Talent Agency Pet Peeves. In this installment, Talent Agent Pet Peeves #9: The “I CAN DO WHAT ROBERT DE NIRO and JACK NICHOLSON CAN DO” School of Acting video reel.

Talent Agency Pet Peeves. In this installment, Talent Agent Pet Peeves #9: The “I CAN DO WHAT ROBERT DE NIRO and JACK NICHOLSON CAN DO” School of Acting video reel.

Hey, I don’t believe in ghosts. But whenever I see a video of an actor trying to say “You talkin to me? Well there aint nobody else here…” or “You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth,” I start to shiver.

Why?

Because next to that actor with 3 weekend workshops of acting skills under their belt, spewing out lines from classic films, I see the GHOST of DeNiro and Nicholson, standing there, dwarfing and belittling this neophyte’s performance. It’s cute when your 6-year-old says “use the force for good, Luke”. It’s anything BUT cute when a first year acting student pulls lines from Obi-Wan Kenobi while (in the agent’s mind) the actor stands next to the holographic version of Alec Guinness.

Don’t go to a gunfight with a sword.

And don’t go to an agency rep with a video of you doing Nicholson, DeNiro, Pacino or Brando.

In fact, don’t take any iconic performance and use it in your video reel. It brings up ghosts for agency reps and Casting Directors. And the actor almost always invites a negative comparison.

To sum up, unless you are Dana Carvey, Kevin Pollack, Darrell Hammond, Bill Hader, Kristen Wiig, Jay Pharoah, their understudies, or working on your impressions to get on SNL, please stop imitating your heroes and start using less iconic scenes for your reel.

Unless you want to end up like Carl, below, in GHOST, leave these iconic images alone.

https://youtu.be/oBRJwiFzJy0

Sincerely,

Ross Grossman
Director
Affinity Artists Agency
Licensed, SAG/AFTRA/AEA/WGA/DGA/AFM
PHONE: 1-323-525-0577

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Talent Agency Pet Peeves #8: The “I’M JUST BEING MYSELF BECAUSE I WROTE MY OWN ROLE” School of Acting and the subsequent Video Reel

Its that time again. Time to play...Talent Agency Pet Peeves. Today's installment: Talent Agency Pet Peeve #9: The “I’M JUST BEING MYSELF BECAUSE I WROTE MY OWN ROLE” School of Acting. Solo Performance is an amazing, thought provoking and often highly personal art form. From Spalding Gray to John Leguizamo to Anna Deavere Smith, solo performers engage us with the immediacy and variation of their characters and storylines.

But Solo Performance is one of the few theatrical mediums where the artist can truly control the art. In Hollywood, it is more difficult to create a vehicle around yourself as an unknown and make that fly. So sending in a reel showing an actor in a role that they’ve written for their own persona, while a great showcase of ability to know what works for them, does NOT demonstrate to agents or casting the actor’s ability to transform themselves in the roles created by others. That's called acting.

When I receive a reel from a writer/performer (who is not shooting for a sketch comedy role in a sketch series) I have to pause and ask myself, “is this performer only able to work with himself or can this person work with other people’s creations?”

Certainly, a writer/performer SHOULD show off his strengths and talents. Equally important however is their ability to portray characters outside their personal comfort zone. That’s the difference between a solo performer and a solo performer/actor.

So by all means, submit your reel of your own creations. But balance it out with reel portraying characters created by others. Mm-kay?

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Part 1 of Talent Agency Pet Peeves: The video reel from the "Why Are You Doing This To Me??!!!" School of Acting.

 Talent Agency Pet Peeves Part 1

Good morning all, this is Part 1 of Talent Agent Pet Peeves. Here we explore the "Why Are You Doing This To Me?!!!" School of Acting video reels. These are reels in which the actor (most of the time, a female) is being victimized, terrorized, chased, beaten, stabbed, shot etc.  Invariably she will scream, yell, cry or otherwise indicate the unfairness of it all...

Yes, it is terribly unfair...Its horribly unfair, its colossally unfair--to the AGENT! In most instances this is not what we consider ACTING--rather I personally consider it a 'acting out' of some childhood trauma of the actress who finds that she must play out this victimization role in a horror or slasher or thriller indie production.

Yes, of course most of these awful flicks are written, produced and directed by men--damn those awful testosterone wielding fellows--but ladies, c'mon...don’t send these reels in to your agent as a testament to your acting skills. IT'S NOT. The weepy, running, crying fearful woman is NOT acting in my book.

Just as wrestling, running, falling, punching, slapping, kicking are not forms of acting. I see this as stunt crying. Please, please, please, stop using these reels as some kind of actual representation of your acting ability. Show them to your friends, get out the popcorn and enjoy them with family. Keep them away from your agent!

Take a real acting class from an industry recognized teacher and let’s get on with it, hmm?

Sincerely,

Ross Grossman
Director
Affinity Artists Agency
Licensed, SAG/AFTRA/AEA/WGA/DGA/AFM

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