The entertainment industry is competitive, so becoming a talented and even famous actor takes hard work and dedication. Good actors are born but great actors are forged in the classroom, otherwise you get actors who don’t really have a solid grounding in the craft. There also must be the desire or passion to act. While college or university is optional for actors, a bachelor’s degree or college diploma in acting, drama, theatre arts or similar discipline can be helpful and set you apart from other candidates. Acting classes will help you hone your craft while meeting people with connection to industry.

While some may get an introduction to acting during their high school experience, it’s important to get a post-secondary school education and attend college or university when you graduate from high school to get a solid foundation before launching into a career pursuing acting roles. If you have a degree from a school such as the Toronto Film School, where I teach, or any other school, you’re going to succeed if you want to – it won’t necessarily guarantee you a career, but will help get you on sets and put you in the right direction of pursuing your dream.

When I attended school, the focus was on developing the complete actor. A wide variety of skill sets should be developed that are necessary to being involved in different genres and mediums. It should be geared towards creating the complete actor so that you learn to do stage, film, television, dance and more.

Training should be an obsessive commitment. I want to see actors who understand what the camera sees and what the director needs to see — what does the writer do to help you realize that character truthfully and honestly? Understanding all those things makes you a better actor.

Actors should be passionate about what they do and tenacious about pursuing the work they want to do and on delivering a good performance. Different types of productions and roles require different skills, but here are some of the common skills actors should have to be successful:

Good written and verbal communication skills

Are you comfortable speaking in front of others? Do you have the confidence to get on a stage and project your voice to the back of a theatre? Can you write and convey thoughts and ideas on paper to provide direction to others? Finding opportunities to practice these skills in various formats and situations can enhance your skill level and help you stand out at an audition.

Creativity

Although actors are following a script, they must interpret and express how a character is feeling or thinking and deliver their lines creatively. This can be helpful when you take on a new role and you are trying to understand how the character thinks. It can also make you spontaneously inventive, which can be great for improvising.

Memorization

Actors must memorize new scripts and cues to give a believable performance. Training your brain to store information and be able to recall that information when you need it is important and as an actor, improving your memory can boost your ability to learn lines and remember stage blocking so you can give a great performance.

Active listening

An important skill for an actor is to take and understand instructions and act upon them. This involves giving people your full attention when they are talking to you. This could be a director, producer or acting coach, among others in the profession.

You can practice this skill in conversation with friends and family and in most other social situations. In your acting career, it can help you respond quickly and effectively to a director’s instructions or to be ready when another actor delivers your cue line.

Singing and dancing

Many productions require actors to have at least basic singing and dancing skills. Singing can exercise your vocal cords, teach you to project your voice and help you overcome any nervous you may have about performing. Your ability to sing might also allow you to audition for parts in musicals or for commercials.

Knowing how to dance is an important skill for an actor, opening up opportunities to play characters in musicals and other productions. Dance can increase your flexibility, tone muscles, build stamina and develop a sense of rhythm and spatial awareness. These physical qualities may also be beneficial for playing certain roles.

Confidence

Actors must perform in front of huge groups of people and on production sets in front of crews where time is money. To do so successfully, they must be confident and self-assured.

Driving

Get your driver’s licence. As an actor, you may be required to travel for auditions and performances. You might also have to travel to find work or to work a second job while you are building your career.

During your acting career you may move between roles in theatre, TV, film, or radio. There are also opportunities to work in productions of online content or voice acting for games.

There are a wide variety of genres in this business in which you can work and make money as an actor:

Film actors work for movies produced independently or by studios.

Television actors are the characters in a television comedy or drama. As a television actor you will also have to attend rehearsals to prepare for days of shooting.

Stage actors entertain an audience by acting, singing or dancing. They play characters on stage and work with the direction of the creative team to bring a piece of theatre to life.

Commercial actors take on short acting assignments in advertisements shot for use on television and online for various platforms.

Motion capture is most commonly recognized by people wearing fitted, black, Lycra suits with small white, reflective markers attached to them. The movement of the actor is digitally recorded, and then typically skinned with a character and manipulated for video games or movies.

Voice actors or voiceover artists are auditory performers who work on a range of productions including video games and commercials to audiobooks, apps, and e-learning courses.

Acting for animation is the art of taking on the personality and character traits of a character and translating them to a previously inanimate object, a computer-generated model, a puppet or a drawing. It requires moving in such a way as to lead your audience to believe that the ‘thing’ can think for itself.

Acting teacher – many actors evolve to become teachers in colleges, universities, theatre groups and offer their services to individuals seeking training.

There is a lot of motion capture work. When I first got the gigs in which I play T-Bone and Watch Dog and various other characters I realized all those years of mime training finally paid off because it has to do with the imaginary world.

