How can a little flexibility help you as an actor? In more ways than you might think. Here are the main areas of your acting career that you should be flexible with, and how doing so will benefit you in the long run.

Insights For Being Flexible With Your Acting Career

• Actors should train with multiple teachers and techniques to broaden their skills and avoid limiting themselves.
• Be open to feedback from directors and willing to find compromises to serve the story and character effectively.
• Maintain a presence on social media and network regularly to enhance career opportunities, even if it feels uncomfortable.

Education

Actors should be flexible students of their craft. Why have just one teacher? Why train in only one technique? You can study at The Groundlings, UCB and Second City. Despite what your may hear, studying with different establishments doesn’t make you a traitor. Many working actors recommend taking what you can from all three.

Representation

You have an agent. Great. However, you must also be flexible. Could you get a better agent? Consider adding a manager. Stay open to improving your representation situation, despite what your existing rep may want. I’m not saying that you jump ship, but it’s your career. They have many clients; you have just you. Flexibility with representation means you are open to whatever is best for your acting career.

Roles

You’ve been cast! Great! That said, you and the director have a different view of the character. Here’s where a little flexibility can go a long way.

Listen to your director. Even though you are responsible for your character, the director is responsible for telling a cohesive story that involves all the characters. Listen to what they have to say with an open mind. This doesn’t mean you should do what they say. It means you should hear them out and accept their input. Then, while considering that, you should arrive at an acceptable compromise that still makes sense for your character. If you feel like it is a power struggle, talk to other cast members. After that, it may be time to speak to a producer.

Genre

Let’s say that you are an amusing person. You tend to submit and book comedic roles. You don’t expect to be known for dramatic characters, so you don’t pursue them.

Let me tell you a little story about my old friend, Josh McDermitt. Josh was a two-time regional semi-finalist on Last Comic Standing. He had been doing stand-up successfully for years. A big Los Angeles agency scooped him up for commercial and stand-up accomplishments. He’s been a series regular on The Walking Dead for years.

You don’t know which jobs you will book. Josh was open to dramatic roles despite being on a sitcom for two years at the time of his audition for The Walking Dead. Be flexible and keep your options open.

Social Media

Have you given up on specific social media platforms? Or given up on networking in general? You’re writing off a vital component of a working actor’s career.

Be flexible. No matter why you chose to leave the path, find your way back.

Actors need to network and be on social media. You don’t have to love it and you don’t have to do it every day, but you do need to do it regularly. If you are that bad at it, find ways to get better. Many actors do this successfully. You can’t be so inflexible that it costs you progress or even success.

Think about it. Is it a deal-breaker? Would you give up your acting career if it meant you had to post, like, comment and share? If so, you don’t want it very much.

Daily Life

There should also be flexibility in your daily life.

You’re going to have to move things around whenever you get auditions. The people in your life need to understand this, and it’s up to you to make them see this.

This is a tough career choice, so be honest with yourself and everyone else going in. Acting can’t come last. It has to be a priority. You must be consistently flexible enough to capitalize on any success as it happens.

Expectations

Be open to any job that aligns with your needs as an actor. You want a job, not a career. Careers pull too much focus away from acting, so be flexible with your expectations.

If you start working a “9 to 5,” you will learn that it just doesn’t work. It may work at first, but eventually, it’s going to get in the way. I have seen this time after time, and the actor has always regretted the decision, but by then it is too late. The job opportunity is gone.

Flexibility has always been a helpful part of every actor’s career. Today, it’s mandatory to keep an open mind about every component of your career.

Final Takeaways

Starting out as an actor means embracing flexibility in every part of your journey. From training to representation, roles, and even social media, being adaptable can open doors you never expected. Here are a few practical ways new actors can stay flexible and move their careers forward:

• Train with different teachers and explore various acting techniques to build a strong, versatile foundation.
• Stay open to feedback from directors and be willing to adjust your performance to fit the story.
• Regularly engage with social media and networking, even if it feels awkward at first.
• Be willing to consider different types of roles and genres to expand your opportunities.
• Keep your schedule flexible so you can take advantage of auditions and bookings when they come.

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Mark Sikes began his casting career in 1992 for Academy Award-winning filmmaker Roger Corman. In the past 25 years, he has cast over 100 films as well as television series, commercials and web series. He has cast projects for Tobe Hooper and Luke Greenfield and many others. In the past few years Mark has also produced four feature films.

Based in Los Angeles, Mark has cast films for many markets including the United Kingdom, Peru, the Philippines and Russia. Domestically, he has cast films that shot all over the country in Texas, Ohio, Massachusetts, Virginia and multiple projects in Colorado.

He currently teaches three weekly on-camera, audition technique classes in West Los Angeles.  Follow Mark on Twitter @castnguy.