The neck bone is connected to...

Today I want to talk about one of the many bits of wisdom I picked up in Theatre School. Now, Theatre School is quite different from, say, Business School or Medical School or any other kind of School. It’s unconventional, to say the least. The good Theatre Schools are, anyway, and my alma mater certainly falls into that category.

Today’s lesson is about how Casting Directors have no imagination. You, as an actor and potential castee, must spell it out for them. For some casting directors (and I do know some) this is not the case. But for many, especially the ones who don’t love their jobs and aren’t particularly successful, it is. And here is a story to illustrate my point.

In my final year at Theatre School, I spent a semester having my soul sucked out by a camera learning how to act for film and television; it is a completely different art form than theatre. As part of this foray into the dark side we were required to meet every Monday night with industry professionals. These included casting directors, commercial casting directors, agents, and managers. It was, well, interesting.

The majority of people who came in were nice and encouraging. Some were even intelligent. The best of them tended to be of the agent or manager persuasion, though there were a few bitter ex-actors thrown in: word of advice, you don’t ever want to work with one of these. The worst tended to be commercial casting directors. My disclaimer is, of course, that not all casting directors or commercial casting directors are like this. But you should probably go in expecting them to be; if they aren’t, consider it a pleasant surprise.

My group’s first encounter was with a commercial casting director who we’ll call “Horace” (Why “Horace?” Why not?). The idea was for him to impart the wisdom of his experience to the eager little actors before we took turns reading mindless drivel commercial copy for him. The reality was that this man obviously had not much of a personal life and viewed this as a phenomenal opportunity for him to command an audience and run the show. He certainly thought he was charismatic. And maybe in real life Horace is a wonderful person, but all signs pointed to Loser. It was almost sad. Almost.

Horace rambled on at length about everything we absolutely must do in order to get a job. None of it was original, insightful, helpful, or even accurate. I was fortunate enough to have had a much better source of career advice the previous semester. Anyway, in the course of regurgitating the text of every bad book on how to break into show business, he starts on the topic of headshots, a topic frequently obsessed over by actors, significantly less so by everyone with the power to actually give you a job. And out of the pile, he grabs mine.

My headshot is, admittedly, a faux headshot. My senior picture was a black and white headshot and used to serve this purpose incredibly well, but that picture was taken when I was 17. I look a bit different now. The current headshot (and I do need to have new ones done) is actually an impromptu snapshot of me taken by my boyfriend, The Photographer, with a professional camera whilst walking through the woods in England. How romantic. I am wearing a cashmere scarf/shawl, my hands are in the picture, and I look about to laugh or do something mischievous. So it isn’t really a traditional headshot but here is why I use it:

1. It looks like me on a good day. So I look good. But it also looks like me when I walk into an audition. Subsequent comments on this headshot have, indeed, included, “Wow, this actually looks like you.”

2. It is interesting. At least, I think so. It says something about me and isn’t just me posing nicely for the camera. Your headshot is supposed to get people interested. There is nothing particularly interesting in just smiling for the camera. My point is, this picture shows my personality. Another subsequent comment: “Great picture.”

3. I like it. Plain and simple. Given that I could not (and still cannot so much) afford “real” headshots, it was and is the best alternative.

Horace’s comment?

“Look at this! This is a bad picture. I can’t tell what you look like, I can’t even tell if you have a neck!?! Do you have a neck?”

Well, Horace, if I don’t have a neck, how do you suppose my head is attached?