“Your Reel Sucks!”

“Can I have a few more copies of your reel?” 

That’s what my acting coach said to me after reviewing my first reel. 

When I came into the industry I knew that I needed a reel, but I didn’t have anything to put one together. 

It wasn’t until about a year later that I finally had a few scenes under my belt and had a friend help me put one together. 

Sound familiar?... 

Of course, I excitedly ran out to my car and grabbed another handful of copies. 

The entire time I was thinking about all of the people he might be giving my reel to and what that would mean for my career. I was envisioning Tarantino and Michael Bay being moved to tears by my masterpiece. 

When I handed my coach the copies, I felt like I had just #MadeIt. 

Here’s what he said… 

“Thanks, the uneven legs on my desk have been driving me nuts and this should do the trick.” 

He then proceeded to even out his desk by sticking my Reel under the legs. 

When he was finished, my acting coach said 

“I’m going to leave those there as a reminder and if you try to remove them, don’t bother coming back to class. Here’s why: your lead in sucks.” 

We then went through my reel together, using one of the spare copies I was still embarrassingly holding as I struggled to decide whether I was angry or crushed. 

“Compare your lead in to mine [referring to the interaction we just had as if it were a scene]. My opening grabbed your attention and made you feel and do something. You actually ran all the way out to your car and back based on my Lead In.” 

As we played my reel, I got the point he was making and it is a mistake that many actors make. I was so focused on making my reel look cool and I had stylized the opening with great title slides and an awesome track. 

Even my coach commended me on the production value. He went on to say: 

“A CD who looks through dozens of reels a day will not sit through that and then the rest of your reel does not matter.” 

See, the Lead In to your reel is what matters most. Use it to grab the viewers attention and force them to view the rest of your reel. 

Open with something offbeat. Think about it this way. 

If you were strolling through the isle at the grocery store, or maybe going for a walk in the park, what would capture your attention, stopping you in your tracks? 

Maybe someone being slapped. One pedestrian pulling a gun on another. Someone screaming “this is the best day ever!” 

Things like this are what force the viewers attention. 

If you see someone being slapped or being held at gunpoint, your brain’s self preservation mechanisms kick in and you subconsciously think “am I next?” 

That forces you to watch for what unfolds next. 

The same is true for a positive note. Some shouting “this is the best day ever!” would trigger your brains gratification senses, forcing to watch what unfolds and see if you can have some of what made that persons day the one ever. 

Perhaps a billionaire philanthropist is strolling through the park throwing wads of cash at everyone. Whatever it is, your brains curiosity will force you to investigate. 

That is how your reel should open. 

Of course, you don’t have to use the specific scenes I just mentioned but you must choose scenes that fill these 3 requirements: 

1. Grab the viewers attention and forces them to watch what happens next 
2. Triggers an emotional or physiological response (loud bangs work great for this) 
3. Leave open ended questions 

Your entire reel should actually contain these 3 ingredients to be powerful enough to help you with bookings. Otherwise, you risk your reel being relegated to the role of furniture leveling device. 

You only have a few seconds to capture the CDs attention so throw your best stuff into those first few seconds. Even though it may be “improper or risky” and acting coaches and your peers would say your crazy for it (that’s a good sign) the most powerful reels open with a loud noise. 

It shocks the viewer out of the mundaneness of the day and forces the brain to switch back on after having gone into “autopilot” during a repetitive task (sorting through dozens of reels). 

Limit this to the Lead In and then again about 3/4s of the way through your reel, when the viewers attention would start wear thin again. 

Another incredible way to force the viewers attention is to leave open ended questions throughout the reel, particularly after the lead in. 

The character in the scene doesn’t have to actually speak in questions, but questions should be triggered in the viewers mind about the character. 

“Did she die, why was it the best day ever, etc?” 

The job of your reel is to force the CD to see you, through any means necessary. There should almost be the feeling of an itch that needs to be scratched, is how Cheryl put it. 

When your reel does its job, the CD will ask the admin personnel to the office to call you in. Before the office actually makes the call, they will do the back end work to see what you’re all about. 

They will scan your social channels to see if there are any liabilities there. 

They will view your IMDb page to see the status of it and gauge your “Castability Index.”

This will happen before they even call you in to read, because there is nothing worse than having to recast a bad apply. 

So as much effort as you put into perfecting your reel, you still have to deal with the casting office and their processes. 99 actors out of 100 do not think of this at all. 

Even with the perfect reel you can still drop the ball in the admin office if your credentials don’t measure up.

A fantastic reel that contains the 3 ingredients mentioned, combined with credentials that match your goals makes you an unbeatable casting candidate. 

