How do I get actors to want to travel to make a movie?

H

harmonica44

It seems that there are just not enough actors in one place to choose from. I live in Saskatoon Canada. There are some here, but not enough. Some in Calgary, some in Edmonton. Both those cities are six hours away. But it seems you won't find all the actors you want and all the locations you can get, all in one city. But most actors it seems are unwilling to travel in my attempts to recruit some, even though I am totally willing to pay for gas money. Is it also wrong to audition actors over webcam, if you don't live in the same area? Some might feel so.

I realize it's kind of a drag to drive or six hours, shoot for eight, or hopefully less, then drive back home for another 6, on your day off, even with pay. But how else does one get a movie made? Is their anything I can do to really get people interested?
 
Pay them. Not just expenses, pay for their time and effort. You're right, nobody wants to drive for 12 hours, it's ridiculous. Fly them out. Pay them well. Easy.

Plus, you only want them for one day 8 hour day? Or would they be expected to drive back again? If so, put them up in a hotel, it'd be cheaper then paying for fuel twice over.
 
and if that's absolutely not an option, write a script that will work with the people and things you do have access to locally, or you travel to where the actors are and shoot there..

But really, you should probably pay them, actors are more or less the hardest working folks on set. Even if it doesn't seem like it.
 
I realize it's kind of a drag to drive or six hours, shoot for eight, or hopefully less, then drive back home for another 6, on your day off, even with pay. But how else does one get a movie made? Is their anything I can do to really get people interested?
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This is the kind of thing you can answer yourself. It's an invention called a question. Try asking the actors. You need to find out their motivation. If they're looking for experience, you might find someone interested, or they may just wait for the experience to be closer to home. If you're looking for talented actors that need exposure, you may need to grow to the point where they'll get exposure from you. Then they'll come running. You have to make it a win-win situation. Driving 12 hours, working for 8 for someone who hasn't completed a project might not have the motivation they're looking for without copious amounts of money.
 
Okay thanks, I will pay them. How much do you think I should pay each of them. I know I should write locally, but I tried that and only five people came to the audition. I need more.

As far as a motel goes, most people can only work about one day a week. Like a Saturday or weekend day off for everyone. No one wants to go a few days in a row cause of their day jobs, and I don't blame them off course. So I would have to keep paying them to drive in.
 
harmonica44 said:
only five people came to the audition. I need more
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I dunno, if it were me, and I hadn't yet made a film and every other option for actors were 6+ hours away... I think my response would be more along the lines of, "I need to write a story that will work for the 5 people that are local" or "I need to move"
 
Ryan/H44 have you completed a short film yet? Using your 6 local actors get a good short filn under your belt and then you will be able to attract more local talent :)
 
Harmonica, I had a similar problem as yourself. But after I carefully calculated the actual cost for shooting in a distant location (death by a thousand cuts), I soon realized I could use 1/2 that money to rent a location, locally. I'll use some of the remaining money toward better food. Everybody wins.

Also, the odds of someone bailing on my shoot is reduced with a local shoot.

Thomas
 
Okay thanks. Me and some collaborators are almost finished putting together a short. When he's done with post production, I hope it's show-off-able.

As far renting locations here, I could do that, but their are just not enough actors in one city. I need to get them from different cities, and have them come to whatever location I get.
 
So why not go to where the actors are? It's surely a lot less expensive to put you and your collaborators up in a cheap hotel room or two and pay the actors a small stipend than to pay six or more people to travel to you and to put them all up in a hotel and to feed them three squares plus the craft table and to pay them a full day rate.

You are constantly putting limitations on yourself. People here offer you solutions and all you do is whine "I can't because..." If there's no film action where you are, go to where the action is. Now is the time to take a risk while you're young; if you don't you'll spend the rest of your life on regrets. I settled where I am because I'm less than an hour from downtown Manhattan and only 20 minutes from Stamford, CT, which is a growing media mecca. My home is five minutes from three major highways and a train station, 20 minutes from an regional airport and just over an hour from three major air hubs (JFK, LaGuardia and Newark).

