What Are The Top 3 Things Actors Should Be Doing For 2017?

Launching your career and booking more work this year is well within your grasp if you can adopt these rules:

Your Olympic Best
Invest in an acting class that doesn't force you to work with a scene partner and allows you to work on currently casting major film and TV auditions every week.

Stop Looking For Reps
Don't waste your valuable time and energy sending out mass mailings and scouting out representation. The reps that will truly help you launch your career will find you.

Pitch Yourself
There's a right way and a wrong way to directly pitch yourself for every role you're right for. This starts with building and maintaining game-changing relationships with the people who actually cast you—the writers, directors, and producers of the projects you love.

Check out my recent article, here, to see how I helped nine clients land series leads in major TV this year.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

How To Land a Series Lead This Pilot Season

Pilot season is coming—it’s really almost a year-long event—and when you’re ready for it, it has the potential to be one of the most fruitful times to be an actor in Los Angeles.

New projects like pilots generally cast a wider talent net and the casting process is often less elitist and more accessible to a greater number of actors. 

Instead of being empowered by this fact, I hear a lot of complaints from actors about how hard it is to get auditions, even during a busy pilot season, and how few pilots they go out for. 

Many actors have false hopes and expectations that their reps are going to get them in for every role they’re right for. As my readers well know, reps who rely on submissions only, and who do not pitch their clients via phone, will not generate more than 0-6 major film/TV auditions per year. And, if the slot machine odds of scoring that submission based audition weren’t cutthroat enough, those that get the opportunity to compete, enter into a significantly more competitive secondary lottery that their audition will even reach the eyes of producers, directors, etc.

Only 1% of reps are picking up a telephone and, armed with their clients’ best selling points, are actively pitching them for every role they’re right for. 

But that doesn’t mean you can’t book a series lead this pilot season. The key is to strap personal responsibility back on your own shoulders.

At our studio, we've helped nine clients book starring roles in major TV series this past year, all without the help of representation. The answer to having a winning pilot season is not about running around frantically trying to get better reps, sending out postcards, trying to find your “niche” or your “type,” it’s about using your ingenuity to develop a more effective strategy to get your foot in the door—a high-end strategy that’s reflective of the Oscar and Emmy-worthy career you aspire to. 

This starts by fearlessly rejecting the herd mentality. Most actors tell the same story: they waste their time looking for reps, get signed, stay on their roster for a year, only see 0-6 major film/TV auditions, and wring their hands in annoyance. 

I’ve Already Made It as Me
Show business is an industry where success depends on unshakeable confidence. I advise my clients to adopt the attitude that they’ve already made it—that they already have a reputable career, the respect of their peers, and a full body of quality work behind them that they can feel proud of. 

This level of success is partially achieved by saying no to as many projects as you say yes to.

Don’t walk around with your tail tucked between your legs, by acting like one who feels lucky to be seen, lucky to get an audition, and so fortunate to be cast. You are being generous by sharing your time and your talents with production, while also being a solution to their problem. Realize that everyone’s in the same boat! This is the attitude you need to move your career forward, on your terms.   

Furthermore, don’t try to adjust your persona into the preconceived ‘niches’ or ‘types’ that already exist in entertainment—they only serve to box you in and limit the things that really make you sellable and singular.

Many successful actors figured this out from the beginning: this is perhaps why Cate Blanchett embraced her crooked nose and nurtured her elegant yet dangerous image. Or perhaps why Paul Giamatti never lost weight or got a hair transplant, or tried to tone down any of his charming neuroses. You being you—that’s interesting. If you try to be what they want, you lose.

Pitch Yourself
Identify the film and TV projects that you want to be a part of this year. 

Draft a short list of the directors, writers, and producers whose projects truly thrill you. 

There’s a right way and a wrong way to build and maintain game-changing relationships with these influencers.

And, from the strength of these relationships, not only will you supercharge your audition rate, you can be more certain that those performances will actually be seen by a member of production team. 

I help my career clients make getting in the room the easy part—by directly pitching themselves for every project for which they’re right, they compete for the role not the audition.

It’s a small industry. Actors competing for many top tier roles will see a significant number of the industry’s top casting directors in any given year. If you’re not at your Olympic-best with regards to your acting, you risk closing far more doors than you open.

Once that door is open, you now have the awesome opportunity to do the real work of making those brave, fun, and dangerous choices to confidently go into the room and book the role—the choices that most actors are too afraid to make. 

