rather than nothing as like a very esoteric philosophical question, um Well, I mean
00:19:55
Speaker
There's something rather than nothing. Oh my God, I'm going to get really deep here. Have you ever heard of a book called Conversations with God? Have you ever read that? Have you read it? I haven't read it though. So this is getting very into a more of a deeper place, but at the start of the book it says God existed and
00:20:14
Speaker
Like, if, you know, God would have, whatever existed. And the reason God created people or created the world, created the Big Bang, was because God couldn't recognize himself if it's just him. If it's just you, you know, he couldn't see himself. So then he created everything around him. He started, he started, you know, cells and humans, whatever, so that he could see himself like through their eyes and then he exists. So it's like, if it's just you, it's nothingness.
00:20:42
Speaker
Do you even exist? No, I mean, there's no point. You're just there. It's like if you're in solitary confinement, you might always all be dead. But it's like everything exists in the God to then, you know, actually make give him meaning so like he can see himself through other people's eyes. He's a mirror for his own existence. But I guess through our own lives, I mean,
00:21:04
Speaker
I mean, I think that's it, isn't it? We're all trying to survive, number one. So we're going to create things. I think just do the act of survival and striving to be the best versions of ourselves. We have to create. If you don't create, you die. It's like the whole thing. You either go backwards or forwards. And I think if you go backwards, you just die. You become homeless. You just cease to exist. You become depressed.
00:21:29
Speaker
In order for us to survive, we have to keep growing and pushing and just expanding to a new level. So I think it's just survival. It's just human nature to do that. Yeah. Fight or flight. Do or die. Do or die. Something rather than nothing. Yes, exactly. Something's better than nothing. I guess. Yeah, thank you.
00:21:54
Speaker
Thanks, Emily. So as you know, I enjoy your music and you do other art projects.
Where to Find Emily Coop Online
00:22:04
Speaker
And I know you're pretty darn active right now. I want to be able to connect the podcast listeners to like where to find you, how to experience your art. Can you just
00:22:14
Speaker
lead us along those lines? Sure. Yeah, I mean, the best place to go and see everything, like on my website, which is just my name, Emily Koop, C-O-U-P-E. And from that, I have tabs of music, acting, and I'll post everything. I'm also trying to produce films. So as they come into existence, hopefully, it'll be there. So under that umbrella, I mean, it's all there. But my Spotify account for music, I mean, I'm on Instagram, Facebook.
00:22:44
Speaker
I've got like an artist page and then TikTok. I need to get more into TikTok. But they're the main ones I use. I mean, I've got a Twitter account too. But if you go to my website, it'll lead to all those things. But yeah, follow me on Instagram. She's my name, Emily Coop. Give me a message. But yeah, that's it. It's great. And I was able to easily find your music on Spotify and you have some
00:23:14
Speaker
great live videos. I wanted to thank you, you know, earnestly, any guests I invite here. It's I really enjoy what you do and your enthusiasm, you know, behind what you're creating. So and as I might have mentioned, you've had so much Australian guests originally from Australia, Prudence Flint is a painter.
00:23:38
Speaker
Vanessa Stockard, a painter, and Dylan Jett, who does music as well. So some good representation, some wonderful artists. And I'm glad to have you here to meet you, Emily. You too. Thanks for hitting me up and asking me to be on this. I love doing this. So yeah, thank you so much.
00:23:59
Speaker
Thanks, Emily, and look to see you both in film and on the radio and other places going forward. Have a wonderful day, Emily. You too. Have a great day too, Ken. Bye. Bye now. This is something rather than nothing.