Acting Business Boot Camp

About Andy:

Specializing in voice-over, Andy Roth is one of New York's busiest casting directors with a career that has spanned over two decades. After several years as the in-house casting director for one of the country's top commercial talent agencies, Cunningham Escott Slevin & Doherty (CESD), where he did the voice casting for over a thousand projects for animation, commercial, television, film, video games and more, he started his own company and has since been working with many of the biggest advertising agencies, casting houses and production companies in the world. He has cast shows for such high profile companies as Discovery Kids and Netflix and worked on projects for known brands including, Spotify, Oculus, Target, Calvin Klein, Geico, Kraft, Coca Cola and many more. His handiwork can be seen on just about any network, cable channel, video game system, and all over the Internet.

As a voice director, he's directed shows for major companies including Netflix and Funimation. And as an award-winning producer, his most recent documentary "The Animal People," executive produced by Joaquin Phoenix, quickly became one of iTunes top 10 most watched docs. His award-winning animated projects "Enchanted Thyme – The Delicious Adventure Series," and "The Peculiar Adventures of Willow B. Star," for which he served as both writer and producer, have gained national attention.

With a teaching resume that boasts three of the Hollywood Reporter's top rated college acting programs, Andy has served as a faculty member at New York University's Tisch School and is a regular guest artist/speaker at many highly regarded acting programs including Rutgers and Syracuse. His voice-over workshops sell out months in advance, and he was twice voted "Best Voice-Over Teacher in NY" by "Backstage".

What do you want actors to know that you never really have time to tell them?

1. The Casting Director is NOT THE ENEMY.
2. Casting Directors is not higher on the food chain.
3. It comes down to the work
4. It's not about proving that you're a great actor.
5. Walk into the room like you belong there.
   • Make the choices based on the information that they have.
   • Commit to those decisions.
   • If you are called in to audition, either there's a personal trust OR it's a recommendation from some I trust.

Not getting a job isn't a rejection, it's an inevitability of a freelance lifestyle.

From the book: Wisdom by Andrew Zuckerman

"Tennis taught me so many lessons in life. One of the things it taught me is that every ball that comes to me, I have to make a decision. I have to accept responsibility for the consequences every time I hit a ball.

It also taught me about delayed gratification. No matter how you look or how much money you have, you still have to learn your craft. You have to hit a lot of balls. You have to train.

There are disciplines of life that you learn from tennis or other sports. Another thing is that you learn to adapt. I have two sayings, champions adjust and pressure is a privilege.

When you're playing a tennis match you can't say stop I want to do another take or can I play that over. That's the way sports are. They're very real that way. They teach you lessons in life but the most important one is accepting responsibility. You have to make a decision, and live with the consequence, that's what tennis does with every ball that comes to me. And I just use my experience in tennis in everyday life now and it's fabulous. It's been a great journey to learn those lessons."

Wanting vs deciding:

Decide that you're going to get something done today,

Catabolic vs Anabolic energy

The energy of responsibility is how you get out of anxiety.

Ask yourself: What am I not taking responsibility for now, which is freaking me out?

You have to train.

"You can't buy self-esteem you need to earn it and you need to earn it from the toughest person on the planet, yourself."

Champions adjust.

It's not the strongest who will survive, but who can best adapt to change.

Pressure is a privilege.

Joel Steingold is known for his work on HOW TO GET AWAY WITH MURDER, HAWAII FIVE-0, and SHAMELESS.

You can see him in numerous other Films and TV shows both on camera and as a VoiceOver actor.

Catch him currently in THE CHI.

Be an asset to the environment that you're working in.

What are you doing daily, weekly, monthly, to enhance your career?

"Work begets work."

Specialize in the slow game

Don't worry about the money initially.

Burnout means you are at a point where an extended period of time has gone by without you taking care of yourself.

Whatever you put before taking care of yourself, you're going to lose.

When you're burnt out take a step back and observe.

Take time out to think about where you are in your life and where you wanna go.

What my ego thinks I can get done and what I can actually get done are very two different things.

Overwhelm happens when I am trying to catch up with what my ego thinks I can get done.

Slow down and look at a week, a month, a quarter, a year.

Start to plan, and take some of the pressure off.

Emotions that come up:

• Burnout
• tired
• defeated
• disappointed in myself
• am I ever going to achieve this?

Cure:

• Baby step it.
• Take time off and just take care of me.
• Journal.

You don't to quit, what you want is a break.

When I'm overwhelmed the number one thing I don't want to do is stop but the number one thing I need to do is stop.

Expectations are premeditated resentments.

Those expectations are from yourself.

You can restart your day at any point.

Identify the tasks that are on your plate that emotionally weigh you down, the things you most don't want to do.

Once you've done that plan when you are going to do those things first.

About Eric:

Eric Nelsen is a multiple Emmy Award winning and Tony Award nominated American actor and producer. He is best known for his work as an actor in Hulu's revival of All My Children playing AJ Chandler, and most recently, his recurring role in season 4 of Showtime's hit drama The Affair.

