INIDIE FILMMAKING:
Tips For First Time Actors on Low Budget Movies
by Film Ladd
So you’re a first time actor or actress, and you just landed a role on a low-budget, guerrilla, micro-budget, or no-budget movie. What can you expect, and what is expected of you? I’ve put together a couple of tips for you to consider as you take your first step into the world of film acting. Not all of these tips are about how to be a better actor and actress; but all of them will make you a better person to be around on the set, which is half the battle.
The main thrust of all of this is to help you toss away the cliches that may be seared into your brain about what it’s like to be on a movie set. Cliches, I might add, created by Hollywood itself. Whatever you do, toss out images of you hanging out in a big trailer and getting a polite knock on the door about how “they’re ready for your close-up.” Things just don’t happen that way on the under-a-million movie set, and if you act like you’re on one of those sets, you will be insufferable.
Now, these certainly aren’t advanced tips for acting; there are hundreds more I could toss in on how to do this or that, how to change your readings, etc.; but such tips tend to be director-specific, and may not work for you with your director. For now suffice to say that if you follow these basic 10 tips, you should be able to (at the very least) get along on any low-budget feature set.
Don’t Be Late – Be Early
Sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how many people make this mistake. Whatever you can do to ensure that you’re there a little bit early, do it. There are multiple reasons for this.
You never know what things will be like when you get on the set. It’s always a good idea to get there a bit early so you can scope out the situation. Things may not be going well, and there’s nothing worse than an actor showing up two minutes before the camera is supposed to roll right after everyone discovered that the food van broke down. Conversely, things may be going super-well, and the director is ahead of schedule; in which case, your showing up early might afford him the opportunity to keep shooting.
Also, since you’re going to be on a low-budget set, if you arrive an hour or so early to discover that there’s nothing in the budget for food or drink, you can run off and supply yourself before you’re actually due to arrive.
Consider too, that if you’re on a low-budget film, the person in charge of logistics may be a moron. Therefore the call sheet you’ve gotten may be incorrect – the directions are bad, the address doesn’t work when you plug it into your GPS, or there was a typo in the call time. Finding this out with time to spare to get to the real location is a good idea.
Now look; sometimes the logistics person (1st AD, Line Producer, director or producer — you never know on a low-budget set) has simply made it impossible to be at the right place at the right time. In that case, try to talk to the person responsible and see if it can’t be fixed for the next day’s call sheet. Also: if you’re yelled at by someone for being late when it’s clearly the fault of the call-sheet, try to be calm. Explain what happened and ask for a better call sheet next time. And then make a mental note to never work for such people again.
Being early is always good for your future career. You may have time to meet crew members and fellow actors. Today’s grip can be tomorrow’s casting director, and they may notice how punctual and responsible you were. You never know.
Conversely, being late and throwing the entire production off-schedule is a sure-fire way to show potential future employers that you don’t play well with others.
Don’t Party The Night Before
You’re on your way to being a star! What better way than to celebrate at an awesome party? Let’s go! Wahoo!
Let’s not.
First, you may end up looking awful the next day; sure, maybe makeup will take care of it. Then again, maybe your director doesn’t want you wearing makeup. Or the production doesn’t have the money for a makeup artist. Or the makeup artist quit. Who knows? Showing up hung-over and bedraggled is never smart.
Remember: film is forever. Do you want to be remembered 50 years from now for the bags under your blood-shot eyes – when your character was supposed to be a teetotaler?
And no, even if your character is a drunken party-goer that puts Lindsey Lohan and the Playboy Mansion to shame, it’s not a bright idea to do “character research” the night before. “Acting” like you’re hungover is far preferable to “being” hungover. Film sets can be dangerous; there’s lots of heavy lights on thin stands with electric cables all over the place. If you’re not freshly rested and bright, you might cause damage to yourself or others.
Parties, bars, and other bacchanalia are rife with chaos and potential hazards. Do you really want to miss your first day of shooting (or even the entire shoot) because you’re in jail for a DUI, or smoking pot, or getting into a bar-fight? Oh sure, you’ve never been arrested before… but there’s always a first time. Stay at home and study the script, even if you have no lines.
Look: even if you’re just “acting as a favor,” even if you’re doing it “for fun,” don’t party the night before. Who knows how your performance will turn out if you’ve had a good night’s rest? You may be on your way to Oscarville. Probably not, but don’t spoil your chance by being a moron.
You’re Not The Center Of the Universe
“I know you had the shoot scheduled for tomorrow but I just got an audition for a brand new television series and it may just be the break I’m looking for, plus I need to get a babysitter for my poodle and there’s a hangnail that’s causing me problems and I have to go to the dentist and omigosh I just love Justin Bieber…”
Are you considering making this phone call to your director, or pulling him aside on the set, to explain every gory detail of your life situation?
Don’t.
While the director (or producer, or line producer) may be polite to you while you are filling their ears with useless, brainless information, I guarantee you they are thinking about something else. Like, for instance, the incredibly complex and difficult movie they are trying to shoot!
Always remember: you, as an actor or actress, are not the center of the universe. In fact, you may not even be the most important aspect of the movie you’re in. Even if you’re the “lead” in the film, this doesn’t mean that you’re necessarily the most important aspect to the production. There are cameras, and lights, and sound… by needlessly taking attention away from those elements, you are potentially damaging yourself by damaging the quality of the film.
Share the trivia with your significant other, and spare the movie, and everyone involved in it, the drudgery.