While I can’t help you cut the perfect reel, here I can help with the rest that is equally as important.

So what will you use as a Lead In to your reel? How will you sprinkle open ended questions throughout? 

Let me know in the comments below or shoot me an email with questions if you have them. I read every one that comes through because my goal is to… 

See you at the top,
Scott

How To Master The Self Taped Audition

If you haven’t been asked to submit a self taped audition yet Grasshopper, chances are you will be soon enough. 

It’s the way the industry is going. 

Last week, I told you about a new digital wave that is hitting the industry that almost no one saw coming. 

Today we are going to talk about a different digital wave that hit a long time ago but that most actors simply ignored (to their detriment). 

It’s the self taped audition. 

Around the time that YouTube went mainstream, a lot of video contests came around. Fans of shows were being asked to submit their own skits for what would happen on next week’s episode, bands solicited fan made music videos and ran contests, and all kinds of stuff came about. 

That’s when the casting offices realized how they could make the audition process much more efficient by asking actors to do the same. 

That is how the era of self taping came to be. 

With all of its inherent flaws, self taping is not going anywhere and if you are serious about making it in the industry, you have to master the self taped audition. 

There is a formula to this and if you get it right, the sky is the limit. 

Get it wrong, and your natural talent will simply not shine through and your career progress could be incredibly hindered. 

Without further ado, this is how you master the self taped audition… 

The biggest mistake that you can make is to treat the self taped audition as if it were a traditional audition. 

Remember that your performance will be seen through a screen, and it has to explode off of that screen. 

In a traditional audition, your personality and your performance will fill the room. In a self taped audition, you really have to amp things up and over-perform to compensate for this. 

BOOM! There is something that no one else would dare tell you. 

Start with a few warm up rounds in front of the mirror and then tape yourself. The performance you thought was stellar in the mirror, will seem completely flat on screen. 

Do several takes until you get your performance to the level where it jumps out of the screen, grabs the viewers attention, and holds it mercilessly. 

A huge difference between a traditional audition and a self taped one is that, you can typically at least get through the entire piece when you are reading in person. 

Why? 

It’s much more difficult to ask someone to leave the room without finishing, than it is to simply press the next button on a self taped audition. 

So, if you don’t grab the viewers attention form the start, the rest of your tape may never see the light of day. In a traditional audition setting, you have the ability to crescendo. 

Not so with a self tape. 

You have to start strong, hit your crescendo and then finish strong too. 

That is the master self tape formula. 

This may not even matter if your environment is not up to par. 

Be sure that you’re not filming in front of a cluttered room or against a busy backdrop. Always film against a solid color if you can, and always film indoors. 

Follow the slate instructions to a T and rehearse the slate, along with the piece you are reading. 

You will want to use a single continuous shot, and if you don’t rehearse your slate along with the piece you’re reading, then it will throw you off rhythm and you will have a much harder time getting a take that you’re happy with. 

Also, ensure that the shot matches the action in the scene. If you must fall to your knees after being assaulted in the scene, then you want to be sure that the camera will capture your reaction to that. 

If it is a traditional piece, then feel free to either sit or stand and capture from your torso upwards, while keeping at least a couple inches of frame above your head. 

Nothing ruins a self taped audition like bad audio. Unless you’re shooting on a sound stage, you are going to have echo and background noise. 

There are 2 ways you can fix that. 

1. Master audio production and buy fancy software to clean up the audio 
2. Invest $10 or $20 into a Lav mic on Amazon. It will clean up your audio big time, adding to your performance instead of distracting from it [with poor audio] 

Lastly, consider a lighting setup. These are also really inexpensive if you do the research and can greatly add to your performance. You won’t have to counteract dark eye-circle expressions if you have proper lighting. 

3 lights will do the trick. 

Place one directly in front of you and place the other two at about 45 degrees to your left and your right. 

If you don’t want to spring for the shaded lights, then some scoop spotlights with parchment paper will do the trick, while saving you a few bucks. 

I don’t like the self taped audition because it shifts a lot of the burden on to you: the actor. I firmly believe that most of this should rest with the studio that is casting the project. 

However, it does allow you the leeway to have multiple chances to “get it right.” 

Nonetheless, it’s a necessary evil for the long foreseeable future. 

More and more productions are going this route every day, so it’s important that you master this type of audition. 

Remember that, whether it’s a self taped audition or a traditional one, the casting director will do some digging before deciding to take you to the next step in the process. 

Be sure that your industry reputation matches your goals.

This is even more important in a self taped audition when you don’t have a chance to interact with the CD. 

They are making decisions based on what they find out about you.

