Why Actors Need a Business Plan (and a Sense of Humor!) with Thomas M. Copeland

S04E09: In this episode of the Late Bloomer Actor, host David John Clark speaks with Tom Copeland, an actor and entrepreneur, about the importance of treating an acting career like a business. They discuss Tom's journey from a business background to acting, the concept of being a late bloomer, and the significance of self-taping and branding in the industry. Tom shares insights on diversifying income streams and the value of experience, emphasizing that actors should focus on the work and not just the fame.


Takeaways

- Talent and training are only half the equation.
- Actors must treat their careers like a business.
- Branding and strategy are essential for longevity in acting.
- Self-taping is a crucial investment in an actor's career.
- Late bloomers bring valuable life experiences to acting.
- Professionalism is key in the acting industry.
- Diversifying income streams can provide stability for actors.
- The journey in acting is often unplanned and should be embraced.

Find Tom on Instagram under 'CastingTom', or his website 'CastingTom'. 

Find everything about the podcast at Big Break Pod.

And if you're keen to try out ShowCoach, download the app straight to your phone.

Transcript

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David John Clark (00:00)

Good morning everyone and welcome back to the Late Bloomer Actor. As actors, we spend so much time perfecting the craft with classes, self tapes, auditions, rehearsals, but too often the part we ignore is the part that actually determines whether our careers last. And that is the business. And that's been the theme this year. And that's where today's guest comes in as well. Tom or Thomas Copeland is not only an actor working in theatre, television, film and commercials. He's also an entrepreneur,

a creator and the host of Big Break Pod, which is where I got to meet him, a show dedicated to the business of show business. With a background in business administration and a successful career in legal tech, Tom brings a perspective to acting that most of us desperately need. How to run our careers like a business and not just a dream. He's also the founder of Showcoach, a platform designed to help actors improve their self tapes and learn more roles. And he's built multiple companies

across creative and tech spaces. In short, Tom knows exactly what it takes to bridge artistry with entrepreneurship. Gotta love that word, don't you? And this conversation feels like the perfect way to wrap up season four because all year long I've been exploring the business side of acting. This is the last stop before we head into the end of year special in October and I wanted to go out with a bang. So what better way than to sit down with someone who lives and breathes

the business of show business. So please enjoy and we'll see you at the end.

David John Clark (01:30)

Good morning. Good morning, everyone. You are coming back to the Late Bloomer Actor. It is eight o'clock in the morning for me. I'm on the back of a night shift. So if I'm looking a bit haggard, that's why I've just finished a 10 hour night shift. I'll come straight in here to talk to a Mr. Tom or Thomas Copeland all the way from the States. Good morning.

Thomas M Copeland (01:49)

Good morning, good morning. And that's actually afternoon for me. So I also look tired because I'm coming from a full day of work and a toddler. So that's, so we're both, we're both coming in with tired faces for different reasons, but what, but we're here.

David John Clark (01:59)

⁓ nice.

I should have more energy then.

Tom's joining me today to talk about why business matters just as much as craft and how shifting your mindset could be the difference between struggling and thriving in this industry. So welcome to the Late Bloomer Actor Show, Tom.

Thomas M Copeland (02:17)

Yeah, hey David, well I'm pleased to be here and pleased to chat with you and the rest of your audience. I know we've been trying to get this together for quite some time. A lot of back and forth on Instagram, but we made it happen. So I'm really, really excited that you invited me here. I'm excited to chat with you and impart whatever knowledge I have and can.

David John Clark (02:33)

And thank you.

I love it. I love it. And that's what my podcast is about. It's about sharing information and reaching out to people that are involved in my journey as an actor. And I've met you because you're a podcast host yourself with The Big Break Pod which I've listened to every episode now. It's a brand new on the market. So if you haven't checked it guys, check it out and there will be links in the show notes. Before we go into things, Tom, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself, how

and why you're an actor and what you do in this industry leading towards that discussion we're going to have about the business side of acting.

