Headshots

Headshots. It’s no surprise that their name also resembles what actors often long for when approaching getting them done.

Having a lovely photograph of you sounds great. And it is. It’s brilliant for Facebook photos, online dating profiles and giving a framed copy to your mum so her living room starts to look like it’s in a soap opera. But getting headshots done can be more of a ballache than landing, legs akimbo, on a pummel horse.

First off, you have to choose your photographer. And there are hundreds of them out there. HUNDREDS. So, the first step is hours of trawling through headshot photographers’ websites until you get to a point where you’re not sure where the constant steely stares down the camera end and your paranoia that someone’s watching you begins.

The first trap when choosing a photographer is going for someone who has taken a photo of someone you quite fancy looking like. However amazing a photographer is, they’re sadly never going to make me look like Gemma Arterton. And the same goes for the amount of famous people they’ve snapped. Just because they’ve taken headshots of Olivia Colman, Benedict Cumberbatch and Sheridan Smith, that unfortunately doesn’t mean that all the BBC roles will soon be yours. It should, but it doesn't. 

I personally chose the photographer I eventually went with because his photos looked different. For hours I’d seen the same head tilt, identical cascades of beautifully styled hair and endless dreamy yet intense stares. And if that’s your look then great. I’m not saying they’re wrong but you have to be realistic about what’s likely to work for you. I’m never going to be glamorous and, as lovely as my hair is, it looks beautiful for all of 3 minutes and then becomes full of crisp crumbs and twigs. Yes, you want your headshot to get people’s attention but you don’t also want to find yourself being charged with fraud.

So, you’ve chosen your photographer and you’ve picked a date. I had a month between contacting my photographer and the shoot. This was just enough time to panic about the state of my skin, the layer of cake obscuring my cheekbones and my unruly eyebrows. For the first couple of days, I was so good. Like a reverse Jesus, I turned wine into water and my beloved McCoys were sent away on a sabbatical. Then, of course, I went up to Edinburgh for a week and wonderful plans were replaced with late nights, beer and deep-fried good intentions. So what should’ve been a month of healthy living turned into a few hastily snatched days of OK sleep and hoping for a miracle while desperately fixating on the BBC Weather App.

The day of the photos arrived and I skipped off happy that my face hadn’t errupted and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I met my photographer, we had a lovely chat over a cup of tea for a good hour and then it was time for photos. I was beautifully relaxed and, weirdly, quite looking forward to the session. But then, a phenomenon that all actors experience happened and everything tensed up as soon as the camera appears. Smiles suddenly become forced, eyes forget what to do and breathing stops completely. It’s a weird sensation and one you have very little control over, like suddenly realising how drunk you are after a glorious afternoon of pints in the sunshine.

But the session was brilliant. I quickly relaxed and the part of my job that I previously hated was suddenly becoming fun. We live in a world where you can now look at photos as the session goes along so you can soon become aware of the weird movement that your right eyebrow does or just how different you look when your hair is pulled back. You also very quickly see how important it is to have a photographer that keeps you present and alert because, as soon as that focus goes, you become dead behind the eyes and look more like you’re queuing for the dole rather than trying to steal Tom Hardy’s career.

And then it’s all over and you have the wait for the contact sheet. Lots of tiny little photos for you to agonise over and marvel at the many ridiculous faces you weren’t even aware you could create. Hours will then be spent choosing between photos, many of which are almost identical. Do your eyes look brighter in that one or that one where your smile is ever so slightly raised? Does your smile look more real in that one or the one where your hair looks a bit better? And then, of course, you make your decision, ask someone else for their opinion, they choose entirely different ones and then you’re back at square one. The battle of choosing betweent the ones where you look your best and the ones that actually look like you goes on long into the night.

Finally you make your decision and you let your photographer know so they can add tiny little lies to your photos. A wisp of hair taken out here, a rogue spot taken out there. Ideally they won’t take out the lines and imperfections that you’ve learnt to live with, those little things that make you YOU, and it won’t be long before you have a gorgeous set of new photos that you can put up on Facebook, add to your dating profile and give to your mum so she can pretend she’s in EastEnders.

