How to go about becoming an actor?

How might I go about becoming an actor someday?

• I'm a sophomore in high school, and I want to be a famous actor someday with every fiber of my being. I started taking community-center acting classes when I was about six years old. I joined the Portland Theatre Brigade (look em up: www.theatrebrigade.org) when I was ten and acted with them for three and a half years. In addition, I've been in five school plays since eighth grade, including Jesus Christ Superstar and Macbeth, and I've got auditions for the Importance of Being Earnest in a couple of weeks, but no major roles yet. Hoping that will change sometime... I've never professionally acted, nor acted for the screen. I'm going to start looking into that, however. Also, I haven't done much singing, although I've been told I've got a good voice that has a lot of potential, and I'm going to have voice lessons soon (I hope). Never taken a dance class in my life, but I've picked up just fine on the choreography in the musicals I've done. I'm not sure whether I want to do stage or film acting. How might I go about reaching my dream? Yes, I know the competition is beyond fierce. Yes, I know it will involve several tons of work. But I really, really, REALLY want this. What are your thoughts? P.S. I live in Portland, Oregon, so I can't easily go down to Hollywood anytime soon.

• Answer:

  Having a dream of being famous is something most children have, but as they grow up they realise that being famous is not at all what you imagined. It really means that you have no privacy at all, wherever you go you’re stalked by the press, photographers, weirdos, etcetera. Every mistake you make, every embarrassing secret you have, every ounce of fat and every zit on your face is suddenly on the front page of every tacky magazine. You never know who your true friends are, as many of them will happily sell private stories about you for a few bucks and others don’t really like you, but hang around because you’re famous. Your family are also stalked, pestered and photographed mercilessly, and their lives will be made a misery even though you’re the famous one. To be honest, it’s a nightmare. Many ‘celebrities’ turn to alcohol and drugs because of the pressure – some crumble completely. No genuine actor wants to be famous. They act because they love acting and honestly don’t care about the money or the fame. They usually want to be the best that they can be, really good actors, but would carry on acting even if they never make much money or become well-known. However, what you've done so far is impressive, and if you're serious, you need to get into a major drama school. And you'll need to train for the stage at first - most training is done on stage, because translating that to camera-work is relatively easy for most actors. And if you get through drama schools and get enough experience to find work, you'll have to take whatever work is going for many years - most actors have a 'normal' job as well, just to pay the bills - work is hard to get and very scarce. You just have to be very talented, persistent, determined, and realistic enough to accept that you're never going to be famous. Also thick-skinned enough to cope with the endless rejection you're going to have to cope with. You just have to keep going. Good luck!