Look, I expect the union to take some kind of action on this in the next few years… but who can wait that long? 

Even when they do take some action, who knows what that will be. Best case scenario, they would force the casting office to callback a large percentage of self taped actors. That still wouldn’t solve all the problems with this nor would it even cover all of us. 

So, rather than waiting around for something to change, take charge of your career and master the self taped audition process using what I’ve shared with you in this special report. 

If you do this, then your self taped auditions will be stellar. 

Just be sure that your industry reputation reinforces your audition, rather than detract from it. 

See you at the top, 
Scott 

Did You Notice?

Future proves past, or as Shakespeare would say “What is past is prologue.” 

Major industry moves have happened all year Grasshopper. If you haven’t yet noticed how different the industry is from just this time last year, pinch yourself! Look around. What did you miss? 

I’ve attempted to connect the dots on several key issues that affect your acting career, and one of the biggest ones has come to fruition just as I said it would. 

In fact, the splash was even bigger than I thought it would be. Over the last few months, I have received emails from a few of you that paid attention to this and have since made big moves. 

Here’s what’s going on and what it has to do with your career. 

The new major [studio] in town has officially opened for business. 

You know who it is. Chances are, you spend time “at” this studio everyday… 

I’m talking about YouTube. 

Last week they launched what will end up being the nail in the coffin of the industry of yesteryear. 

You don’t even have to sign up for it to see what’s happening. Browse through the landing page and you will see one TV channel after another live streaming their shows on YouTube. 

How many new releases do you see? 

You’ve been able to purchase movies on YouTube for some time, but it used to be months before they would hit YouTube. 

Have you noticed how the digital release dates are now happening before the DVD (or BluRay) releases? 

I’ll get to how this impacts your “castability” in a sec, but it’s important that you understand why things will never be the same again. 

The most important thing to note is that the industry is going fully digital, but don’t make the mistake of thinking that it’s only happening in distribution. 

The changeover is actually being engineered by a music industry executive. He was behind the launch of YouTube Red, which officially introduced original content produced by YouTube itself in the more common broadcast formats. 

Here’s where things get interesting. 

Before this executive joined the ranks of YouTube, he spent 2 years in Silicone Valley, immersed in new technology. He took that technology back to New York and founded a joint venture music label with none other than YouTube’s parent company: Google. 

At his label, what he was able to perfect was the talent scouting process. 

More accurately stated, what he perfected was the ability to take the human element out of searching for talent. They got so good at doing this, that the label was responsible for more hits and for launching more successful acts than anyone in the last decade. 

Here’s why… 

Because they were able to get ahold of talent before they were on anyone else’s radar, they had a giant advantage. Not only that, but they were also able to discover new acts while their “star” was already on the rise. 

They developed technology and algorithms that scan the internet in search of talent. 

The old way of sending out talent scouts to find new acts, bring them in to record a few demo tracks, test market the demo tracks, and then explore signing them to a full recording contract, was long and cumbersome. 

It could take months. Today, that entire process takes days. 

This technology picks up on emerging artists that are generating attention and puts them on a “watch list.” 

If the artist continues to generate positive attention, the system then recommends that artist to the executives, who can act quickly to sign the artist and launch them much faster than ever before. 

What if I told you that this same technology is what was used to produce primary casting decisions for the YouTube Red shows and movies? 

You may have already noticed that the studios don’t really do anything by themselves. Where one goes, they all go. 

This means that you can expect this technology to show up in all of the other studios. The “majors” are playing catch up, but this is already being used in places like Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon’s production house. 

This has big implications for many industry sectors, namely your agent. 

Their role has always been to source opportunities. In a world where the opportunities find you, they will soon be squeezed to a point where many of them will be pushed out of the industry. 

These moves are that serious and have those kinds of effects, that reshape the entire industry landscape. 

It’s a driving factor behind the biggest names, like William Morris Endeavor diversifying and going into other businesses. They saw the writing on the wall and bought The UFC. 

Others are going into the Casino business or shifting to event promotion rather than solely representing talent. 

I’m not saying that you should fire your agent. I only use that point to illustrate the changing landscape. 

Ultimately, agent or no agent, you are responsible for your career. 

Here’s how you can take the wheel and have a huge advantage, while other actors are simply going with the flow as if things are always going to be the same. 

The technology that is being used, scours all corners of the internet in search of new talent. It reads social media signals and processes your follower base, it searches for mentions of you online such as articles written about you, it looks for interviews, projects you’re involved in or have been announced as being involved in, and it of course processes your IMDb STARmeter. 

