If you tune into the awards shows like everyone else, you could be missing out on something big!

Sure, the glitz and glamour are fun and so is the anticipation of waiting to see if your favorites will be giving acceptance speeches, but the awards can also give you some incredibly valuable industry information, if you know what you are looking for.

It’s a chance for you, as an actor, to see what the industry is responding to.

If you actually pay attention to why the winners won and why the nominees were nominated, you can do the same to build your own acting career.

Here’s how...

Start by paying attention to every category, not just the categories for actors. Everything from Cinematography to Best Picture can help you recognize trends.

For example, did any projects sweep the awards and nominations or were they spread out pretty well among a large number of projects?

Who was involved in the projects that got the most attention?
What was it about those projects that the industry admired? Dig deep into the reasons for this.

If it was a great story that was well told, what made it a great, well told story? Even a terrific screenplay won’t be nominated, if the casting and everything else on the production itself falls short.

A lot of factors come together to make a project award worthy, and what you want to do is pick the project apart and find out what made the biggest impact.

For example, a good screenplay can become an incredible and award worthy story with the right actors attached.

You don’t only want to look at the actors. You should also look at the directors involved in the projects.

Study their other work and find out what else they were involved in, and why they chose to work on those projects.

You also want to see the actors they have worked with in the past.

Do you see any patterns in the actors they choose to work with? Those patterns are not always obvious, so you should also look into the actor’s backgrounds.

Here’s what I mean...

When you look into the actor’s backgrounds you want to find out things like what kind of training they have.

You want to know what other projects the actors have been involved in and why.

By looking at the big picture you can also find out if this director prefers to work with highly experienced actors or if they like to work with actors that are fairly new to the industry.

Every director has their preferences and so does every Casting Director. When you get to know their preferences, you can give them exactly what they are looking for.

The reason you want to find this out about the award winners, is that it will give you an insight into what the trend currently is. Things change over time. For a few awards seasons, everyone was rooting for the newcomers.

It meant that having a limited resume could be an advantage. If you were following awards season closely, in the way we’ve been talking about, you could have adapted the way you approached things.

In that case, emphasizing your training more than your past work might actually give you an advantage.
But, if the opposite is true and the more experienced and “familiar” actors tend to be the ones sweeping the awards, you could be putting yourself at a disadvantage by highlighting your training and downplaying your previous work.

While you should do this every awards season, don’t stop there. Find out as much as you can about the people you will be auditioning with and study their work as much as possible.

It could make a huge difference, when you are prepared and you can give CDs and industry decision makers exactly what they are looking for.

Of course, this is only helpful if you can get in the room. If you are having trouble with getting enough auditions, it could be that you need to be more visible to the industry. Here’s a great place to start.

Delivering a great performance on set is half the battle. If you want to be a professional actor, you also have to create demand for yourself. We’ll be talking more about that over the coming weeks but you can get started on something now.

You can get started on making sure that your industry reputation is in tip top shape because that’s how you will get the industry’s attention.

That’s a big part of what will impact your career.

You have to get the industry’s attention so they can invite you to read. If you have a great industry reputation and appear to be a great fit for the role, why wouldn’t you be asked to read for it?

When that happens, things change quickly.

Getting the industry’s attention can happen by having an impressive body of work to point to that shows them you are a talented actor. That happens over time, but it can also happen when you have a great industry reputation . Here’s how I can help with that part.

Don’t let this delayed awards season go to waste. Do the research that we talked about today. You will be surprised at some of what you’ll learn about the actors you look up to.

Remember, I’m also only a comment or an email away so get in touch, even if you just want to bounce ideas. I’ll always help however I can, because I truly want to...

See you at the top,
Scott