Actor Growth

So today in Vancouver there was a little news in the newspaper about a tax credit that affects the film industry. You can read the article at http://www.vancouversun.com/travel/increases+film+production+credit/2518958/story.html

Maybe it’s just me, but it seemed like the credit was more around the video game industry with most of the film related comments being doom and gloom still. That was kind of confusing in terms of the big headline boasting a film production tax credit.

Things here are pretty slow during the Olympics it seems. I myself will be involved during the Olympics game and so that is going to tie me up. Guess being in that ad kind of started the train in terms of surrounding my activities around the Olympics here.

Now I just hope people won’t confuse me for a real ice skater if they saw me in the ad and then see me near the events. lol.

Okay, I am officially on the lookout for a person to create a web series of sorts with. The first question that comes to my mind is “Where to start looking?” I’m trying to think of all of my local contacts here too as obviously I would need to work with someone local.

I actually have a concept in mind that I would personally enjoy a lot as I think it would be entertaining yet educational. At the same time, I think it suits an online audience perfectly as most people will “get it” right away. Technically I think it would work out best to find another actor who is comfortable in doing a little bit of post production.

I think this would work out cool too as it is like on the side we can create our own work for fun as you never know what can happen and at the same time we can keep an eye out for auditions and such. I know I can probably just use like a free classified ad and get hundreds of response, but that isn’t exactly the best odds to find someone who would be equally serious/committed to it I think.

Hey universe, I’m calling you out. Send me someone!

Session started in the morning today which was a semi surprise as the coach had to attend an event. It was kind of an interesting day as I did the very serious scene. As it turned out, I kind of accidentally went too deep into the scene where I got a bit emotional after the take. Usually when you do that as an actor you always end up saying “Oops, that didn’t come out right.”

The coach was saying though that you shouldn’t ever hold back magical moments like that and he emphasized how he wished that I would have just allowed it to all go during the take. He was even saying too where at first if I was a girl he would have probably just said “breathe it off” or something. But since I’m a guy it’s not an everyday thing you see and at first he thought that I just say had something in my eye. lol. It was actually the reader at first who noticed it and had a concerned look on his face.

I don’t know. It just didn’t feel right though in context of the scene. But I guess for people watching it things like this are more engrossing to see. It was kind of funny now that I look back at it as one person used an accent for the character which I thought made it interesting and would help to make you stand out in an audition.

I then asked the coach what I could do to make it more interesting and for the most part during the first take he said that he liked it the way it was. Then low and behold this happens unexpectedly during the second take.

Afterwards, we taped another scene for my demo reel and it looks like I should be working with the coach tomorrow to start submitting my portfolio. Hopefully that will go through as planned.

Off topic….It’s snowing in Vancouver

There are a lot of big featured films being released soon where many of them were shot here in Vancouver. As a result, it’s not surprising that many of the films have local actors who have roles in them. I happen to know a few of them too and I think it is so cool to see them get their opportunities for which they have worked years to get. While there is always a chance someone can just get “discovered” and have all the opportunities pour in, for the most part it is one crazy journey. That’s the fun part right?

Okay, so that means next one of you actors out there in cyber land with blogs that I follow need to report right away when you land a big gig too. I want to see more successes.

So this week there has been a lot of season premieres starting on TV. The show Fringe and The Good Wife were actually shot here in Vancouver for a lot of the scenes and as a result a lot of local talent were cast to act in them. I knew that two local acting coaches were in them too which made me curious to IMDB them. In both of the shows I noticed that the actor’s character names were simply using the actor’s real names. That was odd I thought.

At the same time, I guess it can be funny where you would see say a badge or plague specifically made for the show where you are like a doctor or FBI agent. The only similarities I saw on why there weren’t original character names is because the roles were simply a small principal role. Example, I guess in the script it would be something like “Doctor #1”. So, I guess that is just a fast way of doing it since they don’t think it is important enough to come up with a name. Although, I usually do see people get credited as just “Doctor #1” many times though.

I only worked as a background on those shows, so I know that would definitely not matter in terms of having to attach a name to the character. Speaking of which, I was then informed that I was spotted on the good wife. Guess I didn’t hide good enough. lol. Errr, then again….I remembered that they placed me right behind the girl that was being accused of murder and I was like the only Asian guy on set. Looked at the online video on the network site and sure enough that is the case. Won’t see me debating about character names for things like that.

Alrighty, I got a question asking how I got an acting agent initially when I first started out and what worked and what didn’t. Just for the record, the agent factor seems to be one of the biggest hurdles for me thus far in my journey I believe. When I first attempted to get an agent I knew one of the biggest tool that I needed was of course the headshot. Not only is this the business card for you as the actor, but since first impressions matter so much it was important to me that I made sure I got a good headshot.

Afterwards, the first thing I did was sign up for a site called the Casting Workbook as from everything I learned in acting school you pretty much had to sign up for that site anyways since agents had to use it to submit you to projects. The thing is too, if you sign up for that site as an unrepresented artist agents can actually browse through your profile as a way for them to potentially discover new and unrepresented talent to sign. So, that’s what I did.