Thomas M Copeland (03:09)

Yeah, great. I ⁓ am also a late bloomer actor. So I mean, figure that one out. It's amazing that we found each other here. So I actually, did do some acting in high school, just typical acting high school stuff. And I did, of course, read all about you and your journey, David, and this idea that like people come out of high school and they go to college for acting and like...

they do or don't thrive. You know what mean? Like it's just something you do at that age that has absolutely no bearing on what the future of your, and I think these are my words, not yours, let me put my words on it, but that you come out of college at 22 and it has absolutely no bearing, maybe you've got some great training, that's fantastic, maybe you went to a great school, maybe you've met some incredible people, but it has really no bearing on what the future of your life is gonna be. And that was sort of the path that I took was, I think I had the...

Maybe the foresight, I don't know what you call it, maybe just the guidance, maybe the mentorship to recognize that. And so I went to college for business. I ended up going to college at University of Florida. That's here on our, case the majority of your guests are over the pond over there. We're here in Florida. I'm actually in New York City now, I'll get to that, but in Florida I went to UF and I went to business school. So for me, just getting a general business degree was very practical

for me and it led to me being able to get a career in technology and in marketing and that led to a career in entrepreneurship after I started my first company a few years after college and then things kind of took off from there on a professional level for me where I kind of started getting into like legal services and legal software and I won't bore you with all of that but the thing is is that it was you know like

David John Clark (04:42)

Wow.

Thomas M Copeland (04:45)

It was an industry that's growing and that allowed me to create some real opportunity for myself and my company and my company, you know, ballooned because of that. So that's what really kind of gave me the freedom after 15 years of that to start to explore what else I want to do in my life. And I've always been, I think anyway, a very gifted writer and I've always been really interested in writing and I've always been interested in reading lots and lots and lots of plays and scripts. So I've sort of always written and then it wasn't until

like so many of other guests, I'm sure you've had as many other people out there, it wasn't until really like right before the pandemic that, and right after the pandemic that I kind of realized, you know, kind of snapped me into like, what am I doing? So I also at that time had a, you know, I also at that time was going through a, I mean, I'll just say it, I was going through a divorce that was really difficult and I just, yeah, and I just wanted to do something for myself for the first time in a really long time.

And so I went and I auditioned for a local musical at the local theater in my town and I got the part. I think over the objections of the musical director probably because I couldn't really sing, but they hired me anyway. Yeah, now I can. Then I could not. There was like a moment where the musical director took the director away and was like, are you sure about this? I could hear them. And the director was like, yeah, just take him by the room and run some songs with him. See if he can sing.

David John Clark (05:49)

So you can sing as well.

Thomas M Copeland (06:08)

Anyway, I couldn't sing, but they hired me anyway. And then I learned to sing and that was a, that was a, that was a blast. So I really got bit at that point. And it was really the stage that brought me back first and foremost. Anyway, to fast forward after that, I did a number of shows at that particular theater in Florida. was a small theater in a small town in Florida. My closest home market was Miami. So I began to get jobs in Miami, got an agent, things started moving. And then there just kind of came a time.

David John Clark (06:12)

Wow.

Thomas M Copeland (06:32)

After that, when I feel like I sort of did everything that I could do in Miami, it's a really small market. There's not a lot of films. There's sometimes TV, but not much. This is probably what's happening over there to David, which is that it's all about state incentives and it's all about country. It's all about like federal and state incentives and like which states are funding film projects, right? And television. And so here we could talk, a whole conversation about this, of course, but here Florida is just one of those states that doesn't invest in it. So we just don't have a lot of work.

David John Clark (06:39)

Okay.

Mmm.

Thomas M Copeland (07:01)

And you compare that to something like LA or Albuquerque or Atlanta or New York. Those are our big our big four. So that led to the next big record reckoning, which is that I realized I wanted to go do something that people are going to see and that meant moving out of Florida. So I somehow convinced my wife surprisingly quickly, my wife now, I somehow convinced her surprisingly quickly to move me, let me move her and our baby up to New York City. And that was a year ago. And so here we are. So that is the whole journey.

