Who and What is The 98%?

And that would be me at three years old saying that I wanted to be an actor, and eventually when my sister became old enough, she's four years younger than me, blackmailing her into being my co-star/assistant in my living room performances for the audience of two, Mom and Dad.

Everything I wanted to do was performing.

Everything I wanted to do in my life was to get to the point of being a professional actor, and I'm sure many other performers out there relate to that.

So all of the subjects that I chose to do at school were, "Okay, what would be best for drama school?" Or, "What would be best, you know, for acting?" Eng- English lit, history, psychology, like, trying to choose.

My life of looking through the world, looking at the world through an actor lens, that started very early for me, and it's interesting now that I tout the total opposite, in that that can be quite dangerous to only ever see yourself as an actor and only ever see, you know, the world as opportunities or, "How can I make my career happen?" But yeah, for me, everything I did, everything I thought about, everything I wanted was about pursuing this goal.

Um, I took a gap year after school, after sixth form, to work three jobs to save as much money as possible and have the time and space to concentrate on drama school auditions.

And very, very luckily, I got in my first try to one drama school and was absolutely thrilled that all my dreams were starting to come true.

[lip smack] That feeling was not long-lived.

[laughs] Um, drama school was not the experience I hoped it to be, and I know that lots of people relate to this too.

I have talked about this throughout the podcast before, but now that I'm in my 30s, I kind of, I really look back and think of it with this new head on my shoulders, and I wish I could just go back to 19-year-old me, which was the age I was when I started first year of drama school, and give her a hug, but also shake her a little bit as well.

Because at that age, you do go from school and life at home with your parents of sort of living, you know, looking for validation, i- or, um, you know, grades, exams.

You're graded.

You want your teacher's approval.

Um, you're following, you know, other people's rules, and then suddenly you're moving out of home, you're living somewhere new.

You are with a whole new group of people in an incredibly intense environment.

I think if you've been to drama school, that might be an understatement.

And what happened for me, anyway, is that I went from that teenager going, "Okay, and what do I do next?" Sort of looking at the world and schooling, to going into drama school and looking towards these tutors and these people of influence, of going, "You are the holy grail," you know.

"Whatever you say go, goes.

You've got my life and my dreams and my aspirations in your hands.

I just have to impress you.

If I can impress you and show you that I'm worthy, you know, then I'll be on the right footing to sort of start my career." And that was a slippery slope.

And I look back at the people at, in my drama school year who were a bit older, you know, in their 30s, 40s, and looking back now, back then, I used to see some of them challenging the things that were going on at drama school or asking questions and kind of saying, "Mm, this is a bit inappropriate," and thinking, "How dare you? How dare you," like, saying, "No," how dare...

Like, "This is, you know, this is-- We should feel lucky to be here." And that's the exact frame of mind that drama schools sometimes perpetuate, which is if you say no, if you kick up a fuss, there are a hundred other people that would do anything to be in your position, so you b- should feel nothing but grateful to be here, and that opens you up to mistreatment.

Um, before I talk more about my experience at drama school, I should say that I think drama schools need to be reformed in some areas, but I'm not someone that's here to abolish all drama schools.

I think it's very important, that sort of vocational training.