“So when are we going to be seeing you in Coronation Street
then?”
“Why don’t you just get yourself a better agent?”
“You know, you could always just do acting as a hobby and
get a proper job instead?”
Chances are, especially if you’re a relatively new actor or
seeing family or friends who haven’t quite learnt the etiquette yet, you’ve
fielded at least one of those questions over the last week or so. In an ideal
world, we’ll have all had a wonderful year and will have responses that will
stop the asker in their tracks and cause them to retreat back into their eye-watering
helping of Aunt Judy’s ‘Boozier Than Oliver Reed’ trifle. However, chances are,
you’ll mumble something about the industry being really tough at the moment and
try not to get too upset over the fact that your niece’s role in the nativity
is a bigger role than you’ve had in years.
But it’s fine, right? You can just sign off 2014 as ‘one of
those years.’ Sure, you didn’t land that TV role you were hoping for and it’s
been yet another year that the National failed to acknowledge your existence,
but, hey, your pyjama draw has never looked so neat and you can now say with
confidence that you’ve tried every single flavour of Walkers crisps. Bet
Cumberbatch can’t boast such things.
The problem with the cheesy, porty No Man’s Land of Christmas
and New Year is that while the rest of the world is marvelling at the novelty
of getting up at 10am and being able to start on the gin at lunch, you’re
waiting for everything to get back to normal again. Don’t tell anyone but, when
you’re self-employed, lie-ins and gin can happen pretty much any day of the
year PLUS you’ve got a chance of getting work. But add the festive period into
the mix and all you get is an empty diary, people wondering what day it is and
constantly being asked “Why don’t you just do panto?”
Basically, the rest of the world becomes self-employed. And
if there wasn’t endless cheese, booze and every food stuff now wrapped in
pastry, it’d be horrible.
So, let’s look to 2015. Everyone is heading back to work now
and although you can’t get up watch an animated film on BBC1 with your
breakfast every morning, you can start looking at your career again.
Maybe you’ve made resolutions. Maybe you’ve decided enough
is enough when it comes to unpaid work. Maybe you’re finally going to get new
headshots. Maybe you’re going to stop lying on your CV.
Whatever your resolution is, or even if you don’t like
making them, I do hope that this year you promise not to be too hard on
yourself. Obviously, don’t be so easy on yourself that you manage to blitz all
6 series of RuPaul’s Drag Race in 2 days but, also, don’t be so hard on
yourself that you beat yourself up daily for not being Tom Hardy.
This job is appalling at times and it’s easy to beat
yourself up over the fact that you’re not getting any work. It will feel like
that one person you went to drama school with is practically everywhere while
the only person who recognises you is the postman who knows you’ll be in
everyday to sign for your neighbours’ deliveries. Yes, you’re more acquainted
with your pyjamas than you are your agent and the only lines you’ve learnt
recently are the ones you recite when someone asks whether you’re working on
anything at the moment, but you’re still brill. Really brill in fact. Because
if you can keep working hard and keeping hold of that dream that got you
through school and still puts a little skip in your step despite constant
rejection then you are definitely brill.
So go forth, my actors. Wear your pyjamas with pride, keep
that dream alive and don’t let anyone make you feel bad about anything; not
even drinking wine at 2pm a Wednesday for no other reason than there was a
bottle in the house and you want to congratulate yourself for finally changing
that lightbulb in the hallway. And if you do end up blitzing RuPaul’s Drag Race
so hard that you end up saying “Halleloo” to everything, you’re still brill.
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