Parents, Do You Have the Flexibility Needed for Your Child’s Acting Career?

Do you have a flexible schedule to accommodate the demands of your child’s acting career?

Once when my daughter got a last-minute audition, I was in the laundry room in our apartment complex moving half-washed clothes from a broken washer to a working one. I’d forgotten my cell phone, so I missed several calls from my daughter’s manager.

I grabbed the ringing phone as I walked in the door to our apartment. The manager had been calling for 30 minutes and was frantic.

Fortunately, I was able to find appropriate clothing, retrieve our wet clothes from the laundry, grab necessary items, and pick my daughter up from school early so we could be at the audition on time.

That 30-minute delay almost made us miss the audition, and it resulted in an annoyed manager. But because I had the flexibility to drop everything and go, we were still able to get to the audition.

Parents, do you have the flexibility needed for your child’s acting or modeling career?

It really is very important that at least one parent of a child actor or model has a flexible schedule. Are you available, at a moment’s notice, to take your child to auditions and jobs?

If you don’t have that flexibility, do you have another relative or friend who can fill in or a person you can pay to do it for you?

You also need to keep your cellphone nearby so your child’s talent manager or agent can contact you quickly.

Occasionally, there are auditions that pop up suddenly and you need to be there within couple of hours. You don’t want to miss these last-minute auditions because chances are a lot of other people might!

Typically, kids’ auditions are in the afternoon and early evening on weekdays. There are some on weekends as well.

You may find out about an audition a few days before, but most often you find out the day before, and sometimes only hours before. You have to be able to drop whatever you are doing and get going.

You also have to have time to do whatever preparations are necessary prior to the audition, such as putting together proper clothing, printing sides (lines) for the audition, rehearsing with your child, and getting directions.

If your child gets a job, you or another adult you give responsibility to has to also be at the job. You might find out your child has “booked” the job as late as one or two days before the job starts. So arrangements often have to be made quickly.