Good Shit To Know About Being A Film Actor

By Greg Dorchak

This book is intended to supply someone who is just starting out (at any age) with realistic expectations and useful information about what goes on in the life of a film actor. It is also useful to those who just want to know what it is like being an actor in the Film Industry.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Class Clown Publishing
• Release date: Feb 3, 2025
• ISBN: 9798348501730

Book preview

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Other books by Greg Dorchak:

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How To Pull A Movie Out Of Your Ass

Who Took My Crayons?!

Where Monsters Go When You Grow Up

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Good Shit To Know

About Being A

Film Actor

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Practical information and

realistic expectations

for the beginning actor

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by Greg Dorchak

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Austin, Texas

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Good Shit to Know about Being a Film Actor

Copyright © 2023 by Greg Dorchak

Class Clown Publishing

All rights reserved

.No parts of this book may be reproduced or utilized

in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,

including photocopying,

recording, or in any information storage and retrieval system,

or the internet without written permission

from the author or publisher.

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Inquiries should be addressed to:

[e-mail]

ISBN-13: 979-8-3485-0173-0

Edited by Nicole Zayas-Dorchak

Interior and cover design by Greg Dorchak

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Ave inceptor,

qui sumus ut praestare,

salutant te

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Table of Contents

FORWARD..........2

THE BUG..........5

BEFORE YOU BEGIN..........9

Get grounded, stay grounded

What Kind of Actor are you?

Find your support system

Realistic expectations

STARTING OUT..........19

What to do, what to do

No business like show business

Looo-king good

My bad

Well, that was weird

The conditions

People, am I right?

AND AWAY WE GO!..........39

Classes

Books, videos

Community theater

Headshots, resumes

Actor reels

Agents, managers

A word on pay

ROLE CALL..........60

Film roles

Commercials

Industrials

Live appearances

Theatrical

A DAY IN THE LIFE..........75

Wait for the phone to ring

Get an audition

Do the audition

Get a callback

Get booked

Show up on set

Get paid

SOME OTHER STUFF..........101

The game

The handshake

Your type(s)

Nobody gets to treat you like crap

Are you interesting?

Awards

Interviews/Appearances

Wardrobe

Weapons, stunts

Hardware

Track your work

Websites

Social media

Union, non-union, hybrid

Giving back

To be, or not

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Good Shit To Know

About Being A

Film Actor

FORWARD

This book is for a very specific group of people: those who want to be film actors, but have zero experience. Brand New Actors.

Yeah, you may have played a tree in the school play in third grade, and you may have even taken Drama in high school because Trig looked too hard. But you’ve never really done anything resembling professional acting, be you 18 or 58.

Unlike wanting to be an Olympic figure skater, you do not need to start out acting at three years of age, and do nothing but practice for twelve hours a day, seven days a week in order to be any good at it. You can start at any age, and you can be from any demographic, body type, culture, or even a pineapple-on-pizza eater.

While acting is something that can be picked up rather easily, like anything else in life, some effort must be employed to be really good at it. One of the great things about acting is that it doesn’t really require a lot of physical equipment like pads or special shoes. All it really takes to start is for the person to decide to be an actor – motivation.

For me, people get into acting for very few reasons, whatever their age:

- They think it looks fun/want something new

- They think they can do better than that actor

- They want money and/or fame

- They want to be someone else for a short time

Whether or not they keep up with the acting depends on a lot of factors, and almost none of them have anything to do with being any good at it. Whatever the reason they get into acting, I don’t think a lot of folks actually know what to expect from the life, or even what goes into making it.

The specifics of the industry will change over time, and from market to market - Austin, LA, New York, Atlanta - but it feels like the broad strokes are the same.

I may not get a lot of agreement on this, but to me – talent has very little to do with achieving success. Does it have anything to do with being able to stay in the game? Absolutely, 100 percent; talent will give you longevity – but getting There can be a lot more complex and/or random than one might think. Indeed, a lot of what it takes to become a success is simply a matter of being able to play The Game and handle the BS. You know, like any other job out there, from being a plumber to running for office.

Unlike being a plumber, however, the acting world can be very difficult for someone who has no idea what to expect. The medium – film, TV, commercials – is a very visual one, so a lot of importance is placed on that visual aspect. The business also has a long history of glamour and opulence, and it is easy to get lost in that, or try to do whatever it takes to gain it (or hang onto it). It can get very ugly, very fast, and just as quickly, it can all go away.

I think one of the biggest issues that affects new actors is the whole glitz thing. From outside the industry, it all looks so shiny and fun on the low end, and way too easy and disproportionately remunerative on the high end. In short, it looks like it is all fun, very little work, with lots of money and fame – which is a hard carrot to ignore.

The reality is, it is very difficult to get to a point where your work gets a lot of notice and you can buy a mansion in Beverly Hills. And if that does happen, there are things you have to give up – like privacy and maybe some little pieces of your self-respect, and even the very thing that has made you who you are up to that point. There will be a trade-off.