Philip Seymour Hoffman’s advice is the best: “If you leave the room...and you’ve acted as well as you can, there’s no way that the people who have watched you will forget it...Something will transpire ultimately.”

This article was originally posted on Backstage

How To Explain Your Career to Friends and Family (An Actor’s Guide To Surviving The Holidays)

Disclaimer: As you know, this career path is not all roses and apple pies. If you’re not having fun—cathartic, invigorated, and empowered fun—it’s not working (in acting and with regards to your career). Having a healthy sense of humor can make those tough times easier to swallow.

With the holidays approaching and certain branches of the industry grinding to a halt, some of you might be heading home for visits, or have vacation plans which include spending time with family members or old friends—some of whom, might think your career choice is totally nuts.

It’s great to reconnect with the people you care about, but at times it can feel like you have a judge and jury scrutinizing your life and making assessments on how well you’re doing—or not. Sometimes this scrutiny can take the form of a barrage of questions; other times it’s a few passive-aggressive remarks.

These moments can make you feel inadequate, judged, or like an outright disappointment. Friends or family members seldom intend for us to feel this way—these questions or remarks often come from a place of concern for our welfare, or envy at our brave decision to not compromise and pursue our dreams. Sometimes these anxieties or personal opinions have a way of seeping out. People say things like, “Do you have a savings account?” “I think you’d make a great lawyer” “My friend Fanny is an actor and she booked a recurring on Forensic Files and a Nike commercial.”

If it were a perfect world, everyone would just say supportive things and wish you the best, and treat you with respect, like you’re a competent person charting the path of your own career. However, because cold reality awaits us, it’s best to carve a game plan so that you can still spend time with loved ones without taking a blow to your self-esteem.  

I would be thrilled if this article offered you the slightest bit of relief when going home for the holidays—to make stressful interactions go smoother, to make you feel better and to stop any looks of pity, words of pity, or any other such negative exchanges. You’re not there to be the punching bag. If say, cousin Mikey is going through a divorce and has a half-million dollars in med school debt, you’re not going to be the tool he uses to make himself feel better in front of the entire family because, at least he’s not an actor and on the fringes of society.

Tip #1. Adopt a body attitude of success and happiness—as if you have the successful career you’ve always wanted. People can sniff out discontent and personal misery almost effortlessly. It’s part of human nature. Walk into any potentially threatening interaction with the attitude that you’ve already made it—that you have the career that you want today. If there’s any universal truth that I’ve witnessed to be true, it’s that what you project—what you put out there—you will become.

Tip #2. Prep your responses. Now remember, you’re the wild one. You left home to forge a path in the big city in a ‘scary’ industry known as show business. People are going to want some feedback on How Things Are.

Here are the questions you are going to get when you go home. Sound familiar?

• What have you done?

• Is there anything I can see you in?

• What are you working on?

• How come I haven’t seen you on any billboards?

• Are you on any shows?

• How are things? (tone of pity)

Below are several responses that you should tailor to fit your situation. Feel free to add in some of your own personal successes (such as: my improv team had ten sold-out shows or I met the (writer, director, producer, casting director) for “Better Call Saul” and she loved me).

“Things are great! I’m in development for a couple projects and it’s really exciting. I can’t give too many details at this early stage, but I’m frankly thrilled and my reps couldn’t be happier.”

You can use the phrase “in-development” to refer to scripts you’re working on or shopping around or projects you are developing with friends or other collaborators. “In development” sounds more impressive than “my friend and I are working on a script.”

“Things are great! In the last few months I’ve met some really high-level (producers, directors, writers, casting directors) and had some big auditions that all went really well. My agent and manager are really happy. I’m not supposed to talk about the finer details just yet, as the paperwork isn’t signed, but I have no complaints.”

This response allows you to be honest if you haven’t booked anything and then throws the listener more of a curve when you talk about “the paperwork not being signed.” What paperwork? Frankly, it’s nobody's damn business which paperwork you’re referring to—if it’s a contract with CBS or a gym membership. If people would ask more sensitive questions, then you wouldn’t have to protect your life choices like this.

“Things are great! I’ve booked some really cool indie projects with some really awesome up-and-coming directors. It’s been a crazy ride but I’ve been really pushing myself as an actor and I couldn’t be happier and the road ahead is really exciting.”

