Could someone please tell me why actors seem to be last to be paid? I've had a lot of work realted inquires from production companies-they all extoll the use of latest cameras/equipment but when it comes to actors, it's "sorry we can only pay expenses and we will through in a DVD" student productions I can understand but not professional production companies. Someone please enlighten me.
Nethercote, this is a prime example of how CDs waste our time. They should have put this is the job description - actors who are not trained. I believe these guys SHOULD also pay us audition fees - that way they won't waste our time.
Fuzz,this was a large corporate company & it was advertised on the CCP site.Everyone suffers because Equity has no bite anymore.When I became an actor,I had to earn my spurs-working 30 weeks as a provisional member of Equity before I gained full membership.Now anyone can walk off the street & often be used as cheap labour!This even affects Extras & walk-ons.
I think its rubbish that we dont get paid for work. Even if it was a little bit then it would help. I owe thousands of pounds because of university, then you have spotlight every year, extra money to put on showreels voice clips etc. Then pay money per month for other casting sights and plus you work in a job that doesnt pay well but has the flexability to be able to go for castings. So when you finally do get a job and they say its unpaid then it does grind on me a little. All that debt for no money at the end of it. Oh an actors life...
The trouble is that companies no longer have to recognise Equity.If companies honoured the Equity contract,then we,as actors,would be happy.I,also,think that Film Schools should all pay for our work.They have funding.All we get is the promise of a DVD-which is usually forgotten.Equity needs more clout,after all we pay enough to them, as well!
Some Film schools do pay the NFTS has an Equity contract and Royal holloway and others have budgets. Do NOT work for nothing especially for film schools!!
What really shocks me is not that students "forget" to send DVDs out, but that film schools award grades to students who fail to fulfil such contractual obligations.
It might help our chances of getting the DVDs (and raise the good name of the individual schools) if delivery of DVDs and prompt payment of agreed expenses etc was treated as an integral part of any film assigmnemt: paid or unpaid.
kqano all your points are basics at good film schools along with the basics of Budgeting for a proper production. Good film school prepare for the Professional world which is PAID!
Actors who work for nothing are spoiling things for all. Start as you mean to go on.
A cautionary tale
As a Producer / Director I recently came up against some Uni students operating as a company for a corporate. They weren't paying for Actors (Offering just a showreel), Equipment hire (Borrowed from Uni) or Public Liability Insurance + (Illegal!) so therefore their quote was bound to be lower than mine. I brought this to the attention of the client and luckily still got the job but god knows how many I've missed out on!!
Don't work for free it affects all!
With due respect, I will continue to do what suits me, and me only. A lot of my paid work has come as a direct/indirect result of unpaid stuff. Whether via contacts made on set - or via showreel footage I would not otherwise have (unless I paid several hundred pounds to have it filmed).
I'm not happy to work for free on projects where others are being paid but I will consider genuinely collaborative 'work' if it suits me (personally) and I've got nothing better to do that day ...
As to why actors seem to be the last ... some make up artists might disagree.
I've been contributing to this forum for about 2 years now, maybe longer. We have had soo many discussions about this topic. It's the same old thing. Most of us want proper, fair wages for a job well done, but some will do ANYTHING for a showreel. Regardless of how bad it is for the industry.
My stance is this....if you want to get together with like minded people and put on a show or make a filn...great. As long as everybody is under the same contract.
When it comes to working for companies who have money to pay for things like camera equipment, make up and just about everything else apart from actors....don't do it!!!
At last years equity AGM, I proposed that equity mount a 'respect' campaign.
I don't want the industry as a whole to have the impression that actors are ten a penny. Students should be taught how and what to pay actors. After all, when they graduate, who's to say that they don't get a job in television and adopt the same attitude for actors there.
RESPECT the industry
RESPECT actors
RESPECT yourself
Sarah I agree with all your sentiments. There must be respect and we are in a business.
kqano I'm not telling you what to do, but just to be clear, I'm saying that there are knock-on's to working for nothing - Like the one that could of affected my corporate. Actors aren't necessarily the only ones to be affected by low / no pay. I think what I'm trying to say (poorly) is that this is a business. If you get decent paid work and a lot more breaks off a freebie then well done - but you are in the minority.
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