If you pass the initial scan, you land on the CD’s desk, already matched as a candidate for X role in Z project. 

What gets a little creepy is that they also assign an “interest score” where your interest in the role is predetermined by processing your social media and even your online calendars to determine if you will 1. Be available for the production and 2. To determine if you would object to being in a certain period piece because of family heritage, for example, or if you would likely pass on slapstick, having never expressed an interest in similar productions. 

That’s all a subject for another time though. 

After you land on the CD’s desk, they invite you to read and the rest is history in the making. 

As one of the very few actors in the industry that is now privy to the sweeping change, here’s what you need to do now. 

Get your social media in order. Here’s a quick way to do that.

I can help with that, but you should still be putting real effort into cultivating a platform. 

You also need to expand your presence online. Strategize and come up with a plan to “be seen.” Offer to be a guest on podcasts. You don’t have to appear as an actor and talk about your project, just being you and giving your opinions is enough. 

Start blogging or vlogging, start a Facebook group about anything that interests you. 

Focus on bringing yourself to the public and crawling out of obscurity. Do this and make sure that your professional reputation matches your goals and you’ll be set.

A couple things might happen as you finish reading this. 

You might decide that I’m nuts, click off this page and rejoin the herd at the next audition. 

You might decide that I’m on to something and get to work. If that’s the case, I’m in your corner and rooting for you! 

Or you might think “that’s interesting…” close this page and forget about it and do nothing. 

That’s probably the worst of the choices. 

Even if you decide I’m nuts, at least you weighed the options and came to a conclusion… 

But what if I’m not??? 

What if it all rolled out just as I said it would (and it has)? 

I’ll leave you with this. 

Think about where your career was 1 year ago… 

1 year from now, you will have spent 1 more year on your career. If past is prologue, where will you be?

Hoping to see you at the top, 
Scott 

Getting “The Call”

They say you never forget your first time but the second time is even more memorable. 

Once is a fluke and you kind of get that feeling. Twice, is the start of something! 

So much changes when you get that call, inviting you to read. 

Usually it’s for a project you didn’t even know existed. 

Making this happen for your career is crucial, yet 99 actors out 100 don’t know how to do it. The process is simple, and once you figure it out, you can repeat it over and over again. 

Before we go on, I’m not talking about just any old kind of reading… 

I’m talking about the kind where you are 1 of only 3 or 4 actors considered for the role. 

It’s incredibly powerful because it puts you in the driver’s seat for a change. 

When actors go into an audition, we tend to think and act as if we are in need. Here’s what I mean by that. 

Casting has something (a role). 

You want that role really bad and it shows. As far as relationship dynamics go, that’s not a good thing. You have to be in control and realize that everything doesn’t hang in the balance if you are passed over. 

When CDs ask if we’re ok with the shooting schedule, we blurt out “I’m wide open!” 

That triggers an instant red flag for the CD. They think “why are they not working?” You are more likely to be passed over for a role for being available rather than for having a minor conflict. 

But, when you are called in to read, the dynamics change. You now have something to offer, rather than being in need of a role. 

So when do these situations come about and why would Casting Directors call you in to audition? 

This often happens when a CD goes out looking for the right actor to play the role. Remember, they’re people too and they don’t want to drag out the casting process with dozens of auditions either. 

What’s happening more often is that CDs are front loading the work. They look through online platforms such as IMDb, and even peruse through social media to find the actors that kind of fit what they are looking for. 

When they do this, there are not going to be 30 actors that fit the bill and that’s why you will be one of only a few actors called in to read. 

That’s why your online presence should match your ambition and always be top notch!

So if you want to be the one called in to read, focus your attention on key online channels and put some real strategy behind it. 

Casting Directors want to see your personality shine through. They should come across your IMDb profile and be dying to meet you. 

Even if you’re fairly new to the industry and don’t have many credits, this can be a great equalizer. They will review your resume after their interest has been piqued, so that puts a “weak” resume in a different light too. 

The biggest problem actors have is not talent related. It’s not a lack of experience. 

It’s obscurity. 

If CDs don’t know you, they can’t cast you. 

Get to know them so that you are at the forefront of their mind. Cheryl spoke about this too and how almost no one ever approached her, but when they did she went out of her way to get them a part. 

Once you have built a relationship with a casting director, nurture it! Most of them don’t want to start their next search from scratch and if you prove yourself to be a good actor to work with and keep up the relationship, you will find them picking up the phone to call you in for their next project. 

The first step is to get your materials in order and become visible to the Casting Directors. 

Here’s a quick way to get started on that.

The industry is changing quickly and actors that focus on this are in a good position to see career changes and opportunities like never before. 

