Hello Ms. In The Biz readers hope you have all been well this past month. In keeping with my candid chat format, I am going to share a personal story from this past month.
I submit to breakdowns on Actors Access, LA Casting, and several other sites daily. Sometimes I get contacted for an audition, sometimes I do not; that’s the nature of the business. I submit, then I move on. Well, I submitted on a particular project and didn’t get audition for it, but what I did get in my inbox (not my cmail or alerts) but my yahoo inbox was the following email:
[The below email has been edited so as to not give the Casting Directors name, or the name or dates of their classes.]
Thank you for your interest in the project _______. We were flooded with emails and headshots from numerous talented individuals, unfortunately, we were not able to call everyone in. We will keep your headshot and information on file for future projects.
In addition, __________ would like to invite you to our upcoming class – free Sneak Peek on Thursday, September _th and Tuesday, September _th.
This is designed to help actors master the skill of auditioning while receiving feedback and critique from an industry professional and special guests. Learn more about it at ___________.
RSVP only. Class space is limited. Email to reserve your seat.
We look forward to seeing you.
Now, I don’t mind that I wasn’t invited to audition, but I sure did mind that this person took the opportunity to capture my email address, and market a class to me. At first I was pretty unhappy about the whole situation. My knee jerk reaction was to think “how does this person know I need a class to teach me how to audition, when they have never seen me audition?” I let that go pretty quickly so I could get to the bottom of what was actually bothering me about this correspondence.
As all actors know, we are inundated with information about classes, workshops, seminars and the like daily. It is hard to wade through it all and make informed decisions on what classes to take when and how much money we can budget monthly to do so. I personally spend a lot of time doing this research, as well as getting advice from trusted friends and industry contacts as to what classes are working for them. When I got this email I just felt like this was not the correct forum for this CD to be pitching their auditioning class to me. I have no problem with marketing your services, we all have to do that, but not in this way.
I’m sharing this story with you so that when these things happen to you, you know they are happening to all of us. I decided to disregard the email and keep on going. There are so many CD’s out there, so many projects, so many agents and managers. Just keep working and keep moving forward with a good and strong attitude.
Till next time, have a productive and happy month!