The 15 Guideline Map to Booking Handbook
By Amy Lyndon
Copyright 2009 Amy Lyndon
Smashwords Edition
Acknowledgements: With deep thanks to my wonderful Thomas for always giving me unconditional love, support and fantastic notes. My life would be colorless without your humor and beautiful designs. Thank you to Mom, Dad, Nunu, Michelle and Jen for your consistent encouragement. To my dear students who encouraged me to write this book. To Harry Mastrogeorge for teaching me that story always comes first.
Introduction To Book or Not To Book – That is the Question! Get ready to learn a proven technique that wishes to compete at a high level. My 15 Guideline Booking Technique is a “take no prisoners” way of working and any Actor at any level can use it. It is for those who wish to learn how to break down a script properly and enjoy the ride in the audition room without having a better audition in the car on the way home. Your goal is to go from the bottom 99% to the top 1% of Actors who book jobs. If you want your booking stats to go up, then pay close attention. After perfecting this technique you will be able to pick up any script in any genre and always know what you are doing. This is not an easy technique, but once you’ve got it down, you will never forget it. In order for you to absolutely understand how this works, you need to get out there and practice.
Audition for anything you can. You don’t need to take the job, but you must learn how to book it. This is not an overnight fix. Give it some time and it will all click in. Learn by doing. It’s a different way of working. Think of this innovative and practical technique like learning a whole new language. I believe that I present a unique approach to booking a job and building an acting career because I am out there auditioning and working my business and marketing campaigns alongside all of my students. I have owned and operated a personal management company for nine years, cast several Feature Films, Shorts and Pilots, and have won awards for Acting, Directing, Writing and Producing.
I understand what you need to do to succeed. I understand how the energy in the outer casting office and in the audition room can determine your success. I know how difficult it can be. There was a period in my life when I had three survival jobs at one time just to pursue my acting career. I’ve sold t-shirts at swap meets, waited tables, had an Amway business, made flower arrangements for bar mitzvahs, sold advertising door to door and even got up at 4 o’clock in the morning to sell toner for copy machines from a boiler room phone operation. I know what it takes to make it happen.
I have made a ridiculous amount of mistakes along the way and I am thrilled to share my experiences with you to save you the time and heartache. I moved to Hollywood directly following my college education where I received a BFA in Drama from Syracuse University. When I graduated, I had all this juice flowing and I was so psyched to get out there, but the people in the audition room terrified me because I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t have a technique or a map to figure out the whole process. I was flying by the seat of my pants. I didn’t know how to take all my fantastic training and apply it to booking a job. Slowly over time, I figured out how to book and the biggest thing I learned was that it was never my talent. It was my approach. It’s unfortunate, but no one will know how great an Actor you are if your approach is wrong. These Guidelines will also keep you safe in the room. You will no longer pick up energy from the decision makers or other Actors at the audition because you will be busy setting up your environment, making your opening moment strong in the outer office, telling the story from your point of view, and knowing exactly who you are relating to in the scene.
Part of the reason Actors have issues booking is nerves and judgment. You want to act because you have talent and want to be seen, but when you’re seen, you’re nervous and affected by the judgment of the decision makers. It’s sad to think that the main reason why you became an Actor is the same reason why you’re not working. The good news is; those days are over! I am giving you a map to booking so you will always know exactly what you are doing. You will get to a place where you’ll be so completely immersed with the story and the specifics that you won’t have time to be nervous. It won’t even matter who’s in the room at that point because you’ll be too busy. You will go in, hit the audition hard, walk to your car and before you know it, you had an amazing experience and you won’t even remember who was in the room. That is the ultimate goal we all strive for! With this technique, you cannot skip corners and be lazy. Answer the questions in the order that it is laid out in this handbook. Remember, you are only going to be as good as your homework. Write the answers to the questions directly onto the pages of your script. If it’s not written all over the pages, then it’s going to be in your head. The more homework you do, the more specific you’re going to be, and the more you’re going to be able to completely let go and perform at the top of your game. This is a tedious and logically straightforward technique that requires great discipline, but it is worth it when you see the results. You can literally turn your career around today. It really is true that, “Success occurs when preparedness meets opportunity.”
First Guideline: What is the Scene About?
