New Term

Even though my school days  are now nothing but a distant memory, this time of year always feels like a new beginning. September brings a new term with new hopes and new targets. I've just taken the whole of August off to work on my new book, and  other than one days corporate training in mid August, it's been a month of tracksuit bottoms and typing.

Next week sees me get back to work. The suits will have to come out of the wardrobe. A trip to Amsterdam for a job, a two-day corporate training programme, and an Actors Centre board meeting, and a voice-over if I'm lucky.

I'd like to think that the next year will be like a new term. Lots of new things to learn, and new experiences.  "I like to think I learn something new on every job" is a phrase that has probably become slightly hackneyed. Most of the jobs I do I'm given because I know how to do them. Yet I would hope that I learn something new about human nature, people, or which car park not to park in at Gatwick on most of the jobs I do. I don't set out looking for this new learning. After all we don't often know what we need to learn until we find ourselves deficient in the knowledge.

That's why I think it's often difficult for people to make the most of the fabulous resource that is the Actors Centre. A huge range of workshops are provided, but often it's difficult for us to identify what we need as performers. I think it is reasonably safe to say that, even though the drama schools are acknowledging the fact, most British drama training is still theatre based, and more time is spent on stage than in front of a camera. Camerawork takes expensive resources, and even though drama schools are now packed to the gills with £27,000 graduates, money is something that is still in short supply. The provision of a working television studio or film set is something that remains beyond many of them. So some of the most popular classes at the Actors Centre are classes in screen work. Young actors identifying something they don't feel on top of and want to improve. Yet, after three years training and parting with a considerable sum of money, most young actors just want to hit the ground running and work. That's when you learn. When you're doing the job.

The Actors Centre is not a job centre, even if on a quiet day it may sometimes have the disparate feel of one.  It's an institution that is there to support actors. That's why it was founded nearly 40 years ago. The English actor does not, in general, feel the need to take class. Americans do class. Americans do class brilliantly. Some American actors, I think, work in cafes or restaurants and then do class. That is their career. They never actually act. The English are more reserved. There is a feeling among many actors that merely going into the Actors Centre is admitting failure and showing to the world that you're out of work. That's certainly how I felt about it until I got involved and became Chairman of the Board.

 Through the Actors Centre I've had the pleasure of meeting many young graduates at the start of their career full of hope and aspiration and potential. One thing the Actors Centre can do is ensure that they are around long enough to realise that potential. Every day you are a working actor. You may not be acting today, but you're still a working actor. The one thing that you do today that may define that may be just popping into the building to have a coffee and catch up with other actors. Being with the tribe. And then you get on with life.

 From 1 October we'll be running "The Working Actor" season, where alongside the normally excellent range of workshops, I have had the pleasure of creating workshops focused on being a working actor. Choosing your head shots, sorting your tax, finding out our casting directors work, getting work that uses your acting skills that will help pay the way between major acting jobs, finding out what a producer does, and working out how to get the best PR. I am immensely grateful to all the people who are coming into the building to deliver these workshops, and I'm thrilled for all the people who, I hope, are going to book them.

Lots of reasons to go back to school.