It’s also easier than ever to be seen and get on the CDs radar because of this.

So what will you do next grasshopper? Let me know in the comments below or shoot me an email. 

I read and respond to every one that comes through. 

See you at the top, 
Scott 

What Casting Directors Want From You: The Cheryl Sequel

My inbox has been completely flooded over the last week with tons of emails about my sit down with Cheryl. 

I was planning an extended series, down the road, because she revealed so much info. In light of your overwhelming requests, I decided to do a sequel quite a bit sooner than planned. 

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been an avid note taker. While sitting down with Cheryl for about an hour and a half, I filled an entire notebook. 

There’s so much to sort through, that I haven’t even reviewed everything but I wanted to bring you what I thought was most important. 

See, Cheryl revealed one priceless piece of information after another, so it was incredibly difficult to keep up. 

Here is what she said about what Casting Directors want to see from you right now… 

“Sometimes, this town sucks! It’s like almost everyone is projecting something. I saw a Ralph’s store manager [wearing the uniform and name tag] putting $10 of gas in a new model 7 series BMW. Why is that? 

Obviously he was trying to impress someone but who cares? Who does he think he’s fooling and why didn’t he at least remove the name tag? You get this better than anyone I know [speaking to me]. At the end of the day, the industry is about people. 

If you’re a diva, word gets around and the bookings will stop. If you work hard, you can leapfrog people that are more talented than you…” 

This sort of philosophical rant went on for a few minutes, before Cheryl returned to make the point I was waiting for on pins and needles. 

She said “Casting Directors, Producers, Actors are all people, and people are driven by status. I don’t want to cast an actor that fits the mold of what they are supposed to be. I want to cast someone that I can point to and say I found her. I want to cast someone that can play the role, yes, but I am mainly looking for the X factor in someone. 

I was one of the first people to have Anne Hathaway read. X factor like nobody’s business.” 

Cheryl went on to describe that X factor in a few different ways but it mainly came down to “the inability to look away.” 

That begs the question…how do you develop that X factor? 

It’s not something that you’re born with, you can absolutely develop it with practice. 

People go about this in several different ways: think Lady Gaga in her early days. 

Compare that to Elon Musk, who also captivates and holds your attention but for a different reason. One is a train wreck and not the route that makes sense in an audition environment. 

The reason that Elon Musk can grab your attention is that you can feel his confidence. It’s palpable. 

Moreover, it’s like he is listening to you even in a room with a thousand other people. You get the feeling that if you were having a one on one conversation, he would hang on your every word. 

When actors go into an audition, they tend to portray the exact opposite of that. Their nerves are showing, they fumble with their sleeves or fiddle with their hair out of obvious anxiety. They don’t even hold eye contact with the Casting Director. 

These are all things that break rapport and give off the impression that you are nervous because you have something to lose. 

So if you really want to nail the audition, you have to remove the risk of losing something. 

If everything is dependent on the outcome of your next audition you will have a problem with the X factor. 

You need to make sure that your schedule is jam packed with so many auditions, that not a single one of them can make you or break you. 

Of course, Cheryl had something to say about that… 

“For the last 11 or 12 years it’s happened to me about once a month. I love to watch people, so if you want to find me, I’m usually out on a patio somewhere. Without fail, someone recognizes me and approaches me. 

They are usually incredibly polite people, and they are very smart. Who in the world recognizes a Casting Director? Not just anyone! If someone recognizes me, I know that they are serious about acting. 

It doesn’t make much sense because it should happen every day. If CDs hold the keys to your future in the industry, those are the people you should get to know. 

Research them, stalk them even. After a while, most of us will turn around and ask who you are why in the world we see you everywhere. We love people, remember?” 

She went on to say “the ones that approach me, I will always find something for. If I don’t have anything, I know someone I can force them onto. It’s not flattery or my ego that does that. It’s the person’s obvious work ethic to take the time and find out about who it is that is making the decisions about their future.” 

Here’s a tough question… 

How many Casting Directors have you looked into? They’re not hiding. They’re not even hard to get a hold of. You can pick up the phone and reach a good number of them, if you just try. I know from first hand experience. 

You first have to get on their radar, have them waiting in anticipation to meet you, and then have the X factor when you meet them, and you’re set. 

If that seems like a lot to do, you’re only psyching yourself out. 

The easiest way to make 2 of the 3 happen is here.

Cheryl mentioned it multiple times and I went into detail about it in last week’s release. “IMDb is the industry’s measure of credibility…” 

She mentioned how she and her colleagues spend a ton of time researching actors on IDMb and often make casting decisions based on what they find. 