When you receive your “sides” also known as a “scene” or “script” for an audition, read it 10 times and ask yourself, “In one sentence, what is this scene about?” Write it on the top of your sides. The sentence needs to be from the storytelling point of view. The more time you spend outside of the scene, as a reader, like you’re seven years old reading a book for the first time, the better off you’re going to be. Describe the scene in one sentence. For example, “A man and woman argue about the wedding of a close friend.” If you jump in too quickly, then you’ll have no perspective on what’s really going on in the story. You’re only going to be playing what you think you should be playing instead of understanding the whole story from the Writer’s perspective. A great example would be a catchphrase on a movie poster that says, “She conquered, he made love mercifully, they were a frightful pair.” Make sure the sentence is not from your point of view, but from the story’s point of view. The Writer is the captain. Respect the Writer. You don’t get the opportunity to re-write the script to fit your needs. Whatever the Writer tells you to do, do it. You’re the Actor, not the Writer or the Director. The sides will tell you everything you need to know Don’t Make Anything Up.
What you are reading is the truth. If the character says that they hate the other person, then they hate the other person in that moment until it changes – unless there’s an action line or a parenthetical suggesting otherwise. Don’t make anything up to make your read stand out to impress anyone. You will stand out if you read it exactly as written. The Writer Makes Your “Choices” For You. Believe me, making random “choices” is the biggest mistake an Actor can make. You want the Writer in the room to say, “That Actor read it exactly as I wrote I – that’s the character!” It’s not a mystery when the Casting Director says, “That’s the girl! She’s exactly as I need her to be.” That is what happens when you read it exactly as written. Take the time to figure out the Writer’s intent. This it The Key to Getting Into the 1%.
Remember when we were little kids in school? The teacher would point to each kid and say, “You’re going to be a gum tree, you’re going to be the fairy princess, and you’re going to be the pumpkin” and we would all excitedly say, “Okay.” There was never an argument; there was never a thought about it. If the Writer wants you to do something, do it. Always ask yourself, “What does the Writer want me to do today?” Do it as written. Stop making decisions. Stop deciding how you are going to do it when the script already told you what you are doing. Don’t waste time making up events that are not written. You really do have enough to play with. You don’t need to make up a “back story” because it was probably already shot in another scene. Concentrate on the scene at hand. Look at it like a frame in a film. Read everything slowly – including the action. Reading it 10 times will keep you outside of the scene instead of making choices and decisions about your character, which can oftentimes leave out so many details about judgment. Because if you don’t, you won’t figure out why you’re even in the story to begin with. Ask yourself, why did the Writer write you? Why are you in the scene? Finding the one sentence that describes what the scene is about is the most difficult process of all the guidelines and it cannot be rushed. It takes the longest to figure out.
You cannot let yourself go onto the rest of the guidelines without an answer to this question. The story is your foundation. If you don’t understand the story, then you cannot be in the story. If you have a tendency to get adjusted a lot in the room or you get a basic “That was nice, thanks for coming in – chances are you’re not in the story as written. You want to go in, nail it, and go home and get on with your life.
Television is story driven. It’s very important to know why you’re in the script. There are a lot of people who don’t book jobs because they’re doing too much for the character as written. If you’re not the Series Regular, then your main function is to move the story along. Fulfill the story. A lot of Actors want so much to be remembered that they overshoot the audition by becoming more important than the star. Don’t pull focus. Know your place in the script. If you’re not booking Television, then you think you‘re more important than the story. For example, if you’re serving drinks in the scene, then you’re just a cocktail waitress. If you’re delivering pizza, then you’re just the pizza delivery guy. That’s it. Feature Film on the other hand, is character driven. Every single role in a Feature Film is important. You can receive an Academy Award for a small supporting role. Know why your character is in the story. Then fulfill the character to the best of your ability. It is vitally important not to jump in right away and cast yourself. I know you’re excited, but you’re doing yourself a huge disservice if you jump in to quickly and only look at your lines and make all these decisions aka “choices.” If you do that, then you’ll only know 50% of the story, you’re 50%, and therefore only have a 50% chance of booking. When you read both roles equally, you’ll have a stronger foundation and understanding 100% of the time. Be careful of judging the material negatively. When you say things like, “That would never happen” or “That’s stupid” or “This is written like crap,” you will never be able to fully immerse yourself inside the scene because you are standing outside of the material. You’re putting your focus in the wrong direction. You will never book with that approach. You need to accept that you are simply a clean vessel of pure Writer’s intent. As long as it is according to the Writer’s intent you will never be wrong; you will always be in truth. The script will tell you everything you need to know. The story always comes first. You are interesting enough. You don’t need to add anything extraneous. You are already different by virtue of the simple fact that there is only one you.