On stage, Nelsen portrayed Brett Sampson in the original Broadway production of 13, and starred in The Good Mother, produced by The New Group. He has appeared in over 30 television series, including The Blacklist, Girls, The Following, NCIS, Blue Bloods, and iCarly. Nelsen has also appeared in the Universal Pictures film A Walk Among the Tombstones opposite Academy Award nominee Liam Neeson and Coming Through the Rye opposite Academy Award winner Chris Cooper.

In 2018, Nelsen most recently won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Digital Daytime Drama Series for his work on the Amazon web series The Bay. As a producer, Nelsen has won three Daytime Emmys for his work producing The Bay and recently was nominated for a Tony Award for producing the Broadway play, The Inheritance. He also produced the indie feature Wakefield starring Bryan Cranston and Jennifer Garner.

At age 23, Nelsen became the youngest producer in history to win an Emmy Award.

What he learned about acting being on the other side of casting as a producer.

You always have to be in class

FOCUS ON YOUR CRAFT

Surround yourself with the right people

So many feelings come up around the opening

• I'm not ready...
• How do I do this?
• Will I sound like a fool talking to real people?

There is a special anxiety around it.

There was anxiety around the pandemic because it had never happened before…but that same anxiety is around opening up because it's never happened before either.

What are the things we can do to take care of ourselves emotionally while this is going on?

Fear and anxiety are never going away, but how we handle those can change.

When we stay in anxiety, we are in victim energy, catabolic energy— energy that eats itself, it's self-destructive.

We want to be in anabolic energy.

How can you break it down? Baby step it.

• Turn our attitude into if I'm anxious about xyz…then what you want to ask yourself is "how can I take responsibility for that?
• ie: If I'm afraid of redoing my resume, then what is one small action I can do to work towards that?
• Go as slowly as you need to in order to take care of yourself.
• Just do the next right thing.

Whatever I put before taking care of myself, I am going to lose.

Good self care is super duper important.

What are things I can bring with me that will make me feel safe?

• A mask
• Some hand sanitizer
• Nice hand lotion
• Lip balm
• Little things that you can pack in your bag that make you feel good
• Water
• Tea

We do have an anxiety epidemic right now.

We are capable of getting through this.

You are not going to be given more than you can handle, but you will be given more than you can control.

This time is not about control, it's about good self-care and doing the next right thing

Asking yourself where do I need help?

How can I ask for it?

What's the next baby step?

Plan out your day the night before.

Knowing that you have a plan, a road map for your career, for your life, these are the tools you can use to ease the anxiety that's coming up.

You can move from being helpless to realizing you have a choice.

When you do the thing that you are frightened of, you earn the one thing you can not buy— self esteem and confidence.

Watch out for perfectionism.

Perfectionism leads to procrastination leads to paralysis.

Write this out: What do I think that I cannot handle in this moment?

• Anxiety is about not taking responsibility.
• Using the illusion of trying to control something that is just not controllable.
• Put your energy into the things that you can do something about.
• Go as slowly as you need to in order to take care of yourself.

About Mark:

Mark Ivanir has been working as a professional film and television actor in Los Angeles since 2001. His first major film role was in Steven Spielberg's 1993 Oscar-winning epic SCHINDLER'S LIST. He rejoined with Spielberg twice, first for a cameo appearance in Terminal, then again for his much anticipated Tintin. A pivotal role in Robert Deniro's 2006 film, The Good Shepherd, landed Mark a role in Barry Levinson's What Just Happened, this time acting alongside Deniro. Currently, Ivanir awaits the release of four studio features: Johny English Reborn (starring Rowan Atkinson), Everybody Loves Whales (staring Drew Barrymore, Kristen Bell, John Krassinsky), A Late Quartet (co starring Philip Seymor Hoffman, Catherine Keener and Christopher Walken) and 360 (co starring Anthony Hopkins, Jude Law, Rachel Weitz and Ben Foster). He has booked over 35 Guest Star and Guest Lead roles on television shows such as: 24, Monk, CSI NY, Law and Order, Fringe, CSI Miami, Nikita and many others.

Ivanir's road to Hollywood was circuitous at best. Born in the communist Ukraine (former USSR), he immigrated to Israel with his family in 1972. While serving in the Israeli Army he participated in the then clandestine mission to bring Ethiopian Jews to Israel. His military experience and expertise has been tapped for various roles including De Niro's CIA thriller THE GOOD SHEPHERD.

After completing his stint in the Military, Ivanir turned down several job offers from Israel's Secret Service and gave up studying medicine to pursue a higher vocation—clowning. He completed two years in a Circus school, traveled throughout Europe performing on the streets, and ended up working in a Parisian Circus – Cirque Pawelles. After leaving the circus, Mark entered into formal theatrical training, studying at Israel's top acting school Nissan Nativ, later co-founding a theatre company made up of actors from the former USSR called Gesher Theatre.

Within two years, Gesher became Israel's top theatrical outfit and was hailed by the London Times as "one of the six best theatre companies in the world." Tapping his command of Russian, English, and Hebrew, Mark performed many different roles, translated and adapted eight plays for the company, and performed everywhere from Lincoln Center to the National Theatre in London as well as major stages in Paris, Rome, and Berlin.