If you’ve never had someone contact you through IMDb and invite you to read, it’s because you’re not using IDMb to it’s full potential. Here’s how to fix that quickly.

For many of you, IMDb is just something that is. It’s there, it does what it does. End of story. 

For others, it’s the engine that drives their career. Will it be what gets you a golden statue? 

Not likely. 

Will it open the doors that send you down that path? 

Stop speculating and find out instead.

See you at the top, 
Scott 

What Casting Director’s Want From You

Do you gamble Grasshopper? What if you could go to the casino and have the dealer tell you exactly which cards to play to beat the house? 

Would you do it then? 

With that kind of insider info, it wouldn’t really be a gamble anymore. 

A few days ago, I sat down with someone who has this kind of access to the industry and she is here to tell us which cards to play. 

Something that not a lot of actors realize is that the industry is changing right before our eyes. It is an incredible time to be an actor. For the first time ever there is a shortage of talent available! 

If that comes as a shock to you, then this just might be the most important thing you read all year, if not ever. 

If you are going on auditions and find yourself in a room of 50 people and think that what I just stated can’t possibly be true, that doesn’t mean it’s not true…it’s simply not true for you. 

Here’s what I mean. 

There will always be thousands more actors than there are roles available, but the shortage of talent that exists right now is in the type of actors needed. 

Stick with me for a minute. 

When I spoke with Cheryl, a world renowned and highly respected Casting Director with several blockbusters under her belt, this is exactly what she shared with me. 

“I see actors everyday that have no clue what we [CDs] really want. They just go out and audition for roles and get new agents every now and then and never stop to think about who it is that holds the key to their future…It’s the people they are reading for.” 

I knew where she was going, but her expertise is so incredible that she was able to explain it better than I ever could. 

She went on to say “all these actors try to leap frog us trying to get ahead. That is like trying to get to the second floor of a building by jumping. Why not take the stairs? We are the staircase and until actors realize that, they will keep wondering why it is that they are not getting ahead.” 

We’ll come back to that in a moment. First, ask yourself how you are trying to get in front of Casting Directors and how you are behaving when you do get in front of them. 

Some actors have been in the industry for a decade and have never auditioned for a CD. Most of the time, you are reading for an assistant. What do you do then? 

Here’s what Cheryl had to say about that.

“I’m much too busy to sit and watch dozens of actors read. I almost always have someone else sort through everyone and call me in only when it’s worth it. However, I do review everyone’s headshot and resume before they come in and I pick only a couple that I do not want to miss. 

Truthfully, anyone can force me to cancel whatever it is I am doing and watch them read…” 

Grasshopper if you are not doing this, then your career will stay in a perpetual state of limbo. 

Go out and try this, immediately after you read this release and you will get confirmation of what Cheryl is about to say. 

Go to the grocery store, or the mall at a time when it’s pretty busy. Stare at the ceiling for about a minute. Don’t say anything to anyone, don’t point, just stare. 

As people notice you, where do you think their eyes will go? 

Concerted attention begets attention so they will start to look where you are looking too. 

This is how you force a Casting Director to attend your audition and pay attention to you. 

In Cheryl’s words “If someone has a buzz around them, I can’t help but see what the hell is so interesting about them. If I see someone with a big YouTube channel or big social media then something in me forces me into the room to see what the big deal is. Not enough people put this on their resumes and I do not understand that. Sometimes I don’t even want to go, but I can’t help myself when I see this.” 

How many times have you been laying in bed at night, staring at the ceiling thinking “if I could just get in the room with this person or if I could just have that person watch my reel?… 

“When I see the numbers I always poke around their pages and see what these people are all about. I’m a people person, I love people and so do the other Casting Directors. Which means that we like actors with dimension and personality. I want to cast someone that I can have dinner with and talk about their grandparent’s farm where they spent summers as a kid, or about the time they crossed over into Rosarito in high school and woke up terrified in a Mexican jail…” 

So don’t be afraid to show who you really are. Peel the onion and tell your story. Here’s how to jumpstart that process.

Here’s what she had to say about IMDb. 

“Only pay attention to it if you care about your career and want to get to the next level. Every casting team scans IMDb as part of the culling process when we get submissions. It is time consuming for us to do it, but there is a very clear correlation between actors that have a good ranking and the ones that we end up casting. IMDb does not tell us whether you are a good actor or not but it does give some insight as to whether you have that X factor we’re looking for.” 

There is so much more that Cheryl and I talked about and I will doing a full series on this down the road. For now I wanted to bring you the most important parts because they are things that you can do right now to force the industry to give you the attention you deserve.

So what will you do next?

