Create Your Own Opportunities!
What’s your excuse for not producing your own projects and casting yourself?
(By Jim Webb)
(Photo: Jakob Owens/Unsplash)
The advent of things like social media and the internet allows actors to bypass the traditional path to success and to find breakout opportunities using their own creativity, ingenuity and resourcefulness.
To put a finer point on it: If you can’t find acting roles that excite you, CREATE acting roles that excite you!
After all, you do have an excuse for not being cast in someone else’s project. Perhaps you had a bad audition. Or perhaps a competing actor was a better fit for the role than you. But what’s your excuse for not producing your own projects and casting yourself?
Waiting is for waiters. And even if you’re a waiter in your survival job at the restaurant, your primary job is “actor”. And, in today’s modern world, actors should never sit around waiting for opportunity. But don’t take my word for it…
Emma Stone
“I was auditioning a lot and waiting for other people to give me a chance. And now, with the internet and all these other outlets, you can write your own things and act in your own stuff and just make really incredible projects without having to wait for someone else to tell you, ‘yes’.”
Viola Davis
“I created a production company out of necessity, because if I literally waited for Hollywood, I would still be playing mama roles.”
Bill Duke
“If you think because you have talent that that is what’s going to get you through, I think you’re in for a painful journey.”
“But if you have the understanding of a business person, and you’re creating a webisode company or you’re creating something else, plus you’re creating strategic alliances with other people, you may have a shot.”
Matt Damon
Matt Damon on his decision to create what became his big break, Good Will Hunting:
“It wasn’t self-doubt. It was frustration with the system. Because the system is not built for you to succeed. You have to break through it.”
Issa Rae
Issa Rae on creating her own breakthrough web series, Insecure:
“I was just like, let me just make content and make my own online soap opera show and see if this is an opportunity for people to gauge my work and potentially share it. And that happened in college.”
Natalie Portman
“I started the production company because I wanted to have the ability to create my own projects and support filmmakers I believe in. Also, I wasn’t always finding the roles I wanted to work on.”
Tara Reid
“I’m not gonna wait for a script! I’m not going to do that anymore. I’m gonna create my own parts. And I’m gonna produce them. This is a really exciting time for me.”
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