(For anyone wondering, I had my most recent photos done with the excellent Jon Holloway. Personally I think his photos are astounding and for the first time ever, I had a genuinely difficult decision to make when choosing my main photos as I was pleased with so many of them. If you’re really not a fan of having photos taken and want something a little different, I hightly recommend him.)

The Fear

The Fear.

As an actor, you have to learn to live with The Fear. In fact, you have to be so comfortable with The Fear that you can let it live in your house, not let it wake you up every single night and be totally understanding that it seems to have eaten all your food, spent all your money and makes you regret choosing Drama instead of Maths.

Yes, The Fear is the seemingly unending absence of work in your life. It’s the realisation that if you had a pound for every time that you worried that you’d never work again then you’d never need to work again. 

The Fear is currently trying to move into my house.

It’s amazing what you can do to try and put off The Fear and hope it lodges with someone else instead. I recently lost my resting job and The Fear booked its ticket here but I’m not ready for it just yet. First, I went up to Edinburgh for a week. I was doing one ten minute Casting Call Woe set while up there so, y’know, totally still working. Now, I’m back and next week I'm getting new head shots done and have one day's acting work booked in. That's the only acting work I currently have booked in for the rest of my life and that's quite a terrifying prospect. When I get up at 10:30am, I can feel The Fear hovering at the end of the street, waiting for its moment.

For the first time in quite some time, I’m totally unemployed. No acting work, no resting work. My savings account is now like the work colleague who finds themself on the same train home as you, desperately trying to avoid contact so it can be left alone to enjoy its book.  You know they don’t want to speak but you’ve made so much eye contact that, despite yourself, you’re clambering over people’s bags to go and bother it.

The fear is a dangerous thing. It makes you doubt yourself and forces you to look at your empty diary until you start putting in the birthdays of long-forgotten school mates just to have something instead of endless blank pages. The fear will happily force you into a call centre and will tell you that a break from acting is fine. TOTALLY FINE. It’ll drag you from the thing you love and do all it can to stop you looking back. Just keep looking forward and focus on how nice it is to be able to afford to buy your friends a drink for once.

I know The Fear means I should just tie myself to the temporary jobs' section on Reed and focus on how I can make a mean Excel spreadsheet and scan a document within an inch of its life. But I’m not. Instead I’m pinning my hopes on my upcoming new headshots fooling everyone into thinking I’m Benedict Cumberbatch and I'm tirelessly trawling through casting websites trying to find work. Actual work. And for those of you who follow my Casting Call Woe Tumblr, you’ll know how difficult that is. Pinning hopes on casting sites is about as safe as getting up on a rickety chair in the opening scene of Casualty. It means that every morning you get up, full of hope, and by lunchtime those hopes have been dashed due to you not being beautiful enough/white enough/naked enough/male enough. But you keep going because, well, that's what being an actor is. 

So, if you see The Fear while you're out and about, let it know that I'm making its bed up and getting in its favourite brand of tea, but I'm not ready for it just yet. Not quite yet. 

No pay but...

It’s been a bleak few months for actors and their earnings. Casting website, CastingCallPro, recently surveyed its members and of the 1,700 that responded, a whopping 46% said they earned less than £1,000 a year from acting work. Equity ran a similar survey and found that around half of their members were earning less than £5,000 a year from professional work. As an actor who very much falls within that category and is extremely reliant on ‘resting’ work, it makes for grim reading.

I could write a whole blog on the problem but sometimes that’s not what we need. So, in an attempt to help cheer us penniless thesps up a bit, here’s a look at some of the ridiculous payment terms I’ve seen in genuine casting calls, most of which come from sites that require you to be a paying member to apply…

Salary: A lovely time.

I can’t afford to pay anyone. I will, however, buy you a Subway sandwich.

Since it’s low budget, I can’t pay you. I can however bribe you with Instagram worthy food.

Payment: petrol voucher.

We can’t provide any expenses or refreshments but the venue has an awesome menu.

No pay but I will write a blog post about you.

No pay but I’ll put the completed film on VHS cassette for you.

No pay but, for this project, name your sandwich because it’s on me.

