I’ve felt a little stuck with my acting career lately. I feel like I’m doing everything right by having current headshots, updating my reel when necessary, networking (both in person and through social media), and being the most prepared person I can when I go into the audition room.
But lately things just aren’t happening for me. I’ve had 3 auditions in the last 6 months. That’s not bad, but I know that it should be better. And I know that everyone is self-producing work, but as much as I try to be a writer, it just doesn’t work for me. My writing style is blog writing not script writing.
So I’ve had to go outside my comfort zone to try to push my career forward. I’m trying to be more aggressive with the options I see out there. I have several friends who have created web series that I’d love to be a part of. So I’m starting to tell those people that I would love to audition for them sometime. It’s not easy for me to ask someone outright like that, but if I don’t ask for myself, I don’t think that they would think of me on their own. And as long as I’m asking politely, it’s working out for me. I’ve had one friend ask me to come up with some character ideas that I could play that fit into the web series that they created and another friend who knows of a part in the upcoming season that I could play and asked me to remind her that I want to play it.
I’m also getting a bit more aggressive with my self-submitting. I’m making sure that if I have any sort of note to include (like how I had met the casting director at an event in the past or a special skill that I think would be an asset to the part), I’m making sure to write a note. I’m self-submitting for more and more work as well. This can be a bit of a weird situation with my agents, but we’ve figured out a system that works. As soon as I hear of an audition for something I self-submitted for, I email them to book out for the audition date/time and I let them know of the shoot dates so they can mark that down as a potential book out date so they know just in case some opportunity comes through them.
I’ve only been more aggressive for about 2 weeks now, and I’ve gotten one audition on my own from self-submitting. I’m also looking for more things that I can participate in this summer to help me out. I’m looking at free workshops through the SAG Foundation (http://www.sagfoundation.org/programs/cap), various workshops with Women in Film (http://www.wif.org), and taking more classes through the SAG Conservatory (http://www.sagaftra.org/laconservatory). But if any of you reading this have other suggestions for me, I’m more than open to hearing about them. I need to take charge of my career more and I can use any help from all of you that I can get!