In this video Aaron Marcus shares a personal audition story to illustrate the frustration actors feel when trying to land roles, then pivots to practical advice for actors who are struggling to get work. He emphasizes that success comes from hustle and proactive self‑marketing rather than talent alone. Marcus recommends two key industry contacts: (1) the art director and creative director at advertising agencies, whom he suggests contacting via mailed hard‑copy headshots, resumes, and a brief cover letter; he provides the American Association of Advertising Agencies (aaaa.org) as a resource for finding agencies. (2) commercial photographers, reachable through the American Society of Media Photographers (asmp.org), as a gateway to commercial modeling work that leverages acting skills without memorizing lines. He explains the roles of art and creative directors, the nature of commercial modeling, and how actors can showcase emotion through facial expression and body language. Marcus also touches on agent relationships, noting that even if an actor finds a job independently, it should still be routed through the agent if under an exclusive contract. The video ends with a teaser for a bonus story about an unprofessional star on set, encouraging viewers to subscribe, like, and share.
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Hey, are you frustrated and need acting jobs? Well, here are 2 people you want to contact, and I've got a great bonus video for you. Watch this to the end and you'll get the link to— oh boy, this is a tough one. A star acted unbelievably unprofessional and nasty to me on a set, and I'm going to share that with you. 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. Before, before I get started, I'm just going to kind of jump topics really quickly, but this just happened to me late yesterday, and, and I want to share it with you. So I recently— it was just a couple days ago— I had an audition for a film, and it's very popular. Actually, it's a remake— not a remake, sequel to, to a very popular movie. And as you guys might or might not know, I truly never believe that I'm going to book the role. I don't. I mean, my goal is to have a good time, period. During the audition. So I got a phone call from my agent and said, hey, just wanted to let you know you're being considered for the role. And honestly, I was kind of shocked. I really didn't envision me, my type, my age, my look for this particular role. I mean, I guess casting did somewhat because they invited me to audition for it. I just didn't. And here's, here's a takeaway that I just want to share with you. I, I still don't believe I'm going to get the job. There, I'm sure there are a handful of other people who are also being considered, but at least out of the— and I have a feeling for this particular film, potentially hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hundreds of people who were submitted to read I'm sure it was a very small select group that were invited to audition for it. So for me, getting the audition, I felt like I won, and it was great. And now to be in consideration, it's exciting. And, and once again, I want to clarify, I still don't think I'm going to book the job. I just don't. And, and I'm still— I'm so far away. I mean, there are still, you know, a handful of people who I'm sure are being considered, and decisions are based not, not necessarily on the audition. It's, it's your look, it's your type, it's the way you present yourself— things that are strictly out of my control at this point. But here's— here is what I wanted to share. It was exciting. It was nice to hear that all the years and years and years and years of training and classes and, and work that goes into preparing for an audition and learning how to prepare and shoot self-tapes, and I won regardless of whether I booked the job or not. Hey, I think it's pretty cool that a You know, people doing the casting, and I assume the director, you know, are helping make some initial decisions at least. And it feels good. And so I just wanted to share that with you. You don't have to book the job to feel good. You know, it's not like hitting a grand slam or striking out. You know, you can, you can get a little single and it still feels great. So anyhow, just wanted to give you that update and share it with you. So let me jump back to my topic. Look, it's hard getting acting jobs, as I just explained to you. It's very hard, and it can be very frustrating. At least it is for me at times when you do tons of auditions, or whether it's trying to get representation with agents and you're not hearing back from people. And that might actually be a really interesting Topic for another video, what to do. But here's the deal. The reason why I've been able to work as much as I have, it's not because of my talents. And I'm not just being humble here. There are millions of people who are much, much, much more talented than I am. But I tell you, I hustle. I work really hard. I always have. And I want to share with you 2 people That you— at least my recommendation is to be reaching out to, to try to get work, especially if you're frustrated and you're not hearing from your agent. And once again, a little bit of a side note, I never— even from the very beginning of my career, almost 40 years ago— I never would sit by the phone and wait. for an agent to contact me. I always was proactive. And I realized, look, maybe you have a full-time job, maybe you're a full-time student, maybe this is such a part-time thing for you, you just don't have the time or the interest. And I get it. I mean, that makes a lot of sense for me. But for those of you who are interested and have the time and interest, you should be marketing yourself. And once again, if you— this gets complicated. This is also another whole workshop or video. If you have a signed contract with an agent that you're exclusive around the world, if you do your own marketing and find a job, well, of course you have to send it through your agent. I also believe that even if you don't, but you are working with an agent, even if you book the job on your own, I still send it through your agent for a whole variety of reasons. And, and you can check out— there are some other videos where I talk about that. But anyhow, let me give you the names of some people. So number one, at advertising agencies, there are 2 people you want to contact. Uh, and by the way, I consider this one person just— and there's somebody else I'm going to let you know about, but there are 2 people at ad agencies, the art director and