What photos belong in an actor's portfolio?
Whether you are going for a lead part or work as an extra, or have your profile on on Spotlight, Backstage, Actors Access, Casting Networks, or Project Casting, an up-to-date portfolio of actor headshots is essential. Casting directors will not look at photographs for more than a couple of seconds, and so headshots must be eye-catching and memorable. The current trend for head shots is to look despondent off into the middle distance in a de-saturated photo with crushed blacks. No doubt it is important to have at least one photo in your portfolio that matches current trends, but that should not be the sum total of what you show off.
Consternation
Moreover, your portfolio must remain current with how you look now, not how you looked six months ago. Have you grown your hair out, dyed it pink, or grown beard? A casting agent will be angry at you wasting their time if you turn up to an audition not looking like the photos you have presented. So, when it comes to updating your portfolio, what photos should you include?
I thought about writing a blog article on this topic as it comes to the last month of rehearsals for a play that I will be acting in. At the Folkestone Tower Theatre, in a play called Hobson's Choice, I'll be playing the part of Willie Mossop. Mossop is a bootmaker who pretty much lives in the basement of the shop, but who ends up marrying the daughter of the shop's owner and is dragged up by his shoelaces to become the master of his old place of work.
I'm particularly enjoying the part because, in order to bring the character to life, I have to demonstrate Willie's arc from a lowly bootmaker with no knowledge of life and social relationships, and who spends most of his day underground, to a savvy businessman who is educated by his wife to end up offering Hobson a choice he can't refuse.
Unsure
As I began rehearsing for the part, I started thinking about how I hold my body and how my face would maintain the sorts of expressions needed to show Willie at the various stages of both his social awareness, but also his self-confidence. I'm sure you will have seen people who lack self-confidence stand stooped, with hunched shoulders, and often-averting eyes. On the other hand, those with genuine confidence tend not to lean back and swagger around the place but instead they look directly at people, usually openly and with a varying degree of warmth.
These are the sorts of expressions an actor needs to demonstrate in their portfolio as they prepare it for a variety of different roles. Think about the parts that you play well at the moment, but also the sorts of parts that you want to play in the future. I recently shot a wonderful local actress, Dounia, who was tired of getting typecast as either the young child or the aloof upper class madam, so I asked her to think about what she would like to play in the future. We began to play with different emotions and expressions after she told me that she wanted to play more serious, naturalist characters. You can see some of her work on my portfolio page.
Disbelief
Another tip that I can give to you from my experience as a dancer is to think about where you hold your weight, and what you are doing with your off-weight leg. Rather than stand on both feet with your weight in the middle, try moving your weight from one foot to the other, forward and back, whilst either straightening or bending the other. If you look at Greek and Roman statues, their models never have their weight on both legs but, instead, demonstrate emotion through a range of body shapes supported with their weight on one leg more than the other. This does not mean however that the other leg can go floppy! I appreciate that we are still talking about head shots, but posture and the support you give your torso plays a big part in how your photo will come out.
You have seen in this article for photos of me that I took to show what I meant by the character arc of Willie Mossop. If I was to pay a photographer for head shots, I would probably wear a better fitting shirt, but these will give you some ideas as to how you should fill your portfolio!
Confidence
If you would like to work with a photographer who also acts and appreciates the importance of a varied portfolio to show an actor’s range, please do have a look at my portfolio get in touch!