Acting in LA: How to Become a Working Actor in Hollywood

by Kristina Sexton

Each year, hundreds of aspiring and experienced actors head to LA hoping to make it big in Hollywood. While many of them have their acting chops in shape, few realize what it actually takes to survive in Tinseltown. Even if they happen to make it onto a set, many are clueless about what's expected of them and how they should behave. Acting in LA: How to Become a Working Actor in Hollywood is exactly what these actors need: a handbook to arriving, surviving, and thriving on- and off-set in LA.
Written by veteran Hollywood actor, acting coach, and acting teacher Kristina Sexton, this comprehensive guide takes no prisoners. With just enough snark to keep readers entertained--and on their toes--Acting in LA delivers solid advice on such topics as:
Headshots, resumes, and reels

How to find your "image" and market it

The SAG/AFTRA debate

Networking

Agents and managers

The importance of creating your own opportunities

Maintaining a life outside of acting

Setiquette

On-set terminology

And much more
A comprehensive guide that can be utilized by actors either inside or outside Hollywood, Acting in LA relies on Kristina's real-life experience as a working actress and exposes the pleasures, pitfalls, and practicalities of pursuing a career in acting.

216 pages, Paperback

Published November 21, 2017

About the author

Kristina Sexton has been working in Los Angeles with over 20 years of experience in the entertainment industry as an actress, writer, director, acting teacher and acting coach. She has trained in LA, New York, and London, earning a Bachelors degree in Psychology, another Bachelors in Theatre Performance and an MFA in Performance from the California Institute of the Arts. Kristina has trained and worked with several prominent acting studios before venturing on her own. Kristina now owns her own actor consultation company, On Set Coaching, where she is an acting coach and teacher. She draws on her extensive experience in the entertainment industry in order to offer practical, concrete, and relevant advice.
Kristina spends her time working as an on set dialogue (acting) coach on sets around the world. Also, she avails her self to private consultation and coaching online or in person, if you happen to be wherever she is at that time. She is primarily based out of both Los Angeles and the Gold Coast in Australia, where she came to coach a film a few years ago and ended up with an Aussie husband.

Reviews

[Tom Donaghey · Rating 4 out of 5]

ACTING IN LA by Kristina Sexton is a nice introduction to breaking into the Hollywood acting scene.
You are from a small town, a small high school, but you were the star of the stage in every production. You knew all your lines and, more over, how to deliver them for greatest impact. Your voice was great, never a dropped note, and you could emote through the song into having the audience eating from your hand. With dancing you were good enough naturally to allow you to hoof it through any production without making a fool or yourself. Be it comedy, drama, musical, farce, whatever, you were the lead people came to see.
And they all said you should go to Hollywood where your talents would make you a superstar.
They just didn’t tell you how to break into the biz.
Ms. Sexton gives you a guide to the working world of the movies and television. She has been a working actor in several movies and several television series as well as writing, director and producing several small movies of her own. It appears her knowledge has been hard won, which is great for you as she shines lights onto the right doors and avenues of approach to allow you to smoothly transition from small time to big screen. Starting with a general view of how Hollywood works, she guides you into the world of unions, workshops, getting an agent, day jobs and, most important of all for the staring actor, money.
Using her own and others experiences, with a great deal of wit, a dash of cynicism, and many lessons from the school of hard knocks, Ms. sexton gives you a good grasp on the “How To” of being a working actor.
She isn’t trying to make you a better actor, which is the true method of achievement in showbiz. But she helps you to not waste time, energy, and that small amount of money you’ve been saving up, allowing you to focus on the important things, like actually acting.
I won this book through Goodreads.

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Must read for all LA bound actors! Kristina shoots it straight but also makes it seem so very possible to pursue an acting career! An honest, straightforward, incredibly helpful and humorous read. She offers advice that you are looking for but then gives you nuggets of gold you didn't know you needed too. She knows her stuff! I will recommend this book to everyone who is about to make the jump into Hollywood.

[John Hayden · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had the good fortune to take Kristy's acting class for over a year in Los Angeles. I learned a tremendous amount during that time, and was excited to learn that she had published a book. From the first chapter it was as though I was in her class again! The content was a refresher on some of the points that I had not focused on in some time, and a wealth of new insights.

Overall, I felt a renewed sense of confidence that can only come from someone who intimately understands how acting works in LOS ANGELES. Thank you for sharing this, Kristy!

[Laura Larson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is am excellent book. Ms. Sextom goes into great detail through each step of the process to become a paid actors in Hollywood. She goes from start to finish, giving expected cost breakdown, where to skimp or splurge, a complete dictionary of acting terms and slang, really everything you could possibly want to know.

[Karyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed reading this book. I found it easy to comprehend and straightforward. The book covered all the questions I myself wanted to know regarding overseas expectations and has a good dose of humor thrown in which adds to its charm. I hope this author continues sharing her knowledge with the dreamers of the acting circle as she herself encourages the reader to keep pushing to reach your dream. It is possible. Loved the book.