So you think you can act

Imagine a show called ‘So you think you can act’ where a bunch of hard up actors vie for the votes of their viewers in their attempt to lock in different role’s like playing lead roles at Shakespeare’s Globe in Romeo & Juliet, amongst others. I sometimes think there should actually be a reality TV show called that.  We have to sit and watch a million reality TV shows taking away from our TV jobs, so it actually would make sense if there was a TV show watching us climbing our way to the top….even if sometimes it is more of an amble than an actual climb.

Which brings me to today’s B.A.B.E. topic.  So do you think you can act?  Is it even about that?

I often question the reason why some actors get work and some don’t, why some make it and others don’t. Is it about whether you can act? Is it about who you know? Is it even about the school you trained at?

My personal thoughts… it’s all of the above, and it’s none of the above.

For some stars, they got a lucky break because they were spotted in the street and asked to audition. For others, they attended the “right school”, got the training, got picked up by an amazing agent and it went from there.  For some they just worked their butts off every day until they were auditioning for bigger and bigger roles.

All I know for sure is that if you don’t constantly work at it, be that in whatever form you see fit, you won’t even get a chance to be discovered, or to meet the right agent, or land that big role.  And on that note, I had the most interesting experience just this weekend. I was with two fellow actors and we were doing self audition tapes for a major feature film that has posted, where the production team were looking for auditions from actors around the UK and beyond, for the lead roles.  We were pumped.  We felt our audition tapes were strong, our character choices worked, and all in all, our pieces were worthy of being viewed by the Casting Director.

Come Monday, before any of us had even submitted them online, one of my fellow actors sent me a link showing the girl who had been rumoured to play the lead role in that very movie.  Wait…what??? Weren’t we just auditioning for that role!  How could she have it if there were auditions online for it right now.  Surely not.

And it was at that very moment that I realised, all is not fair in love and acting. But that is the nature of the beast.  And then something wonderful happened.  Instead of the three of us moaning about the role and why we had even bothered to tape our auditions for it, one of the girls emailed the positive flip side….”well at least there will be other roles in the movie and won’t it be great if she is the lead”.

And she is absolutely right.  So I may not be rumoured to play the lead role this time, and maybe I don’t have the biggest agent in London, but I have something else.  I am willing to get my butt out of bed on a Sunday (Easter Sunday no less), having learned my lines, and spend three hours with my friends to nail my online audition.  I bet there are another 50+ actors who thought… ahhhh too hard, I can’t be bothered.  And I bet every time I do get up and do my self audition tape I get one step closer to that leading role I so desperately want.

So you think you can act? That’s not even the half of what you need to do.  Are you out there living the dream by working the dream? Get on it. That leading role waits for no one.

You’re a B.A.B.E.

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