#SOBLESSED: the Annoying Actor Friend's Guide to Werking in Show Business (5 page)

Let’s discuss the monthly budget of an average actor
in New York City:

Rent:
 $1,000

MetroCard:
$112

Cable and Utilities:
$200 - $300

Gym:
$80 -
$180

Voice Lessons (1 x week):
$400 (low end) / $1,600 (Liz Caplan)

Dance Classes (4 x week):
$256

Student Loans:
$500 - $600

Bar Tab:
$1,000

Tanning:
$80

Office Depot Supplies for Vision Board:
$167

Food:
$7

Once you have the appropriate amount of savings in
your bank account, or at least up to that limit available on a credit card, you
are officially ready to take the leap. Now, where should you move?

New York City is made up of the following five
boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island. Personally,
I believe that anything above 116
^th
Street in Manhattan is a sixth
borough known as Upstate New York City.

When you first move to The City, it is necessary that
your quality of living arrangements come before anything. You might be fresh
faced and beautiful, but nobody is going to give a shit about you at first. You
might as well be happy with the home and neighborhood you’re living in, because
it’s the only thing that will comfort you when your career is moving
perpendicular to your classmates’. Here is what I know about the various
boroughs:

Manhattan:
If you love the awesomeness of running into people who
ask “how have you been?” when all they really mean is “are you working?”
– then Hell’s Kitchen is for you!

Brooklyn:
I went down there a lot this summer and came to the
realization that as awesome as I am, I’ll never be cool enough to live there.

Queens:
Astoria is a fantastic place to live if you like
being late everywhere. The N and Q trains are like the two old guys from
The
Muppets
, just sitting in their private box out on Ditmars Boulevard,
ridiculing our brave attempt to be performers by never getting us to auditions
or half hour on time.

The Bronx:
There is a zoo that a cobra escaped from a few years
ago.

Staten Island:
The ferry is free.

It doesn’t matter where you live as long as you
genuinely enjoy it and are not, in fact, lying to yourself. Do not overstay
your welcome in an atmosphere that makes you miserable. Do not pretend that a
fifteen-minute walk to the train is OK because they’re “short blocks.” As much
as you love that trendy coffee shop in Greenpoint or the amazing views of the East
River from Astoria Park, I suggest you weigh it all against the consistency of
the MTA on a busy audition morning in the dead of April, when it’s still
winter.

HOW I GOT MY EQUITY CARD

I was born Equity. Not everybody is granted the same
fortune in life, so I will briefly explain how you can go about joining the one
union within the theatrical world that is most definitely a Bottom. IATSE Local
One (the Broadway Stagehand union) is totally a Top and the Associated
Musicians of Greater New York (Local 802, because they don’t need to be at work
until the downbeat at 8:02 p.m.) gets paid to watch, leaving AEA as the Bottom.
Obviously AEA is a Bottom… Such a Bottom… But not a Power Bottom. AEA is the
needy Bottom who keeps insisting that each time the Broadway League (of
producers) Tops, it will be “the last time” – but then ends up texting
two days later, “Hey... I’m lonely.”

Equity Contract

You can join the union simply by being hired under an
Equity Contract. This is the ideal situation if you are #blessed enough to go
straight to Broadway. If you receive your Equity Card from a regional theatre,
it is more than likely that they will only turn you Equity for the final few
weeks, thus requiring you to do the majority of the run as both non-union and
the brunt of everyone’s jokes. You will be left unemployed, with a $1,100
initiation fee, $400 of which must be paid immediately for you to enjoy any of
the privileges of being a union member. But, WERK, you’re Equity now!

Four A’s

Also known as “sister unions,” the “Four A’s”
include: AEA, SAG-AFTRA, AGMA, and AGVA. If you are a member of one A, you can
“buy into” another A, after being a union member for one year. A few of the
“Four A’s” make you jump through various hoops to join their union. SAG-AFTRA
requires you to have worked under a Principal Contract with AEA if you want to
join their union, but AEA don’t give a shit. They’re like, “Did you do
background work? Do you have $400? Welcome to Equity!”

Actors’ Equity’s website lists another “sister union”
entitled, Guild of Italian-American Actors (GIAA). I clicked on the link AEA
provided and it rerouted me to a website called, “Online Pokies.” I fucking kid
you not. On July 3
^rd
, 2013, the union that takes 2% of my weekly
paycheck, linked me to a porn website. OK, it wasn’t really a porn website. It
was a site for something called a “pokie machine,” which is an Australian
version of a slot machine. Either way, I’m not sure what Australian slot
machines have to do with Italian actors, unless I’m missing something other
than the fact that my dues are being funneled into online gaming or the salary of
a truly non-eq web designer.

Equity Membership Candidate Program (EMC)

There is a lot of non-union work out there and most
of that non-union work exists within union theatres. Equity houses will hire as
many free actors as humanly possible. If you’ve been hired to save a regional
theatre a shit ton of money, why not put those weeks toward your Equity Card? If
you enter into the EMC program, AEA will gift you with your card after working
fifty weeks in participating theatres within a five-year period. If this sounds
like a good fit for you, make sure you keep track of your weeks, because when
you accumulate fifty, the next theatre that hires you is obligated to put you
under a union contract. Once the theatre finds this out, they will not hesitate
to throw your ass under the bus and replace you with a non-equity delight.

When Should I Join Equity?

