Acting is a freelance profession. Sometimes you are able to line up work to follow one after another, with little to no time in between. Other times you have work waiting for you on the other side of a months long dry spell. And other times, those which wake us in a cold sweat during our most horrible nightmares, at those times we have only the promise of more auditions and the hope of work sooner rather than later. As you might imagine, filling those in between times is something that an actor, if one plans to stay an actor, must become very good at doing.
In the past, and in fact in this upcoming two month hiatus from paycheck theatre work (that is to say, theatre work for which I am paid weekly for performing my actor-ly duties weekly), those in between times have languished in some writing, mostly temp or retail, and lots and lots of teaching. Teaching theatre is fantastic, in that I get to stay in my field; but as an actor teaching theatre leaves a little itch inside, yearning for the rehearsal studio and performance stage. This upcoming hiatus, between the fall rep and the spring rep at Stage One, I am re-evaluating my approach to these in-between times.
Inspired by Kimberly Wilson over at Tranquility du Jour and all the creative entrepreneresses she shares with her podcast listeners, in particular Michelle Goodman, whose book The Anti-9-to-5 Guide I cannot recommend highly enough, I have begun to have a new understanding of the possibilities for filling these in-between times. Spurred on by some of the stories and tips gleaned from these fantastic women, I sought out other creative entrepreneur types in social media. As a brief tangent, I'd like to say that it seems my generation is, both by choice and by circumstance, reframing how people view work and work/life balance...more on that in a future blog post. There is a big shift happening in my grey matter that I don't completely have a handle on, but there are exciting things on the horizon as I begin to act on these new inspirations. You'll get to see how they live out, too, as I'll be sharing my journey with these new-to-me ideas here.
Check back soon for all the goodies!
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