Aaron Marcus, a 40-year acting veteran, argues that the industry advice to abandon all side work destroys careers by creating financial stress that tanks auditions. He recommends acting-adjacent jobs like role-playing gigs and standardized patient work, which also sharpen your skills while covering rent and insurance.
Actors are always getting advice from people in the industry. I want to share with you one piece of advice that can just simply destroy your career, and I'm going to show you how to avoid it. Watch this video to the end. I've got a great bonus video for you. It's— if you think this way, I can tell you you're going to lead a miserable life. And trust me, I know. Okay, let's get started. Hi, I'm Aaron Marcus, and welcome to the Acting and Modeling Quick Tips channel in the Actor Career Center. Look, there are people who are always giving actors advice, and something that I've learned is that you've got to filter everything that you hear. Even things like you might be on a set and people might say, what a great actor you are, and it was wonderful. And look, that's nice to hear. I much prefer hearing that than you're horrible and the scene is terrible and we're going to fire you. But even when you hear good things, you want to filter it as well, just because people say all kinds of things for different reasons. So the main piece of advice that I've heard a number of industry professionals say to actors is, look, if you're really serious about acting and you really want to make this a career, you can't— you can't have a side hustle job. You can't do other kinds of things if you really want to pursue this. You got to jump in 100%. You can't have any kind of backup plan. Let me just tell you, look, there is no one right answer to all of this and to other things as well. Sometimes people kind of give you the impression that they are omnipresent and they, you know, whatever they say is the only way to do things. And I've never believed that. Look, I've done over 500 videos here, and what I'm sharing with you are things that have been very helpful to me, or things that haven't been helpful. But I completely understand that my way is not the only way to do things, just like when I work with people privately. I do private online mentoring and coaching. I've done over 800 workshops. Look, what I have to say, once again, has been very helpful to me. But there are lots of different ways to have success. So if somebody says to you, you cannot have any kind of backup plan, something to fall back on, I have a different feeling about that. Now, look, I've been very, very fortunate in the industry, and I've been able to do this full-time for 40 years. Yes, I do have some additional income. I wrote a book. how to become a successful actor and model. And like I mentioned, I do private coaching, I do workshops, I have an actor career program. But, you know, my main income is from acting and modeling. Now, for me, I was in a slightly different situation than most people. I dropped out of college, went to work as a full-time musician for 7 years and toured for a number of those years. And then when I decided to pursue acting, I really didn't have any plan to fall back on because I didn't have a degree, didn't really feel like I had a whole lot of other skills except for music maybe. But I tell you what I have found is that for people who do have Some kind of additional cash flow. It can make your life so much better. It can take a lot of stress out of your life. I think it can allow you to give a better audition because if you are so consumed with, if I don't book this, if I don't make some money this month, How am I going to pay rent? How am I going to pay for food? How am I going to pay for insurance? Or whatever it is that you need additional money for. It makes it hard. I'm not saying it's impossible. It makes it really hard because you might feel so incredibly stressed out. And let me tell you, to be perfectly honest, look, yeah, I've had success, but there have been times I've been incredibly stressed out. Times where there weren't many auditions, times where I didn't have many bookings. And I did find there were ways I was able to cope really well and block out anything else going on in my life when I had an audition, but it's stressful. So my opinion is I think it's really helpful to have some additional money coming in. Now look, you don't want to be in a position where you get you start spending so much time on another job to pay your bills that you don't have time to take classes, to attend workshops, to be able to buy reading materials to improve your skills. If that happens, then you're not giving yourself your best chance. But if you can find some alternative jobs that are part-time, that are flexible, that Will allow you to continue to pursue your acting dreams. I think that's a great idea. And something I was going to mention, if you go to my website, howtoactandmodel.com, I have an incredible video there that you can get. And I think it's 44 side hustle jobs that are great for actors. And some of these are things that you probably never even heard of, like role-playing jobs, standard standardized patient work. There are a whole lot of other jobs that will actually allow you to use your acting skills, make money, get better with auditioning, or get better with improv, and you're making some money with it. So anyhow, check out, check out that video. I think it would be really, really helpful to you. But most importantly, there's nothing to be ashamed of to need some additional money coming in. And if it will make your life a little bit easier while you're pursuing your dreams? Absolutely. And don't let other people talk you out of it and, you know, it's a badge of honor not to have any other kind of work. If you need it, then do it because it will help you follow your dreams. If you have ever gotten any great advice from other people or bad advice, please Share it here on the channel so we can learn from you. If you haven't done this yet, don't forget to subscribe, click the notification bell. If you like the video, give it a thumbs up because that's actually helpful, and share it. You know, if you really liked it, share it with your fellow actors so we can continue to build a great, a great community of actors who are learning from and helping each other. I did promise another video, and it's right up here. And I'm telling you, if you do think this way, you, I can guarantee you, you're going to lead a miserable life. So watch the video. I know you're going to enjoy it. I'm Aaron Marcus, and I can't wait to talk with you again soon. See ya.