Choosing
when to become a member of Actors’ Equity Association is somewhat of a
controversial decision among many performers. What if I don’t get work? Should
I wait until I have more credits? What if I’m not old enough for the roles I’m
right for? These are all valid questions to ask yourself before you take the
leap, and I could make a pretty solid argument for not taking your card right
away. However, I must give full disclosure by admitting that I once signed my
name on an “unofficial list” at the Equity Building, and was subjected to being
a non-equity polyp within the Ursula’s Grotto waiting area before being
#blessed enough to have my Starbucks confiscated from me upon entering the Equity
Lounge to sing eight bars in a studio next to restrooms labeled “Guys” and
“Dolls.” It’s not a happy memory. I don’t wish it on anyone. Get your Equity Card
as soon as possible. If you still have questions and doubts about whether or
not you did it too soon, just ask yourself the following question: “Seriously?” 

HOW TO LAND AN AGENT

There is no right or wrong way to land an agent, but
the best option is probably by #nailingit at your senior showcase and having
someone sign you on the spot. If that doesn’t happen, you may have to put in a
little extra effort. This shouldn’t be too hard, provided you are either twenty-two
or hot. It’s better if you’re both.

Usually you can get your foot in the door of an
agent’s office just by having someone recommend you. Call all of your friends,
ask who represents them, and compile a list. Then ask your friends if they are
happy with their representation, and when the majority of them carry off on a
diatribe explaining how their agent is the reason they don’t get any work,
proceed to cross every option off your list.

So, what do you do when there are like a hundred
agents and you don’t know anything about them or if they’ll be able to get you
any work? Lucky for you, I’ve developed a formula for efficiently finding the
best agent for you.

Annoying Actor Friend’s
Agent Algorithms Method

STEP
1.) Gather a bunch of Playbills and read all of the cast bios.

STEP
2.) Make a spreadsheet that lists the actors on the top line and the directors,
choreographers, and casting directors they’ve worked with underneath.

STEP
3.) Google each actor’s name to find out who represents them.

STEP
4.) Sort the actors and the people they’ve worked with into their respective
agencies.

STEP
5.) Score the agencies by applying the Annoying Actor Friend Agent Point
System.

Actors = 1 point.

Directors = 2 points.

Choreographers = 3 points.

Casting Offices = 5 points.

STEP
6.) You should now have a healthy list of agents that are ranked from highest
to lowest, based on how often their clients work, how big their casting
footprint is, and how much they can do for your career.

Easy right? There’s always a way to cheat the system!
Success is never random. It’s calculated.

The
Annoying Actor Friend’s Agent Algorithms
Method
gives you an idea of how much clout an agent has before meeting with
them. Remember, you are interviewing them as much as they are interviewing you.
It’s imperative to make sure you know a sixth or seventh choice before you walk
in the door.

Getting the Meeting

Now that you have a list of agents who would be #grateful
to have you on their roster, add a few “safety agents” to submit to just in
case. I suggest finding about a hundred. Most agents accept submissions via
email, but I am sure none of them would kick you out of bed for sending a retro
hardcopy headshot they can promptly toss in the trash after making a few jokes
about your credits and the composition of your photo. It’s probably safest to
submit both ways.

Hardcopy submissions might be dated, but at least you
know where you stand with them. Although the process of using headshots,
labels, envelopes, and stamps could potentially bankrupt you, at least you’ll
know your submission is obligated by the government to reach its destination.
Email submissions can always find an excuse to get lost in cyberspace or the
agent’s spam folder. While the convenience and quickness of it all can be
alluring, you never know where your impulses are going to go after hours behind
a computer screen zombie-fies you. One time I got so stressed-out while putting
together submissions, that when I was done I self-medicated with a little
Vicodin left over from an old audition injury. I awoke the next morning to find
I had emailed a casting director to tell them how awesome I was, and apparently
tried to see how hard I could bite my hand without feeling anything. I was left
with an unsightly scar and the casting director never responded. I’ll let you
guess which scar lasted longer.

When putting together an agent submission, the necessity
to draft the perfect cover letter will hinge on how far along you are in your
Actor Life Timeline. If you’re a little older, but have reasonable credits, a
simple and clear cover letter should suffice. If you are inexperienced, you
might need to work a little harder to construct an eye-popping cover letter to
grab attention. If you are fresh out of college and really attractive, your
cover letter can be a literal transcription of the Swedish Chef’s popcorn scene
from
The Muppets Take Manhattan
, and no less than 85% of the agents you
submit to are guaranteed to call you in for a meeting.

Once you have finished the submission process, sit
back and wait for the meetings to pile up. Since you are reading this book, I
have no doubt in my mind that a shit-ton of agents will be contacting you. If
more than one agent offers you a contract, pick the one that scored highest on
the
Annoying Actor Friend’s Agent Algorithms Method
. It doesn’t matter
if you click better with a different agent. You’re not there to make friends.
You’re there to make your dreams come true.

HOW TO PISS OFF YOUR AGENT

Sometimes agents need a little help doing their job.
I’ll bet you’ve often heard about auditions happening that you were right for
and thought, “Why wasn’t I submitted for that?” In the dark ages, before smartphones,
Kickstarters, and Lea Michele being a celebrity, people used to pass around
PDFs of things called “The Breakdowns.” If you were on one of those elite
lists, you were considered secret royalty. The Breakdowns told you everything
you needed to know about what projects were currently auditioning around town. If
friends got wind that you had access to The Breakdowns, they’d hound you until
you created your own special list with them on it. This concept of The
Breakdowns is completely moot now, and I would worry I’m dating myself by mentioning
it at all – except joke’s on you, this all happened when I was up for one
of the kids in Jason Robert Brown’s
13
.