No pay but you will receive compliments.

Unpaid but you’ll get to take home a small bag of coffee.

Unpaid but you will get a raffle ticket.

You will be paid in love, glory and possibly a pizza of your choice.

Payment: kiss on the cheek.

And a genuinely wonderful one…

Payment: bottle of gin, travel card, £20.  

All taken from my Tumblr, castingcallwoe.tumblr.com

Been In Anything I Might've Seen?

“Oh, you’re an actor? Been in anything I might’ve seen?”

You know your career is in dire need of help when it reflects poorly on the person asking if they have. Like many actors, it would be highly unlikely that you’d have clapped eyes on my brief offerings to the actor gods (Dench & Hurt.) In fact, unless you're one of the following people...

• A lover of Theatre in Eduction

• The person behind the fact that all three adverts I’ve appeared in have never made it to air

• Have a knack for stumbling upon poorly advertised plays

• My mum

…then I’ll never have been in anything you might’ve seen.

Never ask this question. Firstly, it makes the actor question their own dubious career and what if we have been in something you might’ve seen? Was our performance so unmemorable that you need to ask us? Are you really going to put us in the position where we have to meekly remind you that we were once in Channel 5’s Family Affairs? Really? Is that how you get your kicks?

AND WHY ARE YOU PRESUMING THAT ALL ACTORS KNOW WHAT YOU WATCH? DO YOU THINK WE HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO WITH OUR DAYS THAN PEER THROUGH YOUR CURTAINS AND KEEP TABS ON YOUR VIEWING HABITS?

Sorry. 

And you should really stop watching Come Dine With Me and, please, clean your net curtains.

Basically, all you’re asking with that question is “Have you ever been on telly?” And I dread that question. Because I haven’t. In 8 years as an actor, I’ve had one TV casting (Hollyoaks. I didn’t get it but I did get to see the Grange Hill building so, y’know, those 3 years at drama school definitely paid off.) I can’t tell people things that might impress them when they ask me about my career. Of course, we don’t do this job to impress others (well, we do) but it’s hard to feel upbeat about your job when you watch someone’s interest physically get up and leave as you tell them about the time you played a stag in front of 8 people. And of course, a TV career doesn’t mean that you’ve made it, but in party-chat currency, it’s pretty damn useful.

Brilliant things are being done to ensure that more actors get at least a slight chance to be seen outside the trusty comfort of friends and family. The Act for Change Project that's asking for greater diversity on our screens and the calls for the BBC to stop going to the same agents time and time again to cast their shows are working hard to open up the TV industry to those who aren’t white or privately educated.

But there’s still a huge gap which was proved today by two stories currently in the news: one listing the top 10 earning actors (Robert Downey Jr made about £44m last year) and the other about Sir Ian McKellen calling for actors to earn a living wage (£8.80 an hour which would allow actors to earn £18k should they be lucky enough to work full time.) Most actors currently find themselves earning way below a living or even a minimum wage and are more reliant on their temp agency than their acting one. 

The main argument is that there are just too many actors but it would be easier to tell how many we need to get rid of ask politely to try a new career if the acting work and wealth were spread out even just a little bit. If the actors we see in EVERYTHING (I'm not naming names but I'm looking at you, Cumberbatch) donated just one job a year to previously unknown actors then imagine that. A few more actors might be saved for that special wince that's reserved for CVs and bank accounts and they would no longer dread being spoken to at parties. 

So, next time you meet an actor and go to ask that question, think about what you’re really asking them and just offer to buy them a drink instead.

The 10 Commandments for Being a Bloody Decent Actor

1. Thou shalt not snap when someone asks whether you’ve been in EastEnders. They're just not sure what else to ask someone who has decided to be a tree professionally. 

2. Thou shall always remember to smile appropriately when another actor gets work. Too little and you look bitter, too much and you risk jaw dislocation.

3. Thou shalt not tweet or create Facebook updates about how much acting work you have on at the moment. Just do your job and tell us when you’re nominated for a BAFTA. 

4. Thou shall remember that leotards are for indoor use only.

5.  Thou shalt not compare you career to anyone else’s, however tempting it may be. One actor’s TiE is another actor’s Hollywood.