While signed up for that site, as well I manually tried to research about the various talent agencies here in Vancouver. Now the first rule that I was told is to make sure that the agency is licensed. So here in BC there is actually a site where you can find that located at http://www.labour.gov.bc.ca/esb/talent/list.htm

Now fortunately I was able to learn a bit about which agencies were the top ones from school and which ones were say boutique style agencies. After doing my research, I submitted to two of the bigger agencies in town through a traditional mail routine. Basically, the paper resume and headshot. As well, I attached a demo reel on a disc. However, I got no response at all. To me, I kind of expected that as those agencies were so big.

I then started to go to my other choices which were considered smaller agencies and the great thing was that they allowed electronic submissions. I submitted my headshot, resume and demo reel through e-mail. As well, in the e-mail I wrote down why I was specifically interested in seeking representation with that agency. Example, I personally fall in the younger look category and so I expressed clearly that based on my research I felt the agency could represent my category very well.

Sure enough, the two agencies that I submitted to were interested in seeing me. What ended up happening though was that I met with one agency and the other never got back to scheduling an actual meeting time. About the same time, having my profile on the site resulted in a different agency all together contacting and expressing interest in representing me. Sure enough, I met them.

Now what I learned from these meetings was that one of the key reasons they were interested in potentially representing me is because they saw my training and how in-depth it was. In a way, I guess that comes across as I am someone who is serious about the business. Because what I learned after is that one thing that an agent is afraid of is representing new talent only to see them give up so easily. It’s basically a waste of their time spending all that energy into promoting someone who is not serious.

Long story short, I signed up with the agency that gave me the best pitch. Example, saying how I was the only Chinese actor on their roster and that I would be the go to guy they would push. It was a pretty bad decision for me though as I stayed with them for about a year and nothing really transpired in terms of even getting auditions for film and tv roles. I was basically keeping myself busy with independent film work and it seemed like most of the calls I got were from commercial casting directors that requested for me from searching on the casting site. So, a change was needed.

I was going to do the submissions again but dreaded having to send paper resumes and all to so many agencies on top of the fact that I got no responses before through the paper method. I then read about this local business that had a business relationship with agents and that they could submit my portfolio to all of them digitally for a fee as well as taping a demo reel if I needed it. It was created by some known people in the industry, so I figured they would be steering me the right way.

After getting a consultation, the person mentioned that taping a demo with them would be good as they felt they could do something stronger than my current reel. So, I paid for the full package and taped some scenes with them to be used as a reel. Now my gut feeling was telling me this was not right as the scenes the person had me do were pretty stereotypical. Since I’m Asian, she said there were a lot of roles involving techies or gangsters and this way I can show the agents that I can be marketed this way to get the work that is out there.

Since this was online based, I got to semi see that my portfolio was being viewed through a counter. Result? At one point it said that it had been viewed like 15 times and yet no agent contacted me. While the normal reaction would be “Dang, I must not be good enough” it just didn’t make sense since before I got a pretty decent response.

So what I did was while this was running I sent my package by manually e-mailing my old material to two agencies. Result? I was contacted by one out of the two. That showed me that the demo reel had a huge effect. You see, my old demo reel was a bit more colorful and lively I thought. Example, it had dramatic work and comedy whereas the ones I taped with that company were so typical. Hence, it didn’t make me stand out.

Therefore, I dropped that service immediately. The bad thing is doing that service probably harmed me a lot too where all those agencies that never saw me before has just seen me for the first time with that dull representation of what I can do and what I am all about. And yes, it probably will affect me if I decide to submit to them in the future assuming they remember me.

Eventually, how I go my current agent was ironically through doing background work. Essentially, most people that do background do it very casually such as for headshots they just use a regular photo. For myself, I took it a bit more seriously and my headshot definitely made me standout since I was using the ones meant for professional acting work. As well, despite background work being considered as a bottom of the barrel type of work I still treated it like any other job. This resulted in me getting called for a lot of work where even my old background agent was saying that I was getting a lot of special requests.

That then resulted in me being referred on a certain production to see a particular agency that represented background and principal actors since I was looking for new principal representation. Because of this referral, the agency was keen in wanting to sign me up and sure enough I did. I was always told that you should stay away from agencies that represent both background and principal actors if you are more focused on acting, but that is a different topic.

So what did this teach me about getting an agent so far? It’s actually not that difficult. It’s finding the right one that you can work with the best that is the challenge. I know the eagerness that one must have in wanting to sign with any agency as a person starting out, but even from my experience it is better to really make sure that you are going with the right person. In a nutshell, for me finding an agent came down to these factors:

1) Good Headshot
2) Resume backed up with good training in the absence of professional film acting credit
3) Specifically addressing a particular agent on why you think you two would be an ideal fit together.
4) A demo reel that helps to show who you are and how you stand out.
5) Referral from an industry professional

What didn’t work for me:

1) Generic package submissions where the agency had no idea why I was seeking representation from them specifically.
2) Mass submission services.
3) A demo reel that revolved around catering to a stereotype and what you think people want to see as oppose to showing your talent and range.

Of course everyone probably has different experiences, but that’s how it has been for me thus far. I’m pretty sure the process is pretty similar in other parts of the world too except you will need to adapt it to where you live.