Hitchcock famously compared actors and actresses to “cattle.” This was not necessarily intended as an insult by the maestro; but it was an indication of how important such creatures are to the making of a film. With effort, a good director can get a good performance out of a bad actor or actress, just like out of a cow. That doesn’t mean a director would rather have cows; but it does mean he or she probably doesn’t want to know about the cow’s breakfast when the “big scene” is about to be shot.
Don’t Bring Friends and Family
Unless you’re a minor being escorted by a parent, don’t bring your friends or family to the set. Filmmaking, as opposed to theater, is not a spectator sport. Your friends and family will be expecting to be entertained in some way, but in all likelihood they’ll be bored out of their mind, with no place to sit.
Think about it. Do you bring your friends and family to watch you make coffee at Starbucks or stock the third aisle of Walmart with Kleenex? Then why on earth would you bring them to watch you act in a film? It’s about as exciting.
Even if your director says it’s okay, give it a serious thought.
If you bring a bunch of people to hang out on the set, all you’re doing is making everyone’s jobs harder. Cries for “quiet on the set” will be responded to a lot faster without a bunch of people bored out of their mind standing around with nothing to do but crack jokes and have conversation. They’ll be inclined to partake of the drinks and food provided for the cast and crew. They’ll be underfoot and getting in the way.
On top of that, low-budget film sets usually don’t have security. Do you really want to put your director and cinematographer in the situation of having to physically fight your insanely jealous boyfriend?
Or have your 75 year-old dad argue with the director about how to direct a scene?
Or have your 5 year-old kid start crying when she scrapes her knee?
Seriously, keep them away. Especially your kids, no matter how “well behaved” you think they are.
And for the love of all that’s holy, leave your yippy chihuahua at home.
Hurry Up And Wait — On The Set
Making a movie is boring and consists mostly of waiting. You wait on lights, you wait on the camera, you wait on the sound guy to get the boom in the right position.
Even though it’s boring, and you’re waiting, waiting, waiting, don’t spend your time away from the set cracking it up with the prop guy or chatting on the cell phone with your girlfriend. Be there on the set. Always try to be the person ready to go, as opposed to the person everyone else is waiting on.
The success of the movie is what you want, right? Time is money, and on a low-budget film there’s not a lot of money. Don’t waste it by being away from the set.
Study your script if you’ve got nothing else to do.
Maintain Situational Awareness
“Situational awareness” is one of those catch-phrases that gained popularity after 9/11; here’s a fairly decent definition:
Situation awareness (SA) involves being aware of what is happening around you to understand how information, events, and your own actions will impact your goals and objectives. Inadequate SA has been identified as one of the primary factors in accidents attributed to human error (e.g., Hartel, Smith, & Prince, 1991; Merket, Bergondy, & Cuevas-Mesa, 1997; Nullmeyer, Stella, Montijo, & Harden, 2005). Thus, SA is especially important in work domains where the information flow can be quite high and poor decisions may lead to serious consequences (e.g., piloting an airplane, functioning as a soldier, or treating critically ill or injured patients).
A movie set isn’t quite as dangerous as a battlefield (not by a long shot) but it can still be dangerous – like a busy warehouse or a construction set. Pay attention to what’s going on, pay attention to people’s moods, pay attention to where you are standing and what is going on around you.
Help Out If You Can – Everything is Your Job
It’s said that Oscar-winning actor Phillip Seymour Hoffman, when not working on a big-budget union film, will help the crew out when he can — picking up cables, moving lights, all of that.
Are you better than Phillip Seymour Hoffman?
If it looks like the crew is a bit shorthanded, and you’re able to pitch in, do so (making sure you know how to help – there’s nothing worse than trying to help someone and screwing it up).
Just because you’re an actor, it doesn’t make you a helpless baby. You’re on this set to be a part of a success, not to be pampered. If you want pampering, go to a spa.
Memorize Your Damned Lines!
This again seems like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how many people manage to flub this one.
It’s not enough to just “know” your lines. Memorize them. Because our public education system has done so poorly with teaching memorization, many people don’t even understand the difference, or even how to memorize lines. Know them so well that you can say them without hesitation despite a nuclear bomb going off next door.
Every director has his or her own preferred method on how they think newbie actors should memorize their lines. I, for one, prefer that they memorize their lines without any emotion, pauses, or punctuation, which can screw up their delivery on the set – and certainly makes it harder for them to change their reading of the line to something more natural. But that’s me.
However the preferred method of your director, the bottom line is this: you don’t want to do fifty takes because you keep screwing up your line.
You’re Not The Director
It’s extremely difficult to understand what the director’s vision is (or even if he or she has one).
Something that looks just awful on set can be beautiful on screen, and the opposite is more often true. Editing, color correcting, sound, music – these are all elements that combine with what you’re doing as an actor to make the final product. And you have no idea what that honest-to-goodness final product will be.
Look: even if you could get into the director’s head and “watch” the movie in there, you’d be clueless as to the final result — because even the director has no idea how the movie is going to turn out. Why? Because circumstances always conspire to make that vision impossible to completely fill. A camera jams; a cloud blocks the sun; it rains one day and a scene must be eliminated.
As a result, every director must mourn the platonic-ally perfect movie in his head once he hits the editing room.
Your job as an actor is not to judge the director’s artistic vision, but to fulfill it.
This does not mean you should never speak up, never talk, never voice your opinion; but there is a difference between offering suggestions that are in line with what the director wants to do, and trying to take over the set.
Always remain cautious in your comments, abstain from overtly loud criticisms, and do your best to maintain harmony. You can’t know if the movie he or she is making is a turkey, or the next “Vertigo” — certainly not before the film is finished.
Goodluck
