Actor

The glamourous picture of an actor's life attracts many people to the profession, but the sad reality is that at any one time more than 80 per cent of actors are out of work. It is very difficult to make a living in this business, and most people have to be content with acting as a hobby in amateur theatre or part-time professional work. Having said that, however, someone with a great deal of determination and talent can make headway, especially if they make the effort to learn at drama school and also make good contacts with others already in the profession. They work in theatres, film and television studios, on location, etc. Work can be either indoors or outdoors, when sometimes the physical demands can be considerable. The range of activities that fall under the umbrella term 'acting' is large, from puppetry to high classical theatre. The work often involves long periods of inactivity, for instance in films when the sets are being changed, which prompted one actor to observe that 'film acting is 98 per cent boredom followed by two per cent of terror'.