Letter of Advice
Hi
Just to give you some background so you know that I speak from experience: I am what we call in the business a 'jobbing actor' - one willing to do the smallest job just to keep working in the business we love; who will take a variety of acting-related jobs: training films, children's theatre, student films - often for expenses only or very little money, as well as the high profile paid stuff: TV, films, mainstream theatre etc. I started out professionally with an Equity card when I was 19 and have done this in total now for 40 years, although I had many years out while raising a family.
My fall-back job has been teaching, and this skill has helped enormously in taking drama workshops into schools and communities as I do now. I get about 4 high profile TV/film dramas every year, but most of the work is ground-level, unglamorous stuff. I get more work that most women. Most young women actors find it very difficult to find work. Men get more parts.
If you want to follow a professional acting life there are several things you need to know: the most important is that regular employment is very rare. Most actors work on short-term contracts of, at the most, three months, but usually anything from a day to a week in TV, 4 weeks to 6 weeks theatre. There is no career structure. For most actors it isn't a career, but a series of jobs, that might lead to a breakthrough, but mostly don't. So anyone who thinks about acting as a living needs to have a burning inner desire they cannot ignore, not just that it might be an OK thing to do.
I always advise young people to study or train in another specialism first, so that when acting is slow or non-existent (what we call a lean patch) it is possible to make good money in your fall-back job to enable you to eat and keep paying the bills. It has always been like that - I have known days in my early theatre career (in the 1950s) when I lived on packet soup and bread for days on end! Even now, very few actors earn good money, whatever you might hear in the media. Only the very few get rich.
So, if you are able and want to go to university, do so, but choose a subject that will lead to well/reasonably paid jobs: lawyer, accountant, teacher - some actors originally trained as priests or doctors & get roles playing those sort of characters. My first degree was in sociology, which led to my fall-back job as teacher, but I ended up as a specialist English teacher. If going to university isn't for you, then think of an apprenticeship in a trade - don't just take a job - train: electrician, plumber, plasterer, carpenter: these pay better day rates if you have to temp., which many actors have to do in call-centres which aren't well paid. Save while you work, for your actor training which can be expensive, though there are a few scholarships. Then do acting/theatre training at a nationally accredited drama school - a one-year post graduate course if you have a degree or, otherwise look at a longer course. These are not wasted years. Acting is about life experience and you gather that along the way as you get older and accumulate knowledge about people and the world. Doing jobs outside the 'business' is another way of accumulating skills and knowledge of how people react to various experience - all useful to an actor. Some actors have come through the repertory system and learnt on the job, which is how I trained, but there are few opportunities to do that these days.
In the meanwhile - are you taking GCSE Theatre Studies/Drama at school? It's a useful discipline and a first step.
Is there a local amateur company that you can join? Although the amateur scene is a completely different ballgame, you would get valuable experience in acting.
There are some very good evening and weekend youth theatres in the larger cities, but you need to do some local research to find out if they offer good training, because not all do.
Contact the National Youth Theatre - you'll find them on line. Quite a few pros. have come through via that route. They work in the holidays and tour nationally.
It might also be possible to join a local extras agency - teenagers are often needed locally in TV as extras & walk-ons; and for youngsters is a good way of getting seen, with the possibility of small parts (I wouldn't give the same advice to adult trained actors, being an extra is not a route to being a TV or film actor, but a child actor gets known in the business and if he or she shows talent, they can continue in the business as an adult).
The best way of finding an extras agent who isn't a scam, contact your local area branch of Equity - Google them to find their website. Or check out the actors groups on Facebook.
If you are still determined to be an actor and are not put off by these facts, then good luck to you; but don't say at some time in the future that no-one ever told you!
Best wishes
Margaret Jackman
Shoebox Theatre