6. Thou shall always treat crew with respect. If in doubt, imagine your mother is always watching you.

7. Thou shalt not feel bad about, occasionally, having a duvet day. Spending a whole Wednesday in your pyjamas watching RuPaul’s Drag Race is what makes being self-employed bearable.

8. Thou shall leave your tax return until the very last minute. Completing it any earlier is just disrespectful to your fellow self-employed friends.

9. Thou shalt not talk above speaking volume in casting waiting rooms. You’re impressing no one.

10. Thou shall remember that you do the best bloody job in the world. Enjoy it, keep that skip in your step and remember that for every awful audition, your best-selling autobiography gains another chapter.

A Handy Guide for Filmmakers

The Real Lessons of Drama School

Drama school. What a waste of time, eh? Singing, dancing and prancing around pretending you’ve got a glittering career ahead of you. Surely it’s just three years preparing yourself for a life on the dole, right? Wrong.

With it’s dizzying array of classes and subjects, drama school can seem like a very expensive way to become proficient at jazz hands but all those subjects can genuinely help you in the real world…

Singing…

Ever wanted a tube carriage that’s exclusive to you and your little gaggle of actor friends? All you need is a good song to sing in the round and with just one turn at ‘Rose, Rose, Rose, Red’ you’ll have ordinary, hard-working people risking life and limb to get themselves on to another carriage. Ah, a seat all the way to Cockfosters... 

Dance…

You might think that the dance that you learn at drama school will make you a hit down at the local disco. And maybe it will if the kids at Infernos are impressed by the same 4 moves repeated for the entirety of Orinoco Flow. But what will eventually stop their taunts and jibes is when you’re stuck in the queue for the toilets. While they’re miserably hopping from one foot to the other looking like amateurs, you can style out that wee-dance like the beautiful lovechild of Wayne Sleep and Michael Flatley that you are.

Improvisation…

Keith Johnstone, author of the book ‘Impro’ which will you'll see an unfinished copy of in every actor's bookcase, said:

“Good improvisers seem telepathic; everything looks prearranged. This is because they accept all offers made – which is something no ‘normal’ person would do.”

Quite. And that’s why improvisation is such a useful tool. There’s no way you’re going to do well as an actor if you deny any knowledge of Microsoft Excel in your temp agency interview. Say yes to EVERYTHING. Fax machines, accounting programmes, open heart surgery...anything so you can stop living off the random selection of cold meats and drying quiches in Tesco’s discount fridge. You can worry about the dead bodies and confusing spreadsheets later. 

Voice…

Vocal support is incredibly important. And no, not because the meanies at the National Theatre won’t let you have a mic. But because how else will you let the rest of the bus know that someone once told you that your portral of Sally Bowles was better than Liza’s? I said “BETTER THAN LIZA’S.” If you don’t allow that to resonate through the whole bus (both floors) then no one will realise just how important you are. And you never know, there might be someone very influential listening in like Trevor Nunn or the recruitment officer for Asda.

Animal Studies…

Tutors can spend as long as they want telling you that Animal Studies is important for character development. It’s not. However, what it is useful for is having a story that’ll instantly make someone else feel better about their life. Friend just been dumped? Sibling lost their job? Their woes will be instantly alleviated when you tell them about the time you were chased around a dance studio while you lumbered about pretending to be a pig.

Accents…

Because you never know when you might be asked to fill in for Aiden Gillen on Game of Thrones…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHIykid21j4 (contains spoilers,)

Alexander Technique…

You might think that lying semi-supine in a studio can’t teach you anything. However, this class will teach you the invaluable gift of sleeping while you pretend you’re doing something incredibly important. If anything, Alexander Technique sums up your whole life as an actor.

Movement…

You may not still fully understand the point of Laban and your physical interpretation of the sound of running water may have been reminiscent of a skittish cat but I defy anyone to beat you at Charades from now on. And what better way to show your family that you’ve finally made it then successfully miming Saved By The Bell to your cousin this Christmas?

Acting…

Don't worry, you won’t be needing that.