CAREER ADVICE REQUIRED! - Is Broadway just a pipe dream??

If your dream is to be on Broadway then yes, the odds are that it won't come true.

If your dream is to make a living as a working actor and to pursue a career in the arts then your chances are as strong as your will and determination.

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Go for it.

Don't expect it. Hope for it.

Don't beat yourself up over factors that you can't control. At the end of the day, be satisfied that you did all you could do.

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I don't understand. So many actors only make it to Broadway once or twice - what about all the actors that are on Broadway at the moment that have had steady Broadway/West End careers - Patti LuPone, for one example has had a brilliant career on the Broadway boards...

Only you can decide your level of involvement and success. You have to really want it and it has to be a large part of your life.

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I think anyone that pursues the dream to be "a star" instead of a working actor is doing it for the wrong reasons. (No matter which medium in which you hope to work.) It's got to be the work that you love, not the possible stardom.

At some point in your journey, others will start asking you if it's time to "try something else" or "move on" or even time to "get your head out of the clouds". Only YOU can decide you've tried long enough. Some people can hold on for many years, waiting and trying. Others much less. YOU will know when it's the right time to give up (if it comes to that.)

Dream big, live realistically.

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Updated On: 2/7/11 at 03:32 AM

Some people do seem to just go from show to show with few times of unemployement. But I can name several people who have been on Broadway and haven't made it back (yet) but have found work in regional theatres, on tours, and in NYMF and other festivals.

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That's the way to do it, PJ

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For years, my response to this question was, "give it a try, what can you lose?"

But then I saw too many times exactly what people can lose - I've seen many wonderful young people, with terrific optimism and joy and positive energy, become dark, depressed, and bitter, because they felt that they had failed.

Now I say - if you can think of anything else at all that would make you happy, do that. The chances are astronomically against you that you'll even be able to make a modest living at performing - even that modest achievement is reached by only a tiny fraction of those who try to make it.

The Disney philosophy, while charming, has done a great disservice to multitudes.

I'm going to quote what Barry Dennen (Emcee in Cabaret OLC, Pilate in JCS album/Broadway/film) said to me when I asked his advice on pursuing an acting career:

"Yes, one word: don't. It's rejection after rejection after rejection. Acting makes you feel like you're going to trip. It's a trip in which you're going to be humiliated, get your feelings hurt, mocked, made fun of. People are going to trample on your feelings and they are going to reject you. Unless you have rhinoceros skin, it's a kind of business that can crush the life out of you. You have to be very, very tough.

I also don't think that actors have the best seat at the table. If you really want to have the power, you have to be a huge star and then you see what happens. They go into producing, directing, they open their own production companies, because that's where the power is. Long after your smile, your million dollar looks, and beautiful voice have faded, you keep a place at the table because of the other things you bring to your work–not the acting, the other auxiliary stuff. If you're clever enough, or talented enough I should say, to be a writer, or a director or producer, any of those things, you are set for life. But if you have to keep auditioning for your work, day after day, week after week, your whole life through, you're always in line for a job or never assured. Unless you're in a repertory company, which these days is very rare, you're never assured for work. You're always pushing. Imagine if someone was working in a business, an office, a factory, anywhere, having to audition for their job every week; having to go to a new boss every week, sit down, and tell them their capabilities and qualifications for their work. It's soul destroying.

I don't say things that young actors want to hear, because I'm telling them the truth about how damn hard it is to get ahead in the business. But you know something? If they are so powerfully motivated, they do it anyway. If people are burning with that hot flame to be actors, I think that's great. But I also say don't be just an actor. You've got the talent to make your mark as an actor, that's great, look at the other actors around you who did lots of other things as well as acting. You will see that that's a way to choreograph your life, so that you're not just acting. You have other quivers to your bow, more bullets in your gun, to keep you going when the acting jobs start to dry up."

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"Patti LuPone, for one example has had a brilliant career on the Broadway boards..."

Out of all the possibilities, he picked Patti as an example.

I just had to giggle.

Carol Burnett mentioned in her memoir One More Time that the advice she was given, and took, when going to NYC to start her career was to give it five years. If in five years she was able to sustain herself as an actress, meaning acting provided her primary source of income, then she would feel as if she had made it. If not she would have thrown in the towel and moved on with her life.

And may I add thank god she achieved that (and more). It would be hard to imagine what life would be like without her making us laugh.