Actors can also transition into roles as writers of scripts, become producers, directors, and teach in acting schools, high schools, and work with amateur theatre groups.

Actors’ working conditions vary depending on the type of production they’re in. For example, television and film actors spend a lot of their time in studios and on sets, while theatre actors work on stage in front of a live audience. If a set can’t be created or re-created, actors may have to travel to other regions or even other countries, but the employer typically covers these costs. Their hours are irregular and often long to get the perfect shot and stay on schedule.

Actors can work in a wide range of environments including theme parks, production studios, theatres, or at a specific filming location and studios. Hours of work for actors are extensive and irregular. From early mornings to late evenings, weekend, and holiday work – most actors have variable schedules. Those who work in the theatre may travel with a touring show across the country. Film and television actors may also travel to work on location.

You will need to dig deep when you’re out on set for 11 or 16 hours a day especially if you’re sitting in the heat of a summer’s day or in northern Ontario on a shoot with a bunch of other actors and the lenses are freezing.

As a working member of a highly skilled, trained unit, being disciplined is an important skill. It’s important to adopt the mantra of showing up on time, have the discipline of a soldier, hit your mark and speak the truth which means apply everything we learn in a class or working with fellow actors to make it believable.

Acting unions, such as the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television, and Radio Artists (ACTRA) help actors find work, earn more money, and receive better benefits. ACTRA represents professional performers in the English-language recorded media in Canada. Members work in films, television, video games, radio, digital media, and commercials. To join ACTRA, you must be a Canadian citizen or permanent resident.

Acting unions are usually run by other actors and offer support throughout your career. There is the option to go union or non-union but, in my view, it’s better to go the union route for both the kind of work environment and compensation that is most advantageous.

About 10 of my top graduates are all making more than $150,000 year right now. If you’re working more than 40 hours a week, that’s a job; if you’re acting less than 40 hours a week, it’s a hobby and most people who are at the top of their game are putting in 70-80 hours a week. According to Talent Canada, the average annual salary for a working actor in Canada is $43,680 or $22.40 per hour. ACTRA daily rates vary depending on role and experience.

Having a desire to make money is a good thing but at the same time don’t be managed by that — be managed by the fact you want to work as an actor. That said, you can’t work for free all the time – be careful when you’re working for just exposure, experience or to add to your demo reel. Yes, sometimes you need to do that, but you also need to be aware that you need to pay rent which you can’t pay with exposure or a demo reel. You need to earn a living and that’s why I promote being part of the union. Look for the filmmakers who you know will be the next generation of filmmakers on the way up and the ones that are willing to pay something. Then when they get another bigger production, they will think of you.

ACTRA Toronto has over 15,000 members and is the largest organization within ACTRA (Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists). As an advocate for Canadian culture since 1943, ACTRA continues to secure the rights and respect for the work of professional performers by:

• Negotiating and enforcing agreements that set out the minimum fees and working conditions for performers.
• Ensuring members have a safe work environment.
• Ensuring members are paid for their work on set or in studio and for the use of the recorded performance.
• Providing training and professional development opportunities.
• Ensuring sets remain professional and safe places to work.

An apprentice initiation fee of $75 must be paid when you join. A $75 annual fee is required to renew your Apprentice membership and maintain any credits you have earned.

Under ACTRA’s apprenticeship program, performers who are new to ACTRA can work on ACTRA sets and earn credits toward full membership. When you get into the union you start to realize the benefits such as the dental plan, extended medical plan, and they can set up an RSP for you.

Once you decide you want to be in the union you can get credits towards becoming a member by being upgraded from a background position or commercials where you may be a person walking in the background, or as an ACTRA apprentice.

You don’t need an agent but those who don’t have one tend to be non-union and mainly work in voice work where it doesn’t make sense to work in a union. I have known actors who never joined a union and paid their permit fees but if you have an $80,000 contract you could be paying $8,000 in permit fees off that and agents will take 15 per cent of the gross amount. To me, it always makes sense to steadily put yourself in a position where there are people protecting you to make sure you get paid, and not just a living wage. There is a lot of money to be made in this business.

If the production is good, it will air many times over. In a series such as Star Trek, for example, the more an episode airs the more money you make in the “sweeps” — the sweeps are whatever you make in the next four years that the shows air. A production will buy you out for the next four years, so instead of working for $1,600 a day they pay you for $3,200 a day but then they own the product for four years. Four years later if it’s still on air they must pay you again.

For example, I was in The Tooth Fairy with Dwayne Johnson, “The Rock” 13 years ago. It airs a lot especially at Christmas time and so every four years I get a cheque for $1,600. I had a small scene with The Rock and worked for two days on that production. It’s an example of how roles can keep paying long after they have debuted.