Creating your acting résumé is the first chance a potential casting director, talent agent, or indeed director, gets of seeing you and finding out more about your capabilities and attributes. It will also help them decide whether or not you are the just the person they should be casting. With this in mind you need to ensure that both the résumé and the headshot that you will attach to the front are high quality and professional.


Your Headshot
First, be sure to attach your headshot - a good photograph showing your features - to the front, with your résumé details attached behind the photo. Your headshot should be the best that you can afford. Make sure it's professional and follows the industry standard - ensuring the casting director or talent agent it seeing a high quality image along with your professional résumé.

Your Résumé
A casting director can decide in the first few seconds of reading whether this person should be auditioned or not, so the more time you spend initially putting together your résumé then the more likely your chances of being contacted about castings.

An actors résumé should be just one page of your most important acting experience including stage and theatre roles, training and of course a background to your education. The résumé is the first point of contact between you and a potential casting director, so take advice from someone like your mentor or another person in the industry in order that you get it right - and have them check it for you in case you have missed some crucial points or have missed a small error. Some actors pay to have their résumé printed on the reverse of the headshot, however just by attaching the headshot and résumé back-to-back is much less expensive and means it is easier to update.

Firstly, remember that your acting résumé should be tidy, attractive, and easy to read from top to bottom and free of errors. Add a description of your physical being and ensure that you add all contact information so that you can be contacted when required - name, telephone and mobile numbers, any alternative numbers that you can be contacted on and perhaps your email address.

It is a good idea to think of your acting résumé as a first audition - if you don't impress the 'judge' at this point, then you are likely to be unsuccessful in getting any further with this casting. With this in mind, it is vital that you get the résumé right and looking good.

Final Word
Finally, a good piece of advice is to ensure that when you are ready, the final print out is completed on a good grade of paper using a high quality printer, if you don't have one then ask for a friend to print it out for you. Keep a copy yourself and have it copied as many times as you need at a printing store (can be found in stationery stores) as the copies will be just as good as the original.

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Copyright © Sarah Bennett. All rights reserved. Used with permission of the author. Not to be reproduced or distributed.

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