It doesn’t matter if you’ve just done some low-budget indies or short films recently with so-so scripts. That’s exciting to the rest of the world, who earn a living from pushing papers around. These are actually meaningful and important endeavors which add to your blossoming career.

While friends and family may sometimes intentionally, or unwittingly deflate your sense of achievement, every little milestone in this industry is seriously awesome and should be celebrated. It’s a tough as nails business and you have to truly love acting to succeed—the only way to “make it” is by chiseling your own path to success and creating your own opportunities. I help my clients launch their careers—on their own terms—and empower them to never wait around for industry breadcrumbs and handouts.

This article was originally published on Backstage 

Is Your Scene Study Class Holding You Back?

Actors who are serious about launching a film, TV, or theatre career are inevitably in search of a top tier scene study class—hopefully one that will get you results. Unfortunately, far too many so-called ‘scene study’ classes offer nothing more than an opportunity to do in depth scene work in the bubble of that acting class—rather than preparing you for the realities of performing that scene in the real world.

Inherently lazy actors expect a scene study class to be one in which you just show up and the teacher drops a stale 10-15 page theater scene on your lap and assigns you a scene partner. This may have been the M.O. in the seventies, but it is so far removed from anything relating to the demands of what it takes to launch a successful acting career today.

Your teacher should point you in the right direction and even show you where to find a treasure trove of thrilling scene choices to suit your unique singularity. However, they should never choose it for you, as it strips you of your power to choose material that’s inspiring to you.

The first day an actor becomes a member of our studio, we show them where to find all currently casting major film and TV auditions, and encourage them to work on something they’ve always imagined themselves playing.

1. Always keep your work in context.

It's vital that you work on a scene within a specific framework and context so you’re never acting within the bubble of an acting class and trying to please a teacher or your classmates.

Don’t expect a great ‘acting class performance’ to translate to a booked role or an award winning performance unless you're empowered by the teacher to practice how you play—hence, always keep your work in context!

Simply putting up scenes with a partner in a class without being challenged to define the context is a colossal waste of effort and energy as you’re doing all this work without maximizing your efforts. It’s like most of the math you learned in high school—you’ll never use it.

When choosing a scene to work on in class ask yourself how I would like to work on it and then tell your teacher, “Here’s the context in which I’m going to do this scene.” Here are some options: an audition piece for film or TV, a booked role, a scene for a piece of theater, a showcase or competition scene, etc.

Back when I first started teaching in Los Angeles, Amy Adams always worked on class material with a clear and specific intention for every working session. It was inspiring to see such focus, dedication, and work ethic.

2. Audition technique work should never be one size fits all.

When working on scene study for auditions it's very common for acting classes to have a one-size-fits-all approach to audition technique training.

This is extremely irresponsible as there are 15+ different styles and methods of auditioning: pre-read on tape for casting, chemistry read, callback, taped audition, Skype audition, callback for producers, etc.!

What you work on in class should be directly related in style and approach to how you're going to work on it in the real world, outside of an acting class. Period.

3. Never be forced to work with a scene partner.

When you’re forced to work with a scene partner and your partner doesn’t care enough about actually putting in the work, or they flake and don’t show up, you are then shit out of luck. And, you’ve just wasted your hard earned money and time.

As I’ve mentioned in previous articles, your words and thoughts create your reality. So force yourself to think bigger—as big as you want your career to be.

Your desire to join a high-caliber scene study acting class should be an informed decision—one in which you must be crystal clear about the results you expect.

Your acting class should be a reflection of the level and quality of the career you’ve always wanted. Our clients practice how they play—every class. This ensures that their work gets hard results in the real world: booked roles and launched careers.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

4 Ways to Launch Your Commercial Career

Your choices and the quality of your preparation will always give you an edge on your competition at any audition.

Not your look, not your outfit, and not your voice—your preparation.

When it comes to commercial auditions, however, most actors consider themselves prepared if they’ve just read the copy over a few times until it’s more or less memorized.

This is shoddy preparation and exactly what perpetuates low-to-no commercial booking rates.

It’s a very small industry. It’s quite easy to visit most major commercial casting offices in one season. If you walk in unprepared, you risk closing more doors than you open.

In all fairness to actors, they’ve generally been fed a great deal of fluff about commercial auditions and how they work.

The playing field becomes murkier with more commercials casting for “real people” and more commercial agents taking on actors who are fresh off the bus to LA/NY.

