Don’t expect family, friends, spouse, etc. to understand, or even support your dream. People, even those who love you, may not ‘get it’ when it comes to what you’re working toward in life. That just means you have to find like-minded people, who do understand and will support you.

Jillian Bullock is the CEO of Jillian Bullock Enterprises, LLC, an entertainment and film production company based in Pennsylvania. She wears the hats of actor, director, producer, writer, and fight choreographer. Through her company, Jillian, and her team, produces films, content, and creative projects that are groundbreaking, visionary, unique, socially conscious, and thought provoking, while tackling difficult subject matters in an effort to bring about change. Each project is created to empower, educate and entertain.
Thank you so much for doing this interview with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to get to know you a bit. Can you share your “backstory” that brought you to this career?

When I was a little girl, I grew up with my African-American mother, my two siblings, and my white stepfather, who was a member of the Philadelphia Italian Mafia. Each Sunday, he’d take me to the movies and we would stay and watch the end credits. He instilled in me his dream, that one day I would be a filmmaker and he would see my name on the big screen. At first, I thought he was crazy. This was during the early 70’s and I had never seen an African-American filmmaker, and especially not a female one. When I told Jake this, he went out of his way to find movies by black directors and female directors. His dream became mine.

Growing up with a Mobster was definitely a different type of childhood. I lived in a white neighborhood and everybody on the block knew who Jake was, who he worked for, so for the most part I didn’t experience racism. I would write short stories about the kids on my block, Italian and Jewish, and how they tolerated, and played, with my siblings and me out of fear probably.