It isn’t all dark clouds and fake smiles, either. There is a lot to like about the life, and when things are working out it can be a LOT of fun. One should remember, however, that it is a job, like any other job, and that should always be there in your mind on some conscious level. Never let your job give you the false feeling that you are better than anyone else, and also never let it make you feel like you are worthless or less than. Not everyone is suited to every job; sometimes you need to try a job out, but if it ain’t your thing, it ain’t your thing. Move on with no guilt or shame or feelings of being a failure.

But if you are going to stick around, just know that a lot of things are going to happen that are not necessarily specific or personal to you. They happen to almost everyone at some point in this business, and I think knowing that can help you in those less-than-fun times.

Navigating the milieu can be difficult, and I know I often found myself wishing there was some sort of non-glossed-over general info about what goes on when I was starting out. It would have helped me a lot – because I learned the hard way, and often – WAY too often – I found my ass hurting from where I kept shooting myself in it.

I finally decided to put some ideas down in this book about what I learned in my 30+ years as an actor – mind you, most of that time was as a film, TV and commercial actor - I have done very little stage work.

The lion’s share of my work has been in the small-to-mid-sized market that is Texas. I consider myself the average person; for this reason, I feel my experiences might benefit the average person out there that wants to pursue a career in acting.

By the way, this won’t be a specific step-by-step training. I’m not here to tell you how to book more, or how exactly to do a self-tape, or break down a script/character. There are plenty of books, videos and classes to give you the specifics. This book is - hopefully - going to supply you with some realistic expectations and useful information about what one can expect from a life as an actor for those just starting out.

The personal stories and photos are here to let you know what could happen, even outside the major markets - picture yourself getting gigs like these... it’s not impossible.

So, grab your ascot and a snifter of expensive imported mineral water, run through some mouth exercises involving the color of leather, try to stand someplace out of everybody’s way, and I will tell you some good shit you might want to know about being a film actor.

A LAUGH CAN

BE A VERY

POWERFUL THING

Roger Rabbit,

Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

THE BUG

The bug can get you at any time. Early in life, later in life, out of left field while you are doing something else, or it can be an itch you always wanted to scratch. But when it bites, man it digs the mandibles in and hangs on harder than a reality star whose show is tanking in the third season.

Me, I know exactly when and where the bug got me. I was in a school play in second grade. I wasn’t playing a tree, but something pretty close – EVERYBODY had at least one line, everybody was getting seen. And, perhaps as a glimpse of the jerk I was to become, I went a tad off-book and got some laughs. Oh my GOD – those laughs – THAT was it. BOOM. I was bit, and it never let go.

Stage production of LIGHTS OUT (circa 1977). Class play at Petrova Middle School. One of my favorite memories of theater, playing a real estate agent with questionable scruples and minimal common sense. Plays like this cemented my desire to take up acting as a profession.

photo courtesy of Author’s archive

I grew up in a tiny little hamlet in Upstate New York. Hamlet means a tiny freakin’ spot out in the BFE with not many people – 500, according to the official road sign. So, as you can probably imagine, there were not a whole lot of outlets for a creative kid to explore in that part of the Adirondacks as it pertained to acting. School plays – which really did not get too interesting or pithy until maybe 6th or 7th grade. Then was some community theater, which I got to dabble in, but that was about it. There certainly weren’t any classes or agents or any of that fancy-schmancy stuff; not that we could have afforded them even if there were.

My father was a forest ranger and my mother was a nurse. Seventy-five percent of what I wore had been worn by my two older brothers first. We had large gardens and raised chickens, turkeys and pigs on our chunk of land in the northern Adirondack Park. Our entire Fall was a steady diet of chopping and stacking firewood, canning veggies and fruits, and processing meat for the winter, which in that part of the country lasted about 16 months.

I was constantly looking for a stage/outlet for my massive talent that was discovered via those few words or facial muggings that elicited The Laughs. I would mimic cartoon characters on Saturday mornings until I got the voices perfect, I would do impressions of famous folks and presidents, even teachers in school. Which they all LOVED.

Teachers loved my antics SO much, I had my own chair by the door in the principal’s office for fourth and fifth grade, because they just KNEW the kind of folks who ran a small-town middle school would know what to do with my amazing talent.

I was active in the school plays in middle school, and then high school - usually acting as comic relief. I loved acting in part because it was great to be able to be somebody else for a few hours a week. I could forget the hassles of everyday life, forget the bullies, forget being awkward and weird; I found a place where my schtick and behavior was more or less accepted.

At some point in there my father actually started doing Community Musical Theater, which introduced me to some of the classics such as Camelot, Bye Bye Birdie, Guys and Dolls and Fiddler on the Roof. I did

not perform in those, but