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These 3 Mistakes Might Be Ruining Your Chances of Getting Cast

By Marci Liroff

Photo Source: Margaux Quayle Cannon

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There are countless career land mines begging to be stepped on by an acting newbie—but that’s where people like me come in. If I can stop you from making these three mistakes below, my job here is done.

You’ve got an audition. How do you prepare? You should read through the script a couple of times or, if you just have the sides, read them through several times. Learn your lines, make distinct choices, and be ready to read for the casting director.

I can immediately tell in an audition when you’ve never rehearsed the scene with another human. I understand that everyone has a different process for preparing, and no one practice is right for everyone. That said, you cannot have a natural conversational rhythm unless you have practiced with another person. That can be done by phone or in person—however your go-to scene partner is ready. Email your sides to your father, girlfriend, whoever; just make sure you’re not reading your lines for the first time in front of the casting director at your audition. And, no, reading to yourself in the mirror doesn’t count.

Another thing I strongly suggest is to learn a scene every day, even if you don’t have an audition coming up. When an actor comes in to audition for me and says, “Hey, I just got this last night, so I’m not quite off-book yet,” I immediately tell them, “So did everyone else.” I’m not saying this to call them out or to be nasty, but to give some perspective to rejigger their thought process. Casting directors love to give you as much time as possible with the material, but sometimes we don’t get the material from the writers until the day before it shoots, leading to a rushed session. Learning a scene every day will keep your memory muscles fresh and get you in the habit of learning something on a quick turnaround.

And you won’t just need this skill for auditioning; it’ll save your ass on set, too. You’ve probably noticed on previous projects that scripts are constantly shifting and changing. Sometimes, you can spend the entire night learning your lines before a shoot, only to arrive on set the next morning and have the first assistant director hand you a set of sides with full rewrites.

If your brain isn’t already in the habit of learning lines quickly, your head will explode.

And, finally, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen an amazing audition, at the end of which the actor says, “Ugh! That was terrible. I’m so sorry! Can I please do it again?” Stop talking us out of liking your performance. Admittedly, we all have bad days, and actors can turn in bad performances; if you feel you’re not in the zone at the top of the scene, by all means, stop and tell us you’re going to start over. No excuses, no apologies. Just say, “I’m going to start over,” and do it. Learn to trust yourself and have confidence in your performance. So often, I see actors make great choices and bring authenticity to an audition, just to then show us that they don’t believe in themselves by expressing how much they think they sucked. Sometimes, being vulnerable and showing us your interpretation of a flawed and complex character can leave you feeling uncomfortable. I suggest you try to work through that uncomfortable feeling by embracing it as a natural human reaction to showing us your true heart; don’t apologize for it.

Make sure to check out my online course “How To Audition For Film and Television: Audition Bootcamp”. You can view it on your laptop or your mobile device and your subscription gives you lifetime viewing privileges for this course. I’ll be adding lectures throughout the year.

Warning: I grant permission to share my blog as written with no additions or deletions. Posting my blog is in no way an endorsement of another site unless you obtain my written consent.

HOW KEEPING A DIARY CAN HELP YOU BOOK THE JOB

By Marci Liroff

276429939_51da76025bPhoto credit: Kiwanja

Remember when you were a kid and you kept a diary next to your bed and wrote down everything you did and thought about that day? Those childhood habits were actually great training for what you should be doing as an actor. Tracking every meeting and audition is a great practice to get into.

I’ve been preaching this to my classes and my coaching clients for years now. They always come back to thank me and point out that this one thing has changed their perspective on their career. Sometimes what you do as an actor – the prep, the auditions, the sheer tenacity you put into your career to get an acting job – can be an intangible thing when you don’t actually get the job and you effectively have nothing to show. But, like I always say, “this is not a sprint it’s a marathon”. So much effort goes into getting the job and keeping a diary or a journal of all your auditions will help you see your progress in black and white.

I suggest you keep a notebook and write down every meeting and audition you have. List the people you’ve met and their position, the project, the role, what you wore, and what choices you made for your audition. Take short notes on what you discussed if you got into a chat with the director. When it starts getting busy during pilot season and you’re going on several auditions each week, and hopefully getting callbacks, it’ll be great to know exactly what you did on each audition that got you back in the room a second time because you’re chronicling it in your book.

You’re going to have a long and busy career and you will probably have a few different people represent you along the way. When you start a new relationship with an agent or manager, wouldn’t it be great if you could give them some actual tools to help you? You can sit down with them in your initial meeting and give them a list of people who are your fans, casting directors who consistently bring you back, and a list of those that you need an introduction. This way you can plan a strategy on which rooms you need to get into.

Actor friend William Mapother goes a step further using an Excel Spreadsheet.

“I keep an ‘Auditions’ spreadsheet in Excel. It has 6 columns: CD, Date, Project, Role (character name), Type (feature, pilot, recurring, guest), and Studio/Co./Network.  I use Excel because it allows me to easily sort the data to see how many times I’ve seen a CD, or to see how many appointments I’ve had over any period of time.”

Here’s the part I love. “When I book a job I change the font in that row to red.  Also, once I book via a CD, I make that CD’s name red throughout document.

Mapother continues, “I also keep another Excel spreadsheet in which I note lessons I’ve learned in various areas and make notes to avoid re-committing horrendous blunders. I’ve noted when circumstances before an audition have helped or hurt me – being hungry, working out, interacting with other actors who are waiting.  The purpose is to experiment and identify what helps me. “Another lesson came not from my experiences, but from reading.  One of Pixar’s rules:  Errors are inevitable, so make them ASAP.  Experiment early.  I noted this in my lessons as “Be wrong as quickly as you can.”

Is this something that you do already? Please share how you’ve been tracking your auditions and meetings in the comments section.

Glad you’re here!

Marci