How to Get Started in Acting

I’m the type of person who loves success stories, biographies, and auto-biographies. It’s inspiring to see the path that people took to get to where they are.

Oftentimes, when people talk about their journey, they give general information, and while that’s helpful, my brain would rather know the specifics, so here’s a bit of my acting story.

(If you’re more into a quick how-to, here's a free guide I made to help you get started in acting, plus the pros and cons of what I did.)

FIRST WORK IN THE INDUSTRY

In college, I was working at a retail store and a guy came in for some props for a film they were doing called There Will be Blood. It was filming near my college. As he was walking away, I told my co-worker I wanted to be in that film. Thirty seconds later, that guy came back in with a business card and said, “Why don’t you come be an extra?”. So I did.

A few months later, No Country for Old Men came into town. I have no idea how I heard about that one, but I was an extra on that set as well and actually got to drive a “hero” car in one of the scenes. I was pretty stinkin’ proud. (BT dubs - Tommy Lee Jones' hands are huge; it felt like they swallowed mine.)

After deciding that I wanted to do acting as a career, I spent my last year of college doing plays and got my minor in Theatre.

If you know my experience with the agency I had in high school, you know that I hated acting and never wanted to do it (but God has His own plans).

FIRST SHORT FILM & VOICEOVER

The very first role I got (post-college) wasn’t because I was looking for it.

I was living in west Texas and America’s Next Top Model was hosting an event to scout new faces. I’m not sure how I heard about it, but I figured out the details and attended. I didn’t get chosen, but after the event, a guy got on stage, Billy Pon, announced that he was doing a short film, and said if any of us were interested, to come see him before leaving. So I did. He wrote a short film called Doll Boy. It’s a horror and it was so much fun to film.

After that gig, Billy asked me if I wanted to do some voiceovers for a couple of different businesses (New Mexico Junior College and The Eleganté Hotel) and I thought that would be fun. So I did. That’s how I landed my first voice-over gigs.

FIRST FEATURE FILM

This is one my favorite stories about not taking no for an answer:

While in west Texas, I was working in physical therapy and all my co-workers knew I wanted to do acting. One day at work, my co-worker, Sassy, had asked me if I saw the news about a feature film that was holding auditions soon.

I finally found some information online and emailed the address they had listed. I got an email back asking me to send a headshot and resume and that they would contact me again if they were interested… but they didn’t.

I never heard back from them.

But I really wanted that audition. My thought was: weeeellllll, the audition location and times are on their website, soooo, technically it’s an open audition. I mean, they didn’t exactly tell me no…

So, audition day came, I showed up (uninvited), other actors were waiting at tables with their scripts, and a woman asked me what my audition time was.

I was like CRAP. I told her I didn’t have one, but she was sweet and said they could see me at the end.

So I waited. Well, wouldn’t ya know, one of my good buddies from college was there to audition so we got to catch up.

I finally got to audition. They apparently liked what I did because they invited me to stay for same-day callbacks.

And wouldn't you know it - I booked the LEAD role! This was the first feature film I'd ever even auditioned for. And I didn't even have sides ahead of time; I had to learn the script that day.

Talk about God stepping in.

As it turns out, the director thought he wrote me back asking me to audition… but I never got it.

I was living off excitement during those months of filming. So much fun. So much learning. And very little sleep (filming until 1am... getting up at 4:30 to get ready for work).

That was about all the acting I did in west Texas, but I wanted to continue. It looked like moving was the only option if I wanted to find more work.

So I did.

One of my friends was ready to get out of west Texas also, so we ended up going to Austin.

(Quick mention because this is a long post: if you’re short on time but would like some ideas on how to get started, here’s that guide you can download and print if you like. Back to the story…)

STARTING OUT IN AUSTIN

Moving to Austin, I knew there were opportunities, but I didn’t know how to find them, so I resorted to Craigslist ads for a while. Those helped me build my resume and find out a little more information about the industry.

I worked at a large gym, and many of my coworkers knew I wanted to get into acting, so one day, one of them told me about a gym member who did acting and introduced us. That girl gave me a Yahoo List to subscribe to for auditions and my whole world changed. So much information!

(Let me quickly say this about the gym – my hours were perfect! I worked from 6am-2pm which was amazing and perfect for acting gigs and missing traffic.)

I kept building my resume and eventually got more involved. When I was on set, I would ask people about agents, acting coaches, what Austin’s like for acting, you name it.

