So you want to be a ‘booked and busy’ actor, but at the moment you’re more of an ‘available and stressed’ one. That’s okay. The gap between where you are today as an actor and your dream is probably smaller than you think!
The reality is that most actors have a booking rate of somewhere between 5 – 10% of their auditions. That means that if you’re auditioning once a week, you might only book between two and five jobs a year! But we understand that when the bookings are thin, doubts can start to rise. You start wondering…
Is it a skill issue? Do I need new headshots? Do I need new reps? Do I need a silent retreat yoga meditation surf camp in Indonesia?!?!! Thoughts start creeping in, the dangerous ones like ‘Maybe I should quit’ or ‘It will never happen for me.’
If you’re in that danger zone, you’ve come to the right place! From total beginner to jobbing actor, we’re breaking down the reasons you might not be booking (yet) and exactly what to do about it.
How to Think About Bookings
Before we get into the meat and potatoes, let’s talking about ‘booking’. The idea of booking an acting job can have so much wrapped up in it for actors.
Let’s be clear about this: an actor booking, or not booking, a job is simply a logistical decision made by a group of people about which performer will arrive at a location on a particular day and have a camera pointed at them.
A booking is not:
- Proof that you deserve to be an actor
- Approval or acceptance of who you are as a human being
- A judgement on whether or not you are ‘good enough’
- Love or belonging
It might seem obvious, but it’s important to remember. Booking an acting job (or not) is an artistic and business decision made by the casting team and director of a project. It’s not a judgment of who you are as a person. It’s also a metric that shows up after the work has been done, what is sometimes referred to as a ‘lagging indicator’. More on that below.
Leading Vs. Lagging Indicators
Booking an acting job is that a result, not an action that you can take yourself. To book more, you can’t just start booking more. You can only control what is inside of your sphere of influence, and what you put into an audition ike your preparation or your attitude. You cannot control whether or not you book a job.
Remember this as we go throughout the article, and have faith that effort is rewarded, even if those rewards are not immediate. Every action you take is building to something greater.
Get Curious About Why You’re Not Booking
The first step to booking more is getting curious about what’s going on in your career right now. There could be a number of factors why you’re not booking. Or there might be just one. Whether or not you even need to change your approach will depend on how you’re approaching everything we discuss below.
You need to become more aware of how you’re showing up. Take the time to really sit with yourself and do an audit of everything going on for you in your career right now. Grab a notepad and a pen and make a commitment to radical honesty with yourself here.
Prompts to get clarity:
- How are my skills?
- Am I confident in my process and training?
- How are my materials?
- Do I have great headshots? A great showreel? Updated credits and training on my CV?
- Am I auditioning?
- If I have an agent, are they getting me opportunities?
- If I don’t, am I actively seeking out my own opporunities?
- How am I thinking about acting work?
- Do I feel energised or depleted? Positive or negative? What story am I telling myself about my acting?
- What do I think is holding me back?
- What am I doing that is working for me? What am I doing that isn’t?
Once you become aware of what’s going on for you, you can start the process of deciding where you need to make changes. Don’t do it before, or you risk basing your strategy off a bunch of preconceived ideas and vague ‘should’s from other people.
Do Your Skills Need Development?
After you’ve had the chance to get honest with yourself, take a look at your audit. Do you have the necessary skills to book acting work? It’s important to understand the craft and find an acting process that works for you.
Equally, it’s important to stay sharp. Practicing scenes and monologues, staying current with the industry, and working on your voice are all important parts of the actor’s lifestyle.
However, Once you understand the craft, you can always practice and learn more, but this probably isn’t the thing that’s holding you back from more bookings. More on that below.
Beware The Training Trap
Beware falling into the training trap. If you’ve trained at a drama school or done a number of independent acting courses its unlikely that you need lots more expensive training. Likewise, you’re constantly looking for the next screen workshop or masterclass instead of sourcing and preparing auditions, it could be a waste of your time and valuable energy. If you’re trained, and relatively confident in your capabilities, the answer to booking more probably isn’t more classes.
Are You Auditioning Enough?