Let me know in the comments below or shoot me an email. I read and respond to every one that comes through. 

Whatever you decide to do, don’t leave it for later. Studies show that if you leave something for later, you are 7X LESS LIKELY to do anything about it and just continue down the same path. 

It doesn’t even have to be a big thing, just take an action that moves you in the direction of what it is that you want to attain. 

Here’s something you can do in less than 2 minutes.

It doesn’t have to be that, just do something because my goal for you is to… 

See you at the top, 
Scott

2 Things That Drive Actors Crazy and What To Do About It

Have you ever seen the movie Gladiator? 

You are Russell Crowe and the games are the industry. 

Who else in their right mind would choose to go into a profession, where the longer you work at it the more likely you are to be chewed up and hung out to dry? 

Actors are special people Grasshopper. I admire the unique qualities it takes to be an actor. 

What really shines through is the passion it requires. 

This passion can be somewhat of a double edged sword. It keeps us pushing through after tough days and it also clouds our judgement at times. 

Through my time in the industry, I’ve met tons of actors and I have gotten to know many of them very well. 

If you pay attention to what they say, you start to pick up on the patterns very quickly. They’ll say things like, my agent doesn’t send me out very often. My boss won’t let me off work so I have missed a lot of auditions. The CD said they wanted someone with more experience. I haven’t been able to book as much work, since I joined the union… 

Those are what I call complaints and actors talk about them in a breezy tone. 

However, because I truly love people and love hearing their stories, I’m the kind of person that asks questions like “why have you only booked one job this year?” 

I ask from a position of pure curiosity and I’m genuinely interested, so they respond. 

This is usually when things go from complaint to contempt. 

There are 2 things that drive actors crazy, like nothing else. It shouldn’t come as a surprise but the thing that drives them crazy most of all is being passed over for a role when they know that they are better than the actor that ended up being cast. 

Unfortunately, the industry doesn’t run on talent alone. There are a host of other factors that CDs consider when making casting decisions. 

More on that in a bit. 

The second thing that drives actors crazy is boredom. By nature, creatives are the type of people that cannot sit still so if we are idle in our careers it’s a pretty horrible feeling. 

Sometimes actors will have months of downtime in between jobs 

When I ask people what they do with all that downtime, I typically get an answer that is somewhere along the lines of “working on my plan B.” 

To be fair, less than a handful of actors have ever used those exact words. It’s usually a veiled answer such as “I’m working on launching my fitness business, I’ve spent more time volunteering lately…” 

Here’s how these 2 things will impact your career. 

Both of them shift the balance of power in an audition setting. 

Remember, Boost My Star is the only place you can go to discover the side of the industry that no one else will dare to talk about. 

So, let’s get real. 

When you are auditioning for a role. You want something from the Casting Director, so they have the upper hand in every way possible unless you know what you’re doing. More on that in a second. 

Some actors, get this part but that’s where the thought process stops. You have to put yourself in the Casting Director’s shoes and think of who they want something from. What are their responsibilities, that they don’t share with anyone else.? 

When you can uncover the CDs true desires, you can then shift the balance of power and put yourself in control. 

When you do this, everything changes. 

You no longer go into an audition, with a need. You go in with something to offer and if the CD doesn’t take you up on that offer, that’s ok. Someone else will. 

Instead of working on other stuff during your downtime you have to work on marketing yourself to the industry so that you can fill up calendar and get rid of that downtime. Here’s a quick fix for that.

See, nobody wants to hire an actor that isn’t working but they will trip over each other to hire someone that is booked solid. They will even rearrange production schedules to accommodate you, if they want you bad enough. 

Most actors can’t even begin to wrap their mind around that, but it happens every day and it’s not even just the A listers that do this. 

I’ve seen no name bit players, have production schedules rearranged for them. It happens when you present yourself properly and have something to offer in exchange. 

That something should be an X factor that draws an audience. 

Something that almost nobody realizes is that when a film underperforms, the first thing that the studio looks at is the cast list and they start to ask questions like “Maybe we should have cast someone else in the lead, maybe the rapport wasn’t strong enough between the actors, maybe nobody wanted to see this actor in the role…” 

Is that fair to the CD? That’s a topic for another time but that’s how the industry works. 

So when you are auditioning, the CDs chief role is not to assess whether or not you can perform the part. They are considering whether or not you can draw an audience. 

That’s what you need to bring to the table in an audition setting. 

When you were passed over for a role that you could have knocked out of the park, the actor that ended up being cast was in a better position to attract an audience to the production. 

It’s easy to gain an audience, when you already have some traction. Here’s how I can help with that.

