In tough financial times, many performance venues are putting on shows and asking their actors to work for free. As an actor, how can you protect yourself from 'no pay' work?
Everyone from your mum to the bloke that works down the chip shop will tell you that acting is a tough career. No doubt you will be heartily sick of hearing that by now.
What they might not know is how much worse it’s getting. Many jobs on casting websites are unpaid, but offer ‘Great Experience...’, ‘Excellent Exposure....’
The issues around unpaid acting work
In these tough financial times, funding is becoming harder to find. In theatre especially, some venues find it impossible to put on shows without asking their actors to work for free.
Don’t think you are somehow cheapening your art by asking for payment.
Other actors will band together to form companies to put on their own work and fund it out of their own pockets. In cases like that, you would think that it’s perfectly OK to ‘volunteer’ your time and not ask for a wage.
The problem is, in most cases, asking you to work unpaid is actually illegal. The National Minimum Wage is there for a very important reason. It protects workers, including actors, from being exploited. There are very few exemptions and even large employers get it wrong when it comes to actors because we’re an odd bunch.
We’re self-employed when it comes to our tax return, but for National Insurance and generally when we’re doing the job of acting we are ‘workers’ who are most definitely not exempt from at least the National Minimum Wage or the appropriate Equity rate, whatever your employer might tell you.
(Registered Charities can still get around this, but the legislation is somewhat contradictory and pretty unproven in a court of law.)
Since 2009, there has been a very real threat of penalties to anyone who does not pay at least National Minimum Wage to its workers. HM Revenue & Customs has signalled its intention to spot-check companies in the arts and media where No Pay abuses are taking place.
Who can afford to work for free?
So where does this leave the new actors who perhaps want to put on their own show? Or those that want to get some experience with a small unfunded theatre company above a pub?
Should you be wary of putting a show together just in case someone tries to take you to court a few months later? Should you be demanding a wage from a company that has no money?
In an ideal world, money wouldn’t matter. We would be free to work for no pay. We would be sustained purely by the art and a fairy godmother would wave her wand and make the bills go away.
However, in the real world we have to tread a fine line between our art and our rent, and it’s incredibly difficult to figure out who is genuinely not able to pay us, and who is making a choice not to pay us just because they can get away with it.
For the last ten years we have been sleepwalking into a situation where we have an industry that is only open to those that can afford to work for no money all their life.
7 ways to protect yourself
So what’s the answer? You are.
We’re all desperate for that next job, first job, the job that will get an agent in to see us, the job that stops us going completely mad with boredom. But we all need to take a few steps to protect ourselves and our future prospects.
1. Know your rights
Check out online resources like Equity, BECTU’s Creative Toolkit, Actors Minimum Wage website. Knowledge is power.
2. Is the company really that poor?
Do you really want to work for a company that has chosen to budget only for certain people?
Do some digging when you apply for a No Pay job. Find out if the company that you’re auditioning for is really that poor:
- Is the director getting paid?
- Are the backstage crew getting a wage?
- Do they have Arts Council funding?
If the answer is 'yes' to any of the above, consider – do you really want to work for a company that has chosen to budget only for certain people?
In the case of an Arts Council funded show, remember they will have budgeted for your wages as part of their application. Also, film and drama schools looking to employ actors for directing projects are paying everyone at that institution apart from you. Think about that.
3. Ask the company directly
Does the company have an open book policy? If yes, then you can ask to see a breakdown of where any funding/profit goes.
4. Understand the risks
If you’re putting on a show yourself – remember you are running a risk. It might be a miniscule one if it’s a bunch of mates just wanting to keep busy, just make sure that everyone understands what the risks are.
No money will probably mean no insurance either. Have you thought about what happens if someone injures themselves?
5. Try and get funding
Looking for funding is not that complicated and by no means impossible. If you have a fantastic idea, you might be surprised how much support there could be. Take a look at the following:
- The Princes Trust
- Crowd funding websites
- Search the Find Funding database
If the idea is good, isn’t it worth doing it justice and doing it really well? Stand out from the crowd as there’s a lot of fringe theatre out there. Funders might agree with your great idea and fund you. Give it a go.
6. Consider joining Equity
If you’re already a professional performer or graduate from a NCDT drama school, make sure you are a member of Equity.
You wish to be a professional, so you need to think like one.
If you feel that you have been exploited on a job (even after it has finished) then you may have a strong case to take the employer to court for the wages you were entitled to.
Equity can help you with that, instead of tackling it on your own. Equity also has a Job Information Service where you will find the odd decent acting job posted – all paid. Much better than some of the so-called ‘casting’ websites out there.
7. Think like a professional
Remember that a wage and an acting job aren’t necessarily different things. Do not be afraid of asking questions and don’t think that you are somehow cheapening your art by asking for payment.
You wish to be a professional, so you need to think like one. There will always be a place for unpaid collaboration and exciting shoestring productions which bring in rewards other than money, but they need to be the exception, not the rule.
We need to protect our industry and ourselves... from ourselves.
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