When Actors Should Say No: Declining Auditions, Unsafe Stunts, and Managing Reps

Very challenging topic because I feel like because for so much of your career, so much of it when you're getting started, you're just drilled into say yes to everything.

right it's like can you dance yes can you book this show yes are you free next week yes right and that's like something that gets programmed into you and i do think early on saying yes to everything is the right call but eventually schedule starts filling filling up uh you get to a certain spot where some of the things you used to say yes to aren't worth the experience anymore

Yeah, definitely.

I think, you know, I kind of think actors are, you know, people pleasers or or at least they want to make it work.

Right.

And so we're used to taking direction.

There's a scarce amount of opportunities.

And then you hear these, you know, incredible Hollywood stories of just like the guy showed up and like it was it was, you know, they were just going to leave town and they did that one last audition before quitting.

And you have this like Fantasy in your head, so saying no becomes a real dilemma, but it can be really powerful when the time is right to know what you want out of every project and audition and opportunity.

Yeah, and that's really what we're going to be talking about in today's episode is how do you know when it's time to say no, right? So I do believe, and I think before we get to saying no, I do think that early on you should be saying yes to as much as possible.

And there's some aspect of that that probably never goes away.

But the person that you would say yes to becomes more selective, right? where, you know, if, if now it's like, if network or studio or to reach out to one of us, we'd be like, yes, absolutely.

Whatever, like my schedule could change to fit that need.

But I'm sure there's a, once you've done a certain amount of work, there's always like, well, I don't know that I want to do this thing because I don't think it's going to be successful or whatever.

Like there's always, there's a business decision that kind of goes into saying no or saying yes.

Right.

Or sometimes it's like, I think at a higher level, then, you know, it's like, I really want to work with that director.

They make, they make great things.

And that's like where we all hope to get to eventually someday is where we're like, saying no to something lucrative because we want to work on something creative, and we're in the position to do that.

But that's a ways away.

yeah and you know i think there's a couple different aspects to like saying yes or no to anything and if you have uh reps a manager an agent certainly um you have to like run it by them even if it like i think when you're out there hustling for opportunities to act and maybe you're self-submitting or maybe you're um you, you did a bunch of, of like someone threw together some comedy sketches and you, and you worked on someone else's industrial.

And now like people are throwing you some opportunities.

Um, it gets harder to just automatically say yes, because you don't want to get taken out of the mix for something else.

Like you don't, uh, you know, and that's, I think what your, your agent or manager might say is like, Oh, if you do that, um, low budget movie that, you know, requires you to travel out of town for two weeks and isn't paying you any money like you could miss a couple auditions i guess now it's easier because of uh virtual auditions and self-taping but that was always a fear i suppose in the past and um you know the other thing though is i to the other side of it is like wanting to say no wanting to be in a position to get better stuff And there is this idea that you have to start saying no, and no one tells, and there's no definitive rule that makes sense.

It's all like your own personal thing.