Aaron Marcus, an acting and commercial modeling coach, explains how extra work can lead to principal roles. He describes becoming a regular in a small core group of background actors, which can get you auditions or lines. He shares a personal example from a current TV series where this strategy worked.
Hi, my name is Aaron Marcus, America's premier acting and commercial modeling career coach, the founder of howtomodel.com. I'm also the author of How to Become a Successful Commercial Model, now in its 5th edition, and I've been making my living as an actor and a commercial model for over 26 years. I, I know there are some actors who won't do extra work, and I completely understand that, but I did want to share with you a way that Extra work can actually get you a principal role on a project. There is a television series that's being shot right now, and basically I've gotten cast as an extra, but I am in a core group. Basically what that means is this deals with political stuff, and I am a staffer. And I'm one of a number of people who are on staff. So they want to see similar faces all the time, which— and I've worked on it a number of times, and actually it's been a great experience. It's a fairly small group of us, and so I get a chance to listen to the director, watch the actors. And I also had the opportunity— they were doing some casting where they wanted some of the staffers to have a couple of lines. And so I had the opportunity to audition for it. I haven't heard yet whether I booked it or not, but whether I get it or not, it doesn't even really matter. The point is, here I am doing some extra work, and I'm also being considered for a principal role. So if you do get the opportunity to do extra work, look, sometimes you're going to be one of thousands of people in a stadium scene. In which case you might not learn that much about the actual production. Still, you'll get a chance to network with other actors, but especially if you are a regular and you're one of a small selection of people that is working over and over again, there is a possibility that you could be asked to do some lines and become a principal. If you have any questions whatsoever, always feel free to contact me on my Facebook page. It's Facebook.com/AaronMarcusActing. Or you can also get to me from my website, howtomodel.com. So I look forward to talking with you again next week. I'm Aaron Marcus.
