april holladay
filmmaker / director
“You were born and raised in Las Vegas?! Did you gamble growing up? Did you live on the Strip?”
These are the questions you get when you’re “Vegas born.” Growing up in Las Vegas was...unconventional. This city built me. Our close-knit, middle-class neighborhood contained the following: schoolteachers, a principal, stockbroker, cocktail waitress, part-time prostitute, dealer, lead detective from the LVMPD, an advertising executive (my dad), a dancer who graced the stages of the Sands and Flamingo hotels (my mom), a Hollywood bit player and a Mob hitman. As kids, we just knew that last one and his wife as a couple who loved their neighbors…to death. (Kidding, I think)
The Las Vegas image may tarnish over time, but there is always a deep rhinestone river of connection just below the surface. You must stick around to appreciate what everyone else thinks are odd, evil, questionable… “sins.” These things happen in every city, but in Las Vegas it’s out in the open – and Las Vegas is always open for business.
In college, at The Utah Shakespeare Festival, and graduate school, my mentors saw I was a director before I knew it myself. They laid the groundwork for me to explore the human condition by teaching me to understand actors and how to illuminate the written word, from Shakespeare to Sorkin.
As founder of FuseWire Entertainment/Films, I am enraptured and curiosity-piqued by stories: heartbreak, joy, hilarity in the darkest of moments, and creativity of all people.
The incredible professional athlete and human-interest stories I have the honor to tell as a director, producer, and interviewer, are consistently changing and transforming my sense of place and purpose. I am inspired constantly as I witness firsthand the lives of those who have withstood and overcome insurmountable physical, mental, and emotional adversity.
In the film, television, and theatre world, I have the privilege of working with fabulous, creative narrative writers. And this is where FuseWire and me, as a Director, continue to push in. Brilliant stories that need breath. Stories – no matter how dark, humor filled, or desperate – ALWAYS seek to have a sliver of redemption.