creative directors. They are— well, first let me tell you what they do. So the, uh, creative director, they're the ones who come up with the concept. For the ad campaign, whether it's TV commercial, commercial modeling, could also be radio spots. And then the art director actually will take that concept and put it on paper so people can actually see what the commercial will look like, assuming it's not radio. That would be— that would be a little hard to see. So what you want to do is contact art and creative directors at ad agencies. And my suggestion is it's old school, but I think it's a, I think it's really helpful, especially in today's time period. Don't just send an email with a headshot resume as an attachment, because most people are not going to open up an unsolicited attachment. Everybody's worried about, you know, getting a virus or something. So I would go old school and send it through the US mail. Assuming you live in the United States. If you're, if you're in the UK and watching this, then yeah, don't send it through the U.S. mail. Not a good idea. But send it through the mail. And what you can do is send a hard copy of your headshot and resume, short cover letter, just, you know, all your contact information, really short note, not a long bio, not a long history of when you start riding your first, you know, tricycle and, and just let them know you're, you know, fresh face in this market if you haven't done that much work in the area, and to, you know, essentially keep you in mind for any future TV commercials or commercial modeling jobs or radio spots, whatever you're interested in doing. And make sure that they know who you are. And so I think that's a really good idea. It's been very helpful to me. And you can also do the same thing with art directors as well. So send them to both art directors, creative directors. Do some research, get the names of the people. Don't just send it to an ad agency, you know, dear art director. You can find a lot of ad agencies, and I'll, I'll list it here. I also will list it in the description section on the channel. It's aaaa.org, American Association of Advertising Agencies. And certainly there are millions of other ad agencies who are not a part of this association, but this will give you contacts in many areas throughout the states. And you can do, you know, Google searches as well to find some ad agencies near you. Okay, so that's one. Number 2, I've always really liked to do commercial modeling. And it's funny, as soon as you say the word modeling to an actor, I find that a lot of times people start cringing because they think I'm not a fashion person. I'm not walking runways. Exactly. Yeah, me neither. I do have the statistics for a fashion model, but I don't have the interest or really the look for it. It's just not something that interests me. I've been to fashion shows and they're very interesting to watch. It's just not my thing. And so commercial modeling might be a really interesting way for you to use your acting skills and get work, and it pays really well. So commercial— and I'll show you a couple of commercial modeling ads right here so you can, you can see them. Commercial modeling ads are the ads that you see on billboards, posters, sides of buses, on the internet, on packages, newspapers, magazines. We're all over the place. And sometimes they need beautiful looking people who are doing high-end commercial modeling. It could be for, I don't know, a cruise line, you know, and they need beautiful men and women for that. Or, you know, maybe for fancy watch. Those are high-end commercial models. Or it can be just a regular-looking person like me. And I've done, I'm sure, probably at least 1,000 commercial modeling jobs. And, and the thing that I was saying before about using your acting skills, it's, it's great because you don't have to memorize lines, but you have to be able to show real and believable emotions. Just through your face, your eyes, your body. And I love doing it. It's a challenge, and I really enjoy it. It could be anything from somebody just proposed to you, and this is for a jewelry store, and you have to be able to believably show that love, that surprise in your face, which it's a skill to be able to do that. Or maybe you're sick. Maybe it's a pharmaceutical ad and you've got allergies, you've got an upset stomach, you feel miserable, you have a migraine. Once again, it has to look real. A way to find your way into that work on your own is to contact commercial photographers, and you can find them— once again, I'll list it so you can see it. There's a great organization, asmp.org, American Society of Media Photographers. And see if you can find— because there are all kinds of photographers who are members of that organization— and see if you can find some in your area. Once again, you can do some searches. Who knows, if you really want to do some detective work, maybe contact some ad agencies and ask them if they work with any commercial photographers in the area, and then reach out to them. Once again, don't just send them an email. I would highly recommend sending a hard copy. And if you have any commercial shots, let them see that. But look, when I first got started, my headshot was all that I had, and that was good enough for commercial modeling work. So anyhow, I hope those 2 contacts were helpful to you. If you have any other suggestions of ways for actors Uh, to find work on their own, please share it here with us so we can learn from you as well. If you haven't done this yet, subscribe. Don't forget to click the notification bell so you always know when a new video has been uploaded. And if you like it, give it a thumbs up and share, share the link with fellow actors so we can continue to grow this channel and have it just be filled with With actors who are not competing with each other, people who are helping each other and sharing information. I did promise this video, and you'll see it right here. It's an unbelievable story. I'm still glad that I did what I did in that situation on a movie set. I could have gone a lot of different directions with it. Looking— and it was quite a few years ago. Still happy that I did what I did, but it was really uncomfortable having a star just act unbelievably unprofessional and nasty to me on, on the set. And it's not— I'm not saying that because I'm anybody special, but I'm a human being and I was on a set and, and there was absolutely no reason for this to have taken place. So anyhow, I'm Aaron Marcus. This was fun, and I can't wait to talk with you again soon. See ya.