Eight months after moving to Austin, things shifted. That Yahoo List I subscribed to sent out an email that needed stand-ins for a show coming to town called The Lying Game (ABC Family). They needed one blonde and one brunette, so I submitted for the brunette gig. Well, my gosh, out of who knows hooooow many submissions, I got offered the gig.

Thank you, Father.

It required me to quit my job at the gym because it was filming Monday-Friday, a minimum of 12 hours a day. I told my job about it and they said they would bring me back on when the gig wrapped – 7 months later. That was amazing of them, and they did take me back after the first season.

Then season 2 came and I got offered the stand-in role again so I accepted. This time, my gym job didn’t want to go through the waiting process again, and I understood.

During my time on set, I made a ton of connections (you can’t help it when you’re there for 12 hours or more every single day). I learned a lot about who did what in the industry, I learned about the crew and each department and how they operated, and I learned about agencies and coaches in the area.

MY FIRST AGENCY

After looking into some of the agencies I’d been learning about, I finally submitted to one. I’m not sure what other agencies required, but all I did was have a meeting and got signed the same day – no audition required, no wait period. That was 2 years into my move to Austin.

When you get an agent, you shouldn’t have to pay for anything until you book a gig, and then you pay your agent their cut. With this agency, I had to pay $100 per year for website fees, but I knew that wasn’t right. Make sure you don’t get yourself into that pickle. Like I said, you don’t pay your agent until you’ve booked a gig through them.

I started getting sent on auditions and then one day, my agent told me about a local acting coach, Carol Hickey, and recommended I take her class. So I did. 

ACTING CLASSES

Unsure of what I wanted and needed to strengthen my acting chops, I took various acting classes about which I’d either heard or read. Eventually, I started taking classes with Carol Hickey and Laurel Vouvray. They each taught a different style of acting at different studios.

After 2 years of taking both of them, I felt like what Carol taught was serving me better (you’ll figure out what fits you) so I stopped taking Laurel's Meisner class and continued with Carol for years. She completely upped my acting game, and I absolutely cannot recommend her enough if you’re in the Austin area.

HOW DID I AFFORD IT?

I was blessed – unmistakably and insanely blessed. While I was on the set of The Lying Game, I met my husband. I had no intentions of finding a guy in the industry. But it happened.

So, I’d saved up a lot of my money from my gym job (and other jobs I had in Austin prior to The Lying Game), and I saved up what I’d made on The Lying Game. But after we got married, my husband encouraged me to go full force into acting if that’s what I really wanted to do.

You have no idea how weird of a concept that was. I hadn’t not worked since my first life-guarding job in early high school. But I did it. I said yes to solely focusing on acting, I took classes, I took all auditions and projects that came my way (if they were my cup of tea), and I had the time to stay on top of my marketing (Actors Access, IMDb, Casting Networks, headshots, I built my own website, I read books, I researched, etc.).

Plus, I had (and have) a massive support system in him. He’s still super encouraging in whatever it is I set out to do, and he’s a big part of why I feel confident saying no and standing up for myself in certain situations. He breathes that backbone into me. Everyone who meets him is in awe of him, and I mean that as a compliment, not a brag.

Back to acting…

ADVICE ABOUT WORKING

Yes, there’s so much freedom to focus on acting when you don’t have a job, HOWEVER, when you go to auditions and the casting directors ask, “What do you do when you’re not acting?”, it is such a bonus to have a job.

Yes, hobbies are great, too, but having a job helps you meet people, it brings more dimension to you as a person and actor, and it gives them something to remember you.

So, if you’re in a funk about having to go to work every day, know that work is a very beneficial thing for acting. Yes, it makes things harder because you have to request days off for shoots, try to trade shifts, don’t have all the time you want to learn your script, but it builds character and it makes you interesting – and it may even help you book roles.

MORAL OF THE STORY?

I wanted to. So I did.

And, thankfully, I was blessed.

That's pretty much the recap as to how I got my snowball rolling in this industry.

Again, here’s that get-into-acting cheat sheet if you need some more ideas or just like cliffs notes.

Like I’ve said before, all of us have different ways we got into the acting world, so if you take some time to listen to others’ stories, you’ll glean some insightful tips to help get you where you want to be.

If you read this far in my post, you’re obviously interested in plotting your own path, so kudos to you. It’ll be interesting to see where you are a year from today.

Start your acting snowball,
Venus Monique

If you know someone who wants to get started or needs encouragement, please forward this post. It’s always a great feeling when people help you towards your goals.