If you haven’t heard of it, it goes something like this: A young actress moves to Hollywood to start her acting career. She takes some classes, gets an agent and books a role on a TV show. Then she books another small part and another and another. Maybe a dry spell here or there, but first year out of the gate and she ends up booking a good dozen or so roles on primetime television or a couple of features.
She might even call home to tell Mom and Dad that she’s ‘on her way to the big time’…and then the next season…nothing.
So, it goes on this way for the next four or five years. Perhaps she picks up a role here or there, maybe gets a commercial, but for the most part nothing. This is where that cliche of waiting tables starts to get rolling…you gotta’ eat, right? But, the three or four or five years of that struggle and the frustration starts to set in. And, one day they’ve had enough, they pack up their things and move back home.
So, what happened?
Most people immediately blame the entertainment industry as a whole. “Hollywood doesn’t know good talent” or “It’s all who you know” or “It’s all who you sleep with” or some variation on that theme. And for the most part they’re all wrong.
The simple fact of the matter is MONEY.
Our young actress stumbled into a couple of monetary realities in the acting business. First, Hollywood needs “fresh faces”. As in, they can’t have the same 20 or 30 people play “waiter” or “girlfriend” or “police officer #2″ over and over again. People will start to recognize them and that ruins the illusion.
Second (and WAY more importantly) they need people that know how to do the job really well. At $700.00 per minute, they don’t have the time to “train” people how to do the job. They NEED you to know how to do the job right, or they can’t financially justify using you in any meaningful capacity.
So, when you’re no longer a “fresh face”, but you don’t have enough job skills to work quickly and efficiently, you stop working. Plain and Simple.
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