After being cast by Spielberg in SCHINDLER'S LIST, Ivanir moved to London to study with Philippe Gaulier and the actors of the Theater De Complicite. During this stint, he landed roles in THE MAN WHO CRIED (with Johnny Depp) and SECRET AFFAIR which encouraged him to relocate to Hollywood. Ever since Ivanir has been working consistently in major studio film and television projects in eclectic roles spanning from a Russian spy to an Israeli producer to a German elephant trainer.

Mark's advice to an actor who's struggling:

• Diversification
• Think outside the box
• Use your own special skills
• Knowing your lines really well even for an audition

Think of something that happened to you that you've held with you throughout your career and created some sort of thought attached to it.

Think about how that instance is holding you back.

"Forgiving is not forgetting, it's letting go of the hurt."

Resentment- the only person it's hurting is you.

Think of resentment as a replay on a football field.

When you have a resentment, and replay what happened in your head, you are reseeing it.

Ex: Two guys collide, and you hear the break of the bone, and the commentators go ooh that was a bad break, and they watch it again. The next time you swear the sound got clarified, louder, and you swear the grimace of the guy who got hurt got bigger, the color got brighter.

And each time they play it again, the sound gets louder, the color gets brighter.

Resentment does just that.

"Don't allow someone to live rent free in your head."

How many resentments do I have that are taking up energy and space?

This is the question: Can I love myself enough to let go of my need to be right so that I can have inner peace?

You can't buy peace of mind, you need to earn it.

Empowering Questions:

• What or who am I resentful of?
• What do I feel they did to me?
• How can I see this from their point of view?
• What pay off or benefit am I receiving from hanging on to this resentment?
• By not letting go of this resentment, how does this keep me stuck?
• What limiting beliefs have I developed because of this resentment?
• How are these limiting beliefs being utilized in my career?
• How can I stop practicing these limiting beliefs so I can move forward?

Tools from Previous Episodes:

• Listen to What is Your Strength Story?
• Listen to Limiting Beliefs and Empowering Questions.

More Empowering Questions:

• What would my career or life look like if I no longer practiced these beliefs?
• What would it feel like without that resentment?
• You have a choice of what goes on in your head, use your mind to govern your brain.
• What are you thinking and are those thoughts healthy?

Take responsibility for your resentments and set yourself free.

About Ed:

Ed Lewis is a Voice Director for Video Games, Animation, Audiobooks, Commercials, Documentaries, Promos and for pretty much anything else you want him for. Ed's extensive experience casting Film, Television and Theatre for ten years, paired with his actor training from the University of Michigan give him a unique perspective on how to approach Voice Over projects. He treats his work as a VO Director exactly the same as his time directing auditions for The Wire, Chappelle's Show, 24 and others.

Ed's experience working in casting with amazing directors like David Simon, David Koepp, David Esbjorson and all other sorts of Davids has taught him how to direct projects from children's animation to first-person shooters. Communicating with actors can be a challenge, but Ed has the vocabulary, insight, experience and knowledge to communicate the client's vision and to make the recording sessions productive with even the most difficult and complex individuals.

What did casting directors do during the pandemic?

It's not the casting director's job to make the choices for you, it's that actor's job.

You don't have to throw a ton of ideas out, you have to settle on your choices.

Casting directors are put under such rigorous standards, actors need to realize that CD's have so much going on.

Audiobook: Prepping is your friend!

Prepping for Commerical and VO auditions:

• Watch a lot of commercials!
• Watching commercials online vs watching on TV:
• If you don't know a product exists, you're not going looking for it as opposed to watching tv commercials on cable, these products come up.
• It's not about your voice, it's about your acting and you got to make a full scene.

Video games:

• Play a lot of video games
• There are so many roles right now for women, women who can fit into that world and understand the action world, there is a huge market

Casting Directors love actors, they want you to succeed!

His pet peeve? Apologizing for your work!

When are we doing too much?

When are we doing too little?

What is our responsibility and what isn't?

My Part vs. Not My Part

The Serenity Prayer

Grant Me the Serenity to Accept the Things I cannot change

I cannot change other people, places, or things, or outcomes.

I did my part but I can not control how that director took my performance in my callback.

Courage to Change the Things I can,

I can only change myself, my attitudes, and my actions.

And Wisdom to know the difference.

Wisdom to know the difference between the things I cannot change, and what I can change.

Thank you for helping to change the things I can control, and to let go of the things I can't.

Recovering your True Self—The awareness of who you will are

When in doubt, leave it out.

Don't just do something, sit there.

When in doubt, slow down, pause, journal, and make a plan for how you are going to take care of yourself.

Journal, talk it out, find a bookend.

Show me what I need to learn today.

Help me to show up for myself and my career today.

Show me how I can be of service in my art today.

Today I take actions for myself that are appropriate and healthy.

I strive for the balance between self-responsibility, responsibility to others, and letting go.