Should I go for it?

Question

I have been kind of wanted to act for a while now, and i am 14. i did musical theater when i was younger, and i am a dancer. i do not want to be an actress when i grow up, but the whole industry intrigues me. i live close to LA, but i don't want to fall behind in my studies my first year of high school. and i asked my mom, and she said no. should i bother to try and convince her, or should i just let this pass? i don't know what to do.

Answer 1

You should have more than just "intrigue", it should be a true passion of yours. As far as school is concerned, I grew up in Santa Barbara with Eric Stoltz and Anthony Edwards. They were in the Santa Barbara Youth Theater Group, driving to LA to do commercials and the "ABC After School Specials", all at the same time as going to high school. And they were getting awesome grades!

You could always try doing extra work to see if you like being on a set, etc. Central Casting in the biggest extras casting company, followed by Bill Dance Casting. You simply register with these places, and then you work. There is a huge amount of work for non-union extras, and just a small amount of union extra work. As a matter of fact, one can work every day as a non-union extra, but if you are a SAG member, it is much harder to get union extra jobs. This is because a given TV show for example, only has to hire 10 union extras, and the rest can be non-union. If you sign up with a "booking service" or "calling service" as they like to call themselves, you can literally work every day. But the pay is not much more than minimum wage for non-union, although overtime is usually the norm as well as "wardrobe allowance" and sometimes "mileage allowance". You also can get paid extra for using your car, pet, or props in a scene. There are many SAG members secretly doing non-union extra work simply because there just is not enough union extra jobs to go around.

You must live in LA (or within driving distance) of course, get a "Thomas Guide" map book, and have a cell phone and a car. But if you do your homework, you literally can work every day, no matter your experience or looks. You can be young or old, tall or short, overweight or underweight, some one-armed dude, or whatever. There is plenty of work to go around, and Hollywood needs all types of people. You don't even need headshots or a resume, they take a digital photo when you register with all of those extras casting companies. Just stick with the legit companies. There is a nominal $25 or so fee to register. Even SAG member have to pay a "photo fee" to register.

So there it is.

Don't take bad advice. Just register with the big extras casting companies and follow the rules of working as a fim/tv extra. As I said, I am NOT out to sell that book, you can do some research and find out all you need, but be careful as there are tons of bottom-feeders scamming people who want to work in film/tv as extras.

If you are lucky, you can even become "SAG Eligible" from doing non-union extra work, but that is a whole other long story.

Here is a link to HollywoodOS (the company that publishes that book "Extra Work For Brain Surgeons").

http://hollywoodos.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=37&Itemid=80

Peace Out,

Alan

PS AFTRA (American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) has jurisdiction over Soaps and Sitcoms among other videotaped and radio broadcast productions. This is a whole different story, and anyone can walk into AFTRA and join for about $1,250

Answer 2

She said no, because the public has a bad perception of acting and actors. If you keep performing in school plays and class recitals, and you get really good at it , you might convince here to say yes when you are 16 or 17., Good luck.

Answer 3

Hi,

you got some good advice here. First thing to tell you is that school comes first. Everything else comes after. Secondly, as difficult as it might be sometimes, try and keep your parents close and in tune with what you are doing.

Three more technical things things:

1) Hi,

If you do a search here on answers you will see other answers to this question, as it comes up usually a couple of times each day. I answer this question a lot and so instead of writing the same or similar answers over and over again, I have created an ebooklet that will give you a lot of intormation as to what you need to do to get started. Just go to http://www.actingcareerstartup.com/acs-blog.html , sign in on the right side of the page and you can download it for free. It's called: What It Takes To Become An Actor.

2) The second resource is about getting an agent, although, if you have no training yet, then I doubt that you are ready, but here it is anyway: http://www.actingcareerstartup.com/how_to_get_an_agent.html . It takes you through a process that I used to get two agents and a personal manager in a short period of time in New York. Using the same process, I also got casting directors to actually start calling me in directly for auditions.

Lastly, here is an answer I gave to a young girl who said that she was having difficulty convincing her parents to support her acting endeavors.
----------------

3) Hi,

what do you think would really make your parents start to take you seriously and support you?

Do they know what actors do? REALLY? Do they know what it's like being an actor? Do they know what you really have to go through to become an actor?

Do YOU know the answers to those questions? Do you know what it's like and what the issues actors face, what it's like to work on set, what your chances are of just getting work, how hard you'll have to work, how much you will have to invest of your time and energy to study, to do mailings, to write cover letters, to submit yourself for auditions, to prepare for auditions, prepare your monologues, bone up on your cold reading skills, take specialization classes, travel, etc.
Do you know what the average earnings are of an actor these days? Do you know how many days on the average an actor works.
Do you know what it takes to become an actor and do you have what it takes?

Have a look at the following links:

http://www.actingcareerstartup.com to see some of the issues actors face while trying to get work.

http://www.actingcareerstartup.com/working_as_an_actor.html to see what it can be like day to day looking for work.

http://www.actingcareerstartup.com/a_working_actor.html to see what it was like for me once on the set of an independent film.

That’s just a start. I strongly encourage you to talk to other actors, both working and struggling as well. It will help you in your education.

That's a lot of questions I know and I asked them on purpose.

Why?

Because if you can start to answer all those questions, maybe you will be more convincing. I know you're young, but you have to get started sometime. Some teenagers have someone who is an adult and who supports them in their goals. You don't so you can either keep butting heads with your parents or being afraid to approach the subject, or you can start to find out things for yourself.
In other words, the more information you have, the more informed you are about what you say you want, the more you can talk about it intelligently and demonstrate that you know what you are talking about, the greater your chances of being able to convince them to support you. If they havejust as much information as you do, then you are on an equal playing field. They are your parents. They're bigger. They're older. They have the money. They win! At least until you’re out of the house or until they no longer foot your bills!

Is that the way you want it? No? Then get a move on and start doing your homework! :-)

Does doing your homework mean that you will get what you want in the end? Not necessarily. Your parents are certainly taking into consideration your best interests. But even if you don't get them to support you, you will know a lot more than you do now about the profession you say you want to pursue.

Go to the site: http://www.actingcareerstartup.com and download a free e-booklet titled: What It Takes To Become An Actor. All you have to do is sign in and you can download it for free. It will help you understand more and get you started off in the right direction.

Good luck!

Tony
ceo
http://www.actingcareerstartup.com

Answer 4

I think if you don't want to be an actress when you get older, maybe you should let it pass. You need alot more passion in acting then just "it intrigues me." ALso, the support of your parents in CRUCIAL. If you don't have it you have a slim chance.

Answer 5

get xpirienc n then convinc er

Answer 6

If it is something that you really want to do then do it!!!