You're not going to catch any fish in the middle of the Sahara Desert, which is what you seem to complain about most. So take the chance and move to New York, or LA, or Vancouver, or Atlanta. Yeah, it's freakin' scary, but do it for Bogs sake!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Yeah but then I have no money for future projects. I have tried to secure locations where the actors are then I can just go with a couple of crew, for those shoot days, but so far location owners don't want to rent it out to someone they haven't met in person it seems. I know everyone says to move, but then their is no money for movies.

I could work three jobs like it was suggested before, but I am trying to help make two shorts right now, and even I barely have time to do that, with just one job. Plus the bigger cities, have much more expensive permits to film anyway, so it wouldn't help. It seems New York, L.A., and Vancouver, are for more wealthy filmmakers only. I guess I will just keep looking for actors who don't mind traveling for a day and hope to find some.
 
You can't travel to another city ? You can't spend so much money on more actors ?

Rewrite your script ,do it so it can fit 5 people and do your movie.
 
their are just not enough actors in one city.
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I find that really hard to believe. I'm doing a lot of stuff on the Gold Coast in Australia. Population of half a million. I looked up the details for Saskatchewan:

Source Wikipedia: As of July 2012, the population of Saskatchewan was estimated at 1,079,958. Residents primarily live in the southern half of the province.

Gold Coast really has no filming hub apart from a movie based theme park. I'm a part of 4 Gold Coast productions at the moment that all have between 5 and 10 actors, with no real cross overs, and I'm sure I have 40+ more actors on my FB friends thingy (Yeah, I can speak fb, right?). While population numbers isn't a real indication of how many actors live in that part of your country, I'm sure you're going to be able to find your cast and crew if you looked harder. What about the productions that weren't yours, I'm sure there were actors on those shoots you can call on, right?
 
With all do respect to users on here saying 'more I can't, I can't, I can't', there is such thing as the impossible, or their is such thing as a problem that has to be circumvented.

I have tried but I cannot think of a script with only five people. So why bother making a script when you can't think of one with only five that will make sense anyway...

And filmming in the bigger cities, requires expensive permits. Permits in that can be thousands of dollars, where as here, you can shoot for free, as long as the owner of the location gives you permission.

Well maybe in Saskatchewan their are not as many people wanting to become actors. The southern half of the province is still at least a 3 hour drive for people, depending on where they live and where the locations I have access to, will be. So as long as they don't mind possibly three hours drive, which I will pay for in their fee. But that's only if I can find enough people who want to act, and are good at it. I have been looking on sites such as Craigslist and kijiji but not enough people responding. I tried Mandy which was recommended to me on here before, along with those other sites, but those sites, only have a few people in cities that are at least 6 hours away.
 
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I made this several years ago, it only has 3 people.
https://vimeo.com/1186238

Aside from a few extras here and there, Cast Away only had Tom Hanks.. Moon is an even better example, just Sam Rockwell.

Filmmaking IS problem solving. If you can't solve these relatively basic problems, maybe it's not for you?
 
harmonica44 said:
With all do respect to users on here saying 'more I can't, I can't, I can't', there is such thing as the impossible, or their is such thing as a problem that has to be circumvented.

I have tried but I cannot think of a script with only five people. So why bother making a script when you can't think of one with only five that will make sense anyway...
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Then if you want to actually shoot the scripts that you write you have to write scripts that fit within your budgetary and other limitations. You shelve the "big" projects until you can afford them. Or you need to be much more creative. After more than 3,500 posts you still have not completed one project.

harmonica44 said:
And filmming in the bigger cities requires expensive permits. Permits that can be thousands of dollars, where as here, you can shoot for free, as long as the owner of the location gives you permission.
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More excuses. I've worked on many films that were shot in the NY Metro area that did not require expensive permits. There are many, many privately owned locations in major cities and lots of people who would be thrilled to be part of the filmmaking process at whatever level, even if it's just donating a location. And most major cities have film collectives that work under blanket permits if you do need to work in a public location.
 
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