Meet Jordan Sims | Director / Producer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jordan Sims and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jordan, why did you decide to pursue a creative path?
I decided I wanted to pursue the film industry as a Director / Producer when I was 10 years old. My younger brother and I would spend our free time making videos with the family camcorder and gather the neighborhood kids and begin shooting. There was such a thrill in making up a world with characters and scenarios that you come up with. Looking back on this time now, I honestly became addicted to it. I was not a very happy kid growing up, which I still don’t know why since I grew up in a loving family and always managed to make new friends despite how frequently we moved for my dad’s work. No matter what was going on in my real life or how I felt, I loved watching film and TV and everything would melt away and I would feel reborn when the credits rolled. I didn’t know why, but I loved this feeling. Maybe because I was a kid and I thought I was learning about life. Maybe because it could be whatever I wanted to fantasize my life becoming. Maybe I just really liked seeing problems resolved, one way or the other. It doesn’t matter now, because I was hooked. This went to the next level when my dad brought out the family camcorder and had my brother and I film a batman short film: Batman vs Ninjas. We were making something in the medium I’ve been obsessed with for some time now and I felt so empowered that I wanted to make films and TV like what I was watching. I wanted to make a large blockbuster spectacle that would keep an audience at the edge of their seats with excitement and anticipation and awe. I wanted to make people laugh so hard that they began struggling to breathe. I wanted to terrify people to the point where they couldn’t sleep for a few days. I wanted to make people feel. To this day I still just want to make people feel.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
Currently I am a freelance Production Coordinator for Branded Content shoots in LA and looking to leave freelance for a full-time job as a Production Coordinator. Being a freelancer, most of my jobs are word-of-mouth referrals from others I’ve worked with. I work with someone, they like me and hear of a job that I’m suited for so they recommend me. So, having a large network is very important to have success. One thing leads to another which leads to another and another. The biggest challenge at the start was growing my network. How I grew it was saying “yes” to every job opportunity I could get on set. This exposed me to a multitude of working professionals, some of which I would get along with or impress and hopefully develop an organic relationship where they liked my presence (sometimes you don’t have to be good at your job, you just need to be liked). I would work my hardest and let the quality of my work speak for itself. Naturally, when these other professionals on set heard of open positions on sets, they would recommend me. Now, the downside of this is that I’ve worked with a lot of awful people with very toxic traits or work behaviors, but every so often I would work for someone who would take me under their wing and mentor me. This is where I grew the most and gained a lot of confidence in myself. These mentors would connect with other awesome people and slowly my network became less toxic and more encouraging. I’ve just continued to network and keep working with the good people and try to avoid the toxic people as much as I can.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
This is not my specialty haha. I spend most of my time working or at home, but I have a few suggestions. Obviously you have to go to the beach when you’re in LA, so I recommend Venice Beach since it’s so close to where I live. I try to avoid bars (because of how expensive they are), unless the Buffalo Bills are playing (I’m from Buffalo and a huge fan). If they are, we HAVE TO go to Busby’s in Santa Monica. It is a Buffalo Bills fans bar and the atmosphere is electric! It’s the best Bills experience you can get without being in the stadium. Regarding people, I like to introduce visitors to my friends.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I’ve had a lot of support in my pursuit of a career in the entertainment industry by a number of individuals. I could write page after page of the people who supported me and how their support shaped me to who I am today. All of these people deserve more than a “little credit”, but at the top of that list has to be my parents. Not only did they provide the resources they could to my projects when they could, but they encouraged this pursuit of creativity and I loved showing them my latest project to get their reactions. One of the most memorable and larger moments of support they showed me was when I decided to move to NYC on a permanent basis (originally I did my last semester of college there while working an unpaid internship with a Production Company). I was terrified living in NYC and cried myself to sleep most nights while finishing my college degree there. I took out extra student loans pay for rent and food, I had a huge fear of public transportation, and I took every bit of criticism from my employer as a personal attack. However, I felt this was the right thing to do though, to show I was serious in my pursuit of this career. So when I brought up the idea that I wanted to live in NYC after graduation and work in entertainment full-time, I was honestly waiting for my parents to outright say “No! That’s so stupid!” I was kind of hoping they would discourage me from doing this because it felt impatient and stubborn of me to do this. Although they voiced their concerns and recommended I wait a year or so before making such a permanent move, they told me that they would support no matter what I decided. If I did decide to move to NYC, they would be there to help how they could. Whether that was to send money if rent was short, always keep an open door at home if I needed a break from the chaos of the city, or give me words of wisdom when I didn’t know what to do. Knowing I had them as a safety net that wanted my best interest gave me the confidence to make it through that first year in NYC. From there, it got easier and I built a nice network of friends and professionals that I made a lot of fun videos with outside of work. I helped encourage others to make the scary move to NYC because I had done it and would support them however I could, just like my parents did for me. So much personal and professional growth happened for me in NYC and I never would have experienced it if my parents weren’t there each and every time I needed them.

Website: https://www.amanwithfriends.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amanwithfriends/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordan-sims-25175388/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzY5watsKTK278anjuKb2SA

Image Credits
Caroline Kelly Will Fortune Osvalda Kremidha