Need to know

Q I am expecting to be made redundant from my (very dull) job in administration when public sector finances are cut back. I’ve got a burning desire to pursue my life’s ambition of becoming a stage actor, but I’m nearly 30. Have I left it too late?

A Certain leg bone structures, it seems, can keep aspiring acrobats from joining Russian circus schools. Anatomy will certainly impact on the chances an aspiring ballet dancer or opera singer has of being accepted to a major school or of having a successful career. Likewise, the career span of a professional ballet dancer as a performer can be limited, and opera singers have been known to eventually retire or at least stop attempting certain arias.
None of the above applies to actors: neither age nor anatomy will keep an aspiring actor from the best of acting schools or from having a successful career. It could even be said that the older the actor takes up acting the better: greater life experience and emotional maturity will allow him or her to tackle a wider variety of roles and the sense of discipline achieved in adult life through employment will allow a mature student to make the most of learning opportunities an acting school can offer. This includes professional practice provision (i.e. information delivered regarding agents, casting directors, etc.) which young students may often be too squeamish or too self-assured to fully benefit from. As far as anatomy is concerned, as with supply and demand, the more unique the actor’s physicality, the fewer competitors there will be for the type of roles he or she can play. It is actually people who correspond to current concepts of beauty who face the staunchest competition in professional life. By the same token, one can surmise how much less competition a trained mature actor will face professionally – there being fewer of them coming out of acting schools. As for talent, that elusive concept, perhaps only a round of auditions in a number of UK acting schools can give objective information on how high an aspiring actor scores in that category.