Aaron Marcus breaks down what actors need to know before signing with an agent: typical contracts run 12 months with auto-renewal, commissions are 10% for union jobs and 20% for non-union work, and most contracts require 30 days notice to exit. Check exclusivity terms, whether self-booked jobs owe commission, and research the agency's client list and casting director relationships.
Hey, in this video I'm going to be sharing with you what actors absolutely need to do before signing an agent's contract. Watch this to the end and I've got a great bonus video for you. Thinking about leaving your agent? You've got to ask these 4 questions first. Okay, let's get started. Hey, I'm Aaron Marcus and welcome to the Acting and Modeling Quick Tips channel and the Actor Career Center. So this is one of the reasons why I love doing these videos and having my Acting and Modeling Quick Tips channel. Someone sent me a note on the channel just saying how much they got out of the last video and asked if I would be willing to make a video on this topic. The topic was what to look for in an agent, what they need to look for when signing a contract I thought it was a great question, and so here it is. And, and so if you all have a specific question, send it to me, and if it's something that I can turn into a video, I will. So the very first thing is, let's just talk a little bit about what a contract is all about. Do all agents require actors to sign contracts? And the answer is no. I've signed very few contracts in my career. There were times I might have worked with 30 agents in different markets. I still have quite a few agents in various markets, and there's one agent that I have a handshake agreement with, and he just said, look, I don't want you working with any other agents in my state. I said, that's fine, but I don't have a signed contract with him. But Here's some of the things— here are some of the things that you want to be thinking about when you're looking at a contract. Number one, let me just explain. Typically, and they will change from agency to agency, but it's not unusual for an agent to ask a new actor who is signing with them to sign for 12 months, and then there will be an automatic renewal After that 1 year unless for some reason the agent decides they don't want to continue working with that actor or if the actor decides they don't want to continue. Some of them have 2-year agreements with a 2-year automatic renewal. So that's— and I don't want this to sound like it's a bad thing. It's locking you in for 4 years potentially. Now you can always get out of contracts. Like I said, it's— Typical that you can get a 30-day leeway where you can send in a notice saying you want to leave, and typically that's what takes place. I'm not an attorney, so I certainly can't give you legal advice, and you should contact an attorney if, if this comes up for you. But from what I have been told, and if any of you who are watching are also attorneys, Let me know if this makes sense to you or not. Let's say you have a 2-year contract and let's say, I don't know, 6 months have gone by. You haven't gotten any auditions. You haven't booked any jobs with the agent. If you want to get out of your contract early, once again, this is from what I've been told, and I'm not, I'm not stating this as fact because I don't have a law degree. That you can get out of that contract. And if, I can't imagine, but if the agency decides to sue you, they have no grounds for damages because they're not losing anything. They haven't made any money off of you. And anyhow, that's something just to keep in the back of your mind. Hopefully that's not going to happen. And just make sure you read really carefully. how to get out of a contract if you're not happy for whatever reason. The other thing that you want to be looking for in a contract before you sign it is what kind of percentages will the agency take. Typically, if it's a SAG-AFTRA franchised agency and you are in the union, they're only allowed to take a 10% commission fee from any union jobs. Now, if you're doing commercial modeling, Then they typically will take a 20% commission fee, but that has nothing to do with the union. If you are non-union and the agent has no affiliation with the union, then typically you, you should expect to see a 20% commission fee in the contract. If for some reason you're not seeing it, ask. Those are really important questions. Something else that you need to know about, and it should state it in the contract, but I can tell you for me, I don't understand legalese well at all. So even if I saw something, I'd probably still ask the agent just to clarify things. But you want to know about exclusivity. You know, when you sign this contract with the agent, if it does say that you are exclusive with the agent, does that mean you are exclusive in that state? Does that mean you are exclusive throughout the country, worldwide? I'd want to know that. And let me also just tell you, and this is just my own personal opinion, if you're just getting started, you haven't had that much experience, maybe you're a full-time student, maybe you have a full-time job, you probably have so much going on in your life that you're probably not going to try to freelance with lots of different agents in various markets or even within the state. It just seems very complicated. My suggestion is get started with one agent first, see how it goes. If you find that you're working a lot, you want to expand, then that's something to consider. But it's a really important thing to find out in your contract and to ask the agent. Ask about exclusivity. And does that also mean if for some reason you find a job on your own and you book it, Do you still have to pay the agent a commission fee if the agent had absolutely nothing to do with it? Something else you might want to just ask before, because it's not going to be written in the contract, but just ask before you sign. I'd like to know if you're interested in film, TV, commercials, are there certain casting directors that you typically work with in the area? I think that would be helpful to know, and then you can do some research and look up those casting directors and just to make sure they really are doing the kinds of work that the agency is telling you about. You can— look, you're not going to ask an agent, well, who are some of your clients? Like, what commercials do you typically shoot with? Like, you know, what— who are some of the big companies and stuff? They're not going to give you that information, but what you can do is go to the agent's website if they have a website, and normally they will show the talent who have booked jobs for various projects, and then you'll get a chance to see who some of those people are just to make sure it's legitimate and these are the kinds of projects that you would want to work with. If you're thinking about working with a manager, and that's a whole separate video. But I would ask the agent if that's something you really want to do. I would ask the agent if they're okay with that. Some agents really don't want to work with a manager. Some of them will say, yeah, sure, that's fine. But just understand that also means you will probably be splitting up your commissions. Most of the time, 15% to the manager and either 10% or 20% to an agent. But I think I'd like to hear the agent's reaction. And once again, I wouldn't bring it up unless you're really seriously thinking about working with a manager. So those are some of the really key things that I would definitely be looking for. Exclusivity— who are some of the people they work with? How long is the contract? If either one of us are unhappy What do we do to get out of a contract? I think those are really important things for you to know about before you sign the contract. Hey, if you have signed a contract with an agent, please share your experience. No need to, to list the name of the agent, but it would be great to know what kind of things you looked for, what kind of questions did you ask, what kind of responses did you get. Were you happy there? Did you— are you still working with the agent? Did you make a change? So anyhow, please share that with us on the channel. And if you haven't done this yet, don't forget, subscribe, click the notification bell so you always know when a new video has been uploaded. If you like it, give it a thumbs up and share the link, you know, with fellow actors so we can bring in more people who can share additional information with us. I did promise a bonus video. You'll see it right up here. If you're thinking about leaving an agent, these are 4 questions you have to ask. Um, I hope you enjoyed this, and I can't wait to talk with you again soon. See ya.