These conditions can make it feel like commercial auditions don’t require the serious preparation that theatrical auditions warrant.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Adopt the following four tips to stick out from the crowd and win the role:

1. Join a high-level, craft-centered acting class.

Audit. Do your research. Talk to more seasoned actors about what got them results.

And no, you don’t need to join a class specifically for commercial acting if you want to book commercials.

At my studio, I help actors launch their commercial careers by teaching them how to deploy a winning choice within seconds. This is an essential technique to employ for commercial auditions where frankly, you don’t have much time with the sides or to rehearse with your partner.

The technique you use to analyze a scene in class, be it for Netflix or Neil LaBute, is exactly the same technique you must use to analyze commercial copy for being a Helpful Honda Guy.

Treat the commercial copy like a short scene.

Every scripted piece you work on is real life with all the boring bits cut out—it’s life on fire! This will give you a competitive edge, as it is exactly how the production and casting team treats it.

 2. Don’t worry about your look.

Too many actors go into commercial auditions with the assumption that they don’t look enough like what’s described in the breakdown and therefore feel they don’t have a real shot at booking it.

The breakdown is not gospel; it’s just a guideline most of the time.

Furthermore, the lore of commercial auditions aggravates this mythology as actors tell one another, “Well, booking commercials is really just dependent on your look.”

It’s far more important to bring your empowered self into the room, and to the performance. That kind of confidence creates memorability: the more memorable you are, the more likely you are to book the job. 

3. Don’t imitate what you’ve seen on commercials.

We’ve all been inundated by commercials that we can’t help but want to imitate the performances we’ve all seen over and over again, because heck, those actors booked it.

Don’t be the super-dufus that annoys his long-suffering wife.

Don’t be the overly-saccharine mom who lives and dies by the cleanliness of her carpet.

You are only you. You can only be you. So be you.

If you can address the commercial copy with the help of a class or coach that assists you in bringing yourself to the role while you channel your inner super-dufus or overly-saccharine mom, or summer-salad-eating-coworker—you have a much stronger chance of booking the role because you’ll be instilling it with more authenticity.

It’s a tough pill to swallow, but your winning performance will truly feel as easy and effortless as if you were playing yourself.

4. Improvise even if you aren’t asked to.

So many actors feel like they have to be given an invitation to improvise. Commercial auditions are opportunities begging you to improvise.

Often the client feels tepid about the copy that the writers have come up with.

Bring your ingenuity and wit to the sides and at the very least, add a final line at the end that’s not already there.

This is a ravishing opportunity for you to let your personality shine, while showing everyone in the room that not only can you solve their casting problem, but you can also add value.

The only time you wouldn’t do this is if you are given strict instructions to stick to the script.

Overcoming the labyrinth of commercials gives you another stepping stone on your path, and they can truly help you become a more seasoned and mighty theatrical actor. Many of the legends of cinema and TV have done them, and many continue to do them.

At my studio, we help actors launch their commercial careers and make the bravest choices that book the job—the dangerous ones that other actors are too afraid to make.

So be ready to work, open yourself up to more financial abundance, and get ready to gush about how you can’t wait to save 15% or more on car insurance with Geico.

The #1 Way To Crush Anxiety in Seconds

“No amount of anxiety makes any difference to anything that is going to happen.” —Alan Watts

I don’t know about you, but I find it slightly insulting when I’m feeling anxious or stressed and some self-appointed guru looks at me with an all-knowing glance and says, “There’s no reason to be nervous. Just relax.”

This falls into the same bin of uselessness and cliché as simply picturing an audience in their underwear. Wishful thinking, but it never really helps—mostly because it just doesn’t work.

The solution isn’t running from anxiety or pretending it doesn’t exist, especially when you damn well know it’s standing next to you in the room.

I help my clients crush their nerves by owning them, reshaping them, and then redirecting them into unshakeable confidence to create a winning performance. Here’s a ridiculously effective exercise I prescribe to instantly melt away nerves:

Visualize already doing it—see it happen moment by moment unfolding in exactly the way that you want. Take a breath, and say to yourself, “I already did it, and now I get to go back and do it again.”

As I’ve mentioned before, your words shape your reality. What you say and visualize—what you consciously put out there in the world—is directly related to who and what you become.

This exercise is endlessly modular and applies to any life event where nerves are present: going out for a major TV audition, asking a crush out on a date, prepping for a big time job interview, standing up to a bully, etc.

This article was originally published on Backstage