For a lot of actors, the key to booking more is simply auditioning more. As we discussed in the introduction, most actors only book around 5-10% of the work that they audition for. If you’re not auditioning enough, you can’t get those bookings you’re after. Therefore, the number one way to increase your bookings is to increase the number of auditions that you do. Want to know how to get more auditions? Or maybe you’re looking for beginner friendly audition opportunities.
Are Your Auditions Strong?
Once you are satisfied that you’re auditioning enough, the next step is to determine whether the quality is there in those auditions. If you have an agent, you can ask them for feedback, or share your work with a coach or trusted peer (or, you can join StageMilk Scene Club for expert feedback)
Finally, make sure that you treat every audition as what it is: an opportunity. Prepare well, invest fully, and perform unapologetically. Then, let it go. We have a complete guide to auditioning that can help guide your process, if that’s what you need!
Does Your Mindset Need Work?
Finally, the piece of the puzzle that many actors overlook might be the very thing holding you back: your mindset.
How do you think about booking a role? Recognise that the story that actors tell themselves about a booking can be highly emotional. Because actors care about the thing they love to do, they want the opportunity! This is completely understandable. But some actors go beyond this and wrap up their self esteem, or worth as an actor, with the number of bookings (or lack thereof).
For these actors, the idea of being ‘chosen’ validates their decision to pursue this career path and art form. Without it, they question their talent, path and whether they’re ‘good enough’ to have the career they desire. But removing the emotion from the process might be the most important step an actor can take in their career.
Mindset Trap #1: You’re Waiting for Permission to Start
Your career is something you need to actively build, not something that you’re passively waiting for. How do you describe your career and you’re acting work? Are you ‘waiting to see what comes through?’ or are you active in the process? If you have an agent, are you communicating with them regularly? The shift from passive to active can be a powerful bookings accelerator for many actors.
Waiting for permission looks like:
- Hoping someone will ask you to audition.
- Waiting until you have an agent
- Waiting until you ‘look the part’
- Waiting for someone else to say you’re ready
- Waiting for someone to tell you that you belong in the room, on set, to be seen.
Instead of waiting for permission from someone else, give it to yourself. Decide that you belong, and that you deserve to be seen. That might look like any number of things. Maybe you finally start making your own work, put together a showreel, or start reaching out to agents.
Mindset Trap #2: You’re Trying to “Get It Right” in Auditions
The single hardest mindset shift to make in an audition is also the one that will set you free. An audition is not a test that you have to pass. Treating it like a one turns every choice you make about your character into a guess about what someone else wants, and an attempt to please them. When you’re so focused on getting the job, you’re not truly present in the scene.
The goal as you prepare your audition and ultimately perform is to make choices based on your view of the character, and to fully live within the scene. Not to impress the panel or to get it right. Once you stop performing for the invisible audience you can finally start start inhabiting the life of the character.
To get out of this mindset trap, ask yourself: How would I play this if I already had the part, and the acting career that I want?
This question allows you to get to the heart of the character and present your most authentic version. Anything else is a version that comes about from your fear of rejection, and your attempts to control the outcome of the audition.
Final Thoughts
Booking more work as an actor is at the top of most actors’ goals, no matter where you are in your career. Once you’ve had a chance to get clear on the facts, it usually comes down to one of three issues:
- Skill Development
- Audition Opportunities
- Self Sabotage
The first two are pretty straight forward. Get in class, sharpen your materials, and go after more opportunities! The mindset is trickier to tackle, but once you’re aware of any unhelpful thoughts and behaviours, you can start to adjust them.
Once you realise that there’s nothing to lose, and therefore no need to ‘play it safe’, you can find true freedom in your creative work! Often this comes down to preparing the material as if you’re already been cast. Make choices as if the role belongs to you and the audition is just a formality. This helps you to be less dependent on what casting thinks of you, and remove any approval-seeking or desperate energy. Usually this is that final key that unlocks an influx of bookings and a world of opportunity!
So what are you waiting for? Get out there and make it happen.
The post Why You’re Not Booking Acting Roles (Yet) appeared first on StageMilk.