The bottom line is that if you truly want to be a successful actor with a full calendar, then you need to go all in on this. Take a proactive approach to marketing yourself to the industry and creating demand for yourself. 

Lastly, make sure that your resume matches your desire to succeed. I don’t mean the resume that is stapled to the back of your headshot. 

IMDb is the “resume” of choice for Casting Directors and even a phenomenal actor with a horrible STARmeter, is likely to be passed over for someone more established. 

Be sure that you are giving this factor the attention it needs. Here’s how.

So what will you do to shift the balance of power in your favor Grasshopper? Let me know in the comments below or shoot me an email. I read every one that comes through and I will help in any way I can. 

After all, my goal is to: 

See you at the top, 
Scott 

Let’s talk about Ent y once and for all

There is so much hearsay in the industry. Honestly, it’s gotten out of control, but that’s the nature of the biz. 

The question is not why this happens. Rather, the question is why it matters. 

There’s something that I see almost every actor doing and part of my mission is to keep you from doing this too, because it’s a big mistake that will stall your career or worse. 

So, I hate that I have to cover this but I feel that it’s important to. 

Without further ado, let’s pull back the curtain and talk about Ent y… 

Yes, I misspelled that on purpose and you’ll see why in a moment. 

In case you’re not familiar with this topic just do a quick Google search for that word without the spacing. 

He’s been a subject of much fascination for people in the industry and for onlookers for over a decade. If you are familiar with it, you have probably found yourself attempting to decode the “blind items” on more than several occasions. 

It wasn’t long ago that the site shifted from a single person to include a collective of anonymous posters. 

Even though we couldn’t be more different, you go there for entertainment, you come here to find out how to become a successful actor.

Recently, I have seen a series of emails come through about this. They come frequently and they all want to know the same thing. They typically beat around the bush for a couple sentences and then virtually blurt out “are you one of Ent y???” 

As if the senders have been sitting on the couch, phone in hand feverishly refreshing their inbox waiting for a reply, they respond within seconds after I click send with my answer. 

Their follow up question is either “I know you have to HAVE to say that 😉 (wink emoji)” or “if it’s not you, do you know who it is???” 

See, the industry is quite fascinated by the mystery that surrounds this individual or individuals ; ) because it’s the exact opposite of everything else in this business. 

Everyone else is out to be seen everywhere they can be and wants to attract as much as possible. So, someone being “behind the curtain” is incredibly interesting. 

There’s an incredible point here that I want to stress. 

How is it that this faceless individual who chooses to remain anonymous, attracts exponentially more attention than the masses of actors who are out to do the opposite and are actively trying to attract that attention? 

What can you learn from that and emulate to benefit your career? 

How do you stand out in a sea of other people also trying to stand out? 

The answer is not to simply scream louder than the other noise. It’s to communicate more strategically. 

Here’s what I mean by that. 

Let’s look at Ent y for example. It could have gone one of two ways. He could have attempted to scream louder than the other tabloid type of blogs. However, would that really be effective? It would be a huge uphill battle and that’s not very different than the battle that you are waging too. 

He could have tried to blend into the noise and write just like everyone else, seeking attention by implicating big names. Instead, he used intrigue. The opposite. 

This led to dedicated readers who spread the word like wildfire without much effort on Ent y’s part. 

What if you did the same. 

I see so many actors that emulate the big social media names in order to grow their following. You might find yourself doing the same thing accidentally. 

If you find yourself snapping a selfie waiting for an Uber, you’re not going to get anywhere. 

On the other hand, I saw one of our members blow up after posting while he was at Coachella. A few of his Tweets were even picked up and published by mainstream outlets. 

He wasn’t posting with a beer in the middle of the crowd with a caption that said “Coachella baby!” 

No, there’s no substance there! 

Instead he tapped into the conversation that everyone there was having, put it online and that collective conversation then went viral. 

He didn’t even tell me about this, I stumbled on it by chance. 

Then, everyone started to get curious about him and the clicks to his reel, his other social profiles, and his website went through the roof. 

It was interesting for people to see that he was an actor, but a real person too. 

That intrigue was legitimized when they looked through his IMDb page and found it to be in good standing.

This was made easier because he already had some legitimacy going for him, because he has been a subscriber of ours for a while. Remember that the battle to go from 0 to 1,000 followers is much harder than going from 1,000 to 100,000. 

Here’s a quick way to do that.

So grasshopper, how are you going about things? How can you go against the grain and still accomplish your goals? 

Let me know in the comments below or shoot me an email. I still read and respond to every one that comes through and I’m always happy to help however I can. 

See you at the top, 
Scott