Business Skills for Actors

Video Transcript

"SCOTT DUPONT: Hi, Scott duPont. Welcome back on behalf of Expert Village. Now, do you ever wonder when you see show business while the word business is so much longer than show? It's actually just as important, if not more important than just the show part. Now, I am a full-time working actor. That's what I do. That's how I make my living and I take it very, very seriously. Every day, when I'm not on a set working, I am in my office checking e-mails, sending e-mails. I also do these little postcards. I took my headshot, I shrunk it down. I just wrote a thank you letter right here to a casting director that got me on a HBO film about two weeks ago. So, when you send these little postcards or these friendly little e-mails or notes, you don't want to bother your agents or casting directors especially, but just let them know you're out there. Now, the other thing I do is I have a notebook here, and I'm just going to glance down for a minute, I have a kind of a spreadsheet of some of the items that I track every single time I go on an audition. And here are some of the columns, and you can just make up the spreadsheet at home if you want. First is the audition or whatever job you're auditioning for, the wardrobe, the casting of the production company, when the audition date is, you want to track that, when the callback date is, if there is a callback, when the shoot date is. Most important, how much the pay scale is. How I got the job whether it's through my agent; once in a while I get referred by some other actor friends. I have another column, did I send the appropriate person a thank-you letter for getting me the audition, such as my agent, or a thank-you letter for someone that helped get the job. Last two columns is I have a column for a reel, which is a--I always try to get a DVD copy if I'm a principal in a film or a commercial. I want to get copy of that for my records and I can cut it together later to have like a little demo. Then, the last column is whether or not I got paid. And if you have that, I highlight all the jobs that--right now I have 15 jobs because I work one or two jobs a week that I haven't been paid for but I can look down here and check and I know I've got three or four cheques coming in this week according to my schedule so that's kinda cool. Anyway, we'll be back for more on Expert Village."