Actor Growth

I was having Dim Sum with the family today and one thing that came up was that my brother told me that I should ask my agent if they would be willing to take on his 2 and a half year old son (My Nephew of course) as they thought it would be a fun experience for him.

Himself and his wife actually tried to get him into a commercial audition once except the production people mentioned that he was too young as at minimum the kid had to be at least 3 years old for some kind of legality reason. I guess that kind of encouraged them to peruse the film industry even more.

Like most people I only read about kids that grew up ion the world of film and how it can be really good or really bad for them. Must be interesting too as at that age you don’t really have to much choice in terms of making decisions for your career. At the end they said they wanted me to be his agent. Lol.

All I said I could do is if they wanted I can post up some funny footage of him on YouTube and see what happens from there since there are so many babies/kids that became popular that way. I have one video where my nephew smacks me over the head with like a doll……so maybe I’ll do something for the heck of it and if an agent or company discovers him well then all the better huh?

Today I was reading this article that talked about how some people absolutely detest talent agents who don’t bother to send you a reply in regards to your inquiry about seeking representation. In general, they take it as an egotistical/pompous attitude of an agent to not have the courtesy to reply to the talent.

To make it more interesting, some people felt it was even worst for agencies that accept e-mail submissions and don’t have the courtesy to take say 1 minute of their time to reply to the sender on whether or not they are interested in signing them. I was reading agent responses to it too and some mentioned the reason they never reply is that they either get too many inquiries or replying leaves room for the sender to push the conversation further if the agent had no room for the talent in question.

One reason why I like online submissions a lot is that I can immediately see if the agency viewed my material or not. I must admit, I tend to have a bias thought where if they don’t take the time to reply after viewing my material I tend to think they just feel that they are too good to bother with me. Hence, the very stereotypical agent that thinks they are all that. On the flip side, if they do respond even though they have no room for me that at least shows that they sincerely appreciate everyone who submits to them and are keeping the bridge open as you never know what will happen in the future.

Just for the record, I feel the same about actors who think they are too big to talk/respond to others when it comes to things like this. The experience has been mixed for me personally and I can honestly say there are agencies I will avoid in the future too largely based on the fact that they did see my material but did not bother to reply.

In my view it just feels like one of those situations where the person was not willing to give you the time of day early in your career and so when you become successful why would you want to hang around with a “phoney” so to speak? Granted that is a bit harsh, but it’s how I feel personally as I’m sure in this industry you will get a ton of people who come out of the woodwork once you have made it. That’s why it is good from an actor point of view to know your fans and supporters early too I’d say.

One thing that should be interesting with the principal agency meeting is that my approach to this one is going to be very unorthodox since I already know the agent from doing other film work. Usually though, the debate is always how you should approach the meeting.

Essentially, you can approach it like an interview where you are trying to find out the agencies direction and goals for you to determine if they will be an ideal fit for your career. On the other hand, some people approach it in an audition style where it’s almost as if they are trying very hard to impress the agent as if they were trying to land a role.

I’ve tried it both ways personally before and to me the interview style is the best. My reason for that is that I don’t think you should have to try too hard to make an agent see your marketability in the industry. If they are truly a good agency fit for you and you believe in your skills, in my opinion they should be able to use their creativity and see dozens of ways to market you.

If they don’t and you still sign on with them for some reason I can only imagine that you will get frustrated as it will seem like you have to work extra hard just to get them to try and push you more. For this meeting though, I am just going to approach it very casual and friendly way. With this agent I want to be able to feel confident that I can speak with them at any time to ensure that the working relationship is always in tact.

I was talking to an actress recently and she was mentioning how she wasn’t too thrilled with her agency representation as most of the work she has gotten herself. Apparently her agent even told her that as the actor you have to work hard to promote yourself still as the agents can only do so much for you.

That is definitely true as I guess in many ways people who are new have the mentality that once they get an agent all they need to do is sit and wait while the agent scrambles to try and find you roles to audition for. You should always definitely be promoting yourself to try and land roles yourself as well.

At the same time, I personally believe an agent should be actively trying to suggest ways for you to try and get your career going while at the same time going out of their way to get you established as well as it benefits everyone in this situation. Kind of awkward if all the person is doing for example is negotiating contracts for you. The agent and actor relationship is definitely extremely important.

Even for myself, literally all the roles I have done so far were from my own efforts. I’m personally not just sitting there and waiting for things to happen.

Today I was looking at a list of agents here and was surprised at how many agencies there were here in BC.  The thing is too most of these aren’t listed as licensed agencies on the government site yet some of them seem like they have working talent on their roster.

I was always taught that if the agent was not licensed that it should be a sign for you to look elsewhere.  Just the other day too I was talking to a guy that I do some martial arts training with and he mentioned that his girlfriend was a model for a particular agency.  When he mentioned the name of it I didn’t see it anywhere on the licensed list.

I’m personally going to stick with talking to the agencies that are licensed though as to reduce the odds of meeting a lemon.  Of course like a lot of people say too just because it is licensed doesn’t mean it is good.