what do actors do when they are not working?

[Slartybartfast]

just googled various actors and got me thinking, these actors, IE Bill Bailey, my age, Their work is not continuous. how do they survive?

Bill Bailey isn’t a great example because a lot of comedians are still working when they aren’t on screen/stage as they will be writing and gathering material for themselves or other projects. It’s the actors who can’t have anything to do career wise as they need a script and a contract I wonder about.

Interesting Holly! I wonder whether that’s becauae her tv work had dried up.

I know a lot of actors who are "working actors" which means you'd probably know their face but they're not famous.

They work a lot but do have downtimes. Often, they get quite highly paid for adverts and that sees them through periods of unemployment.

Voiceover work can be lucrative and a successful but non-famous actor will often do a lot of that.

Actors who don't get much work work in restaurants and theatres/pubs or they temp.

that was an interesting link , one of them was found dead

I have two friends who had careers in acting though they rarely do it now. They both have academic jobs connected to the theatre. One is a playwright. You wouldn't have heard of either but they have appeared at the National Theatre, radio, adverts.

Most people i have known with creative jobs have their billpaying job, their creative work and all the hustling they do to try and get their creative career off the ground. I don't personally know anyone who hasn't ended up prioritising the billpaying job, usually once they have kids. There is often one half of the couple whose billpaying job keeps them closer to the creative work than the other which can cause conflict.

Bloody exhausting.

dd is doing art at university, and working evenings in a bar/restaurant.
good job she has that training and experience

sounds exhausting. spinning plates

The jobbing actor I knew had temp jobs and wrote for soaps. He was not a well-paid man.

An actor I know (friend of a friend so I have met him a few times but not loads) has what he describes as a “portfolio career”. From what he has said that seems to mean lots of bits and pieces over the course of a year e.g. if he’s in a theatre production - musical theatre is his “thing” that might keep him pretty busy for a while depending on length of the run and size of his part, he was in Wicked a while back so with rehearsals and performance that was pretty busy. He then does seasonal but still performance related work (e.g. minor panto roles or stuff like santa’s grotto elves at high end stores, work at a summer school drama club thing), and then takes on casual work when times are tough. He has done bar work in the past, but he is great with kids and has been DBS checked for the summer school so more frequently does baby sitting/house sitting. He’s also done dog walking and has friends who have done pizza delivery, deliveroo, Uber etc. Basically anything casual that can be stopped at relatively short notice if an acting job comes along.

I went to see a play with a friend recently, friend remarked how quite a few of the main characters were famous (i.e. on TV), but the lady playing the lead 'was really good even though she had only been in a couple of things on TV'. This lady had a list of West End credentials a mile long!! I pointed out that many actors are better known for their stage work than appearing on TV; but because TV reaches a wide audience it means that their faces are often the ones we know the best, so we tend to think of them as famous. It irks me a bit that some people are famous on TV for having no particular talent and for doing absolutely nothing (world of reality TV).

I am sure that many actors are in regular work, perhaps with a short break between contracts to enable them to rest and prepare for their next contract. Often scripts are sent out in advance too, so they may also be learning their lines whilst lying on the beach! For young drama school graduates, there may be some spells of doing other jobs (bar work, waitressing, freelance dance/drama teaching) either in between contracts or to subsidise them whilst they build up their CV by doing smaller contracts, but a good theatrical agent will ensure that their client has plenty of work lined up. Then there are the am-dram ones who think they can skip training altogether, don't bother with drama school or any sort of proper theatrical training, hire themselves a less reputable agent who is happy to take their money, and try to get their big break into the industry that way - again, they may be lucky, or may find themselves in a completely non-related job whilst they try to make ends meet. I would say that most established actors are in regular work , even if it's smaller contracts in between the bigger roles.

must be difficulty, being choosey, if you are watching the pennies,work comes along but you can tell by the script it is rubbish

although i heard that when Robert Carlyle finished doing the Full Monty, he had thought it was rubbish! Until it became successful

I know a couple who are both actors - she had a reasonably big part in The Fall which kept her going for a while and she writes scripts for children’s tv shows. He had a smallish part in the first series of Unforgotten. They both walk their dog a lot and are exhaustingly optimistic (outwardly at least). They’re always hoping that the next thing is the one which is going to lead to fame and security. They don’t have kids yet so at the moment all their energy can go into their careers.

Another friend from school who occasionally pops up as a character part on tv/stage is married to a ‘national treasure’ type actor so I think her acting is now more like a hobby than anything else

They read the bedtime story on CBeebies!

I know a cab driver who is a bit part actor, with parts in Harry Potter, Eastenders rtc

I know someone who is a part time actress/model and between jobs she's a lash artist. She's very good at it and earns a lot of money so in my eyes I see the actress/model jobs as a hobby as although she does a fair few jobs she's not earning as much as she is from her lash artistry. She's won competitions for it and everything too.

I also read about Jon Hamm, (Mad Men) who had a 5 year plan, or something, a time limit that if he hadnt got work by the time he was 30 he would give up.

www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/jon-hamm-the-negotiator-interview-comments-casting-mad-men-don-draper-beirut-a8483116.html

A lot of less successful actors work in events or promotions where their talents come in useful and they can take on work when they need it without long term commitment, in case any acting jobs come up.

They also work with corporates - we use a company to help senior people get better at communicating, also use actors for client role plays. They all still act/ direct / do voiceovers and there's a mixture of those who work in TV and Theatre.

I think most people who call themselves actors are NOT in regular acting work. It's always been insecure, even more so now than ever as tv is substantially full of cheap reality programmes rather than expensive drama or sitcoms. Doing a semi-staged reading of a new play once in six months, emailing old colleagues from drama school in the hope that you can get a spot in their Legz Akimbo style school theatre troupe, rationing yourself to one call to your agent a week, saving madly to try and raise the cash to fund a week in an Edinburgh festival show next year, auditioning for that two-line part in the Archers - again - and writing your own one-person adaptation of The Importance of Being Earnest in the hope of producing it one day if you can find a venue, that's the life.

I work in the creative industries and there are several people who are or have been actors or well-known in other areas of their lives - vloggers etc. I also have a friend who was once famous and acted in a serial drama for several years.

When my friend was written out, she took a few months out to do a writing project. Then she worked in a couple of temp jobs in the creative industries while she worked out what she wanted to do next. I met her during one of these jobs and at that stage she was still recognised all the time, appearing in the papers and getting freebies from brands.

We often had famous actors in our offices who were there as 'talent' who knew my friend from her acting. Her pals who aren't finding they get much work any more do things like launching clothing lines, voiceover work, acting coaching, corporate training, local radio or retrain - often as coaches or counsellors interestingly.

Anna Richardson is training as a cognitive hypnotherapist for example - she still has tv work but this way she has a backup and a more predictable income.

In an old job, we had IT people in to set up the Blackberries. One of the guys used to be in Hollyoaks.

My very greatest friend was a jobbing actress until her death, aged 80+, a few years ago.The other strings to her bow were many and various, including tour guiding,giving elocution lessons and teaching English to foreign students.She was a member of a touring group during the last war to the far east for which she received a Govt. pension. Mainly her investments in property gave her a steady income and in fact I was her Girl in the Garrett, cos I first met her when I rented her top floor of a house she owned near the old BBC at Pebble Mill..Apart from her acting she also 'played' the stock market
I miss my friend, always.. A remarkable lady.

I know a couple. They teach when they're not working in an acting gig - mostly dance and musical theatre.

I met a chap who was in a popular kids TV drama. He would act for 3 months filming, and then go back to his regular job - as an electrician.