Dear Paul,
Hi, I would like to be an actor and I just want to ask you for some tips and steps because I want to be in film & tv. I am thinking of taking theatre in college, but I don’t know yet, cause people tell me you don’t need an acting degree.
Sincerely, Solomon S.
Dear Not-Sure-Which-Degree to Get, So glad to hear from you and that you are going to college! Should you get a college degree in Theater? My thought is this – maybe. Let me explain. Have you considered during that first year of getting your college generals out of the way, to also try meeting with agents, audition & hopefully perform in commercials and films? You could see if you even like the work involved in being a film/commercial actor. (Believe me, it can be tedious and dull.) Then, if you decide you do like the it, you could either focus your degree on acting/theater, or you could consider something related to the industry- like a business degree, advertising degree, or even an entertainment law degree. (So many of my friends that have degrees in theater say that they wish they’d have gone to college for a degree in something other than theater to earn a better salary when they aren’t performing.)
Dear Not-Sure-Which-Degree to Get, So glad to hear from you and that you are going to college! Should you get a college degree in Theater? My thought is this – maybe. Let me explain. Have you considered during that first year of getting your college generals out of the way, to also try meeting with agents, audition & hopefully perform in commercials and films? You could see if you even like the work involved in being a film/commercial actor. (Believe me, it can be tedious and dull.) Then, if you decide you do like the it, you could either focus your degree on acting/theater, or you could consider something related to the industry- like a business degree, advertising degree, or even an entertainment law degree. (So many of my friends that have degrees in theater say that they wish they’d have gone to college for a degree in something other than theater to earn a better salary when they aren’t performing.)
Even if you don’t want to make a decision about your college degree just yet, you may dig into the industry. Something invaluable to me when I began my career was the local library. When I was 16 I went there and got as many books on acting, agents, and the entertainment industry as I could get into my hands.
A few book titles that I’ve read and found to be insightful are:
- Breaking Into Acting for Dummies by Larry Garrison
- Acting in Film by Michael Cain
- An Actor Prepares by Konstantin Stanislavski
- Audition by Michael Shurtleff
- The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing by Al ries and Jack Trout