Aaron Marcus shows beginners how to break into acting through student films at local colleges and independent films found on Facebook. Student work builds your reel and resume, though it's unpaid. Always vet scripts and take safety precautions on set.
Getting started in the acting industry is— it's really hard. I know, I spent 2 years doing things by trial and error and trying to figure things out. And trying to get acting jobs when you're first beginning is also really tough. So in this video, I'm going to be sharing with you 2 different ways where you can get Acting experience and cast, even if you're just beginning. And if you watch this to the end, I've got a great bonus video for you. It's— let me get the exact title— You Won't Believe This Absolutely Crazy Job, Acting Job I Accepted. Okay, let's get started. Hi, I'm Aaron Marcus, and welcome to the Acting and Modeling Quick Tips channel and the Actor Career Center. You know, when actors are first getting started, we typically think, all right, so what TV commercials can I audition for? What feature films? What television shows? And the hard part is you might not be living in an area where there's a lot of this type of work available. And especially if you're just getting started, even if you hear about auditions it's really tough because your headshot and resume is going to be submitted along with, you know, could be, you know, hundreds, hundreds, thousands of headshots and resumes, and the casting director might only accept, you know, maybe 30 people to invite to audition for it. So I got a couple of ideas for you and ways that you can search And try to find some really interesting jobs on your own. So one way is to try to get student film work. Now you've got a couple of options. One is, and this will help you no matter where you're living, go online and find a community college, a college or university in your area. And here's the trick. You're going to go to the art department division of the institution and then start looking for film classes. But here's the deal. You don't want to just pick any film class. If it's the history of American film, that doesn't make any difference, and that's not going to be helpful to you. I shouldn't say it doesn't make any difference. It's probably an interesting class. But if you're trying to get acting jobs, That's not the place to go. What you want to do is find a class where students have to shoot films for the class. Most likely they're going to shoot shorts. You know, they might be 5 minutes long, 10 minutes long. And then once you find some classes where students are actually creating films for the class, you can get in touch with the instructor and you can send a headshot, you can send a resume, you can send a cover letter. And just say you're a local actor, you'd be really interested in auditioning for some student films. Now, I know people who've created an entire reel just with doing student films, and I'm not saying they're easy to get. I'm not saying that they are necessarily great films to be in. You might work on a student film that looks horrible. It might not be interesting, it might not be shot well, it might not be lit well, or maybe the sound is really poor. So I'm not saying you're going to definitely get a chance to use it as a reel, but you certainly can add it to your resume. And I wouldn't put student film if you do have 3 columns in your resume. I would put the name of the film, I would put your character, And the importance of the character in parentheses, starring or whatever it is, featured. And then in the third column, don't put student film. Put either the student's name as the director, or if the student happens to have a production company, you can add that as well. But even in the worst-case scenario, the shot doesn't look good, you've gotten some experience working in front of a camera. You can watch it and you'll learn so much from watching your performance. Best case scenario, this thing is phenomenal. And you never know where a student filmmaker might, you know, go to. Maybe the next project this student does might be a small independent film. Maybe they'll go on and start shooting major projects. They like working with you. Why wouldn't they ask you to audition again or maybe just cast you again? So finding student Student films can be incredible. One thing that I would also just suggest is you've got to read the film— read the script, make sure it's something you're comfortable with, and depending on who you are, you might want to bring somebody to the shoot. If they're shooting outside, they're shooting in a park, just because somebody's a student doesn't mean that they're sane and they're good to work with. That's all I want to say. You've got to protect yourself. There's a lot of craziness in today's world, so I want to suggest that. Here is a link. It's a great website for student films, and maybe you can find student films being shot in your area. The other thing that you can try to do is find independent films. You know, these might be very small budget, and once again, you're probably not going to get paid for any of these, but it doesn't matter. You're trying to get experience. You're trying to get opportunities to work in front of a camera, build your resume, and potentially add to your reel. And so here is a link to a Facebook group of independent filmmakers. So I just wanted to share those 2 ways of trying to get some experience when you're just beginning. I did an independent— I'm sorry, it was a student film, and I was already pretty experienced, but it was an interesting idea, and it wasn't so short. It actually was a pretty long film. I think it was like 45 minutes. I mean, it was a pretty long film that the students shot independently for the class. But he was a, he was a student, and it was really good. I'm not going to go into details about it, but it was a really good experience. It was a character I never had an opportunity to portray, and I thought that would be really interesting, and it was. So keep your mind open for things, but those are great places to go to, to try to find work. Now, if you have ever gotten either independent work or work on a student film, please share your experience with us. If there are any links where we can go and either watch it or, you know, places that people can go to, to find out about other independent films or student films, please share it here on the channel so we can learn from you. I also wanted to just quickly mention, if you haven't done this yet, you can Go to my website, howtoactandmodel.com. Sign up there. You'll be on my free mailing list. I will send you a great video. It's 6 Secrets to Mastering Home Auditions. You definitely want to do that. And if you haven't subscribed to the channel yet, please subscribe. Click the notification bell so you always know when a new video has been uploaded. And this way you will always know. And share, share the link with fellow actors. And if you like it, give it a thumbs up. That's always really helpful. Here is the link to the bonus video. I'm telling you, this was the craziest job I've ever accepted. It was a great job though, paid pretty well too. I loved it, and I love to share this experience with you. I'm Aaron Marcus and can't wait to talk with you again soon. See ya.