Yeah. And so now I see New York City right out my window right here. it's been a journey for the last year for sure. It's been wonderful.

David John Clark (07:36)

Nice.

That is awesome. And I'm assuming since you've been through a divorce before, you put a lot of thought into these sort of moves to make sure that you're not doing something that might cause that to happen again.

Thomas M Copeland (07:53)

Yeah, that's true. Yeah, talking

was a really good first step. Talking about things is a really good first step. Communication 101 communication.

David John Clark (07:57)

I love it. And now,

I love it. And now you were saying that before, you can class yourself as a late bloomer. So I'm not going to ask you how old you are. You've got a young child. But what's your thoughts of what is a late bloomer and how does that change for different people? Because, typically a lot of people think a late bloomer is an old person that's come in and done something.

But you're not an old person, so what's your thoughts on that?

Thomas M Copeland (08:27)

What a cool question. I have two thoughts on it. First, I'm happy to answer your question because I'm just happy to. And I like to reveal things. I guess I'm open. I'll give an age range. I typically get hired for 35 to 42, but I just turned 40 this year. It was, you know, it's like, you know, I don't know, halftime. So like, have to like, I have to kind of figure it out, you know, what the second half of this is all going to be.

David John Clark (08:43)

I love it. Nice.

I love it.

Thomas M Copeland (08:54)

And so when we started having the conversations about moving, was probably around like, I was like 38 years old and I was starting to drop the hints that like, I think there's more out there. I've lived in Florida for 38 years. I've got this notion, you know, that, you know, I've got some talent and some drive and some ambition and I've got something to explore and something to push. And if I could get out of Florida and go to like New York, for example, it could really blossom and open up.

David John Clark (08:55)

Hmm.

Mmm.

Thomas M Copeland (09:20)

That was really what drove that. To answer your question about the late bloomer, it's a great question because I personally struggled with that quite a bit actually. So one of the things that brought me to New York City was not just moving up here. I actually wanted to go do an MBA. The equivalent here of a Master of Business of Arts, it's a graduate level degree at an acting school. That's what I wanted to do.

David John Clark (09:26)

Thank you.

Mm-hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (09:46)

And I applied, applied, applied, work, work, work, got into a few, didn't get into the ones I wanted to. But then I kind of got this surprise little, this is how like life's life always goes. I had this surprise little fork in the road and that surprise little fork in the road was that a very close friend of my brother's, my brother is a producer in Los Angeles. He's an episodic television producer in Los Angeles. He's been on The Big Break Pod. For any guests out there who are interested in hearing him chat. He's incredible. Yeah, Chris. Yeah, he's awesome.

David John Clark (10:10)

I It's a ⁓

nice connection to have when you're an actor. ⁓

Thomas M Copeland (10:16)

Indeed, indeed.

He's just a wealth of knowledge and him and I just spend we spend time all the time talking about this. So like, I just put him on the podcast and we just talked on the podcast, which is very cool. So but anyway, so Chris connected me with somebody very close friends of his who is an Emmy award winning actor, Bill Baretta also on the podcast, he won an Emmy for the Muppets last year. And he went to this place called the Neighborhood Playhouse, which the more I learned it looked into it, the more I was intrigued by it. What it is, is it's a

one to two year you choose your track, but one to two year theater conservatory. It's like an old school theater conservatory where you get dance and singing and movement and voice and acting. And what was really unique about it is American theater has a very rich, obviously London does as well, so no comparisons here, but America has its own aesthetic in its theater and it was really created in the 1930s, really from the 1930s to the 1950s by really

by very famous playwrights and very famous actors like Sanford Meisner, Clifford Odetz, Stella Adler, yada yada. Out of that group, that was called the group theater, and out of that group came a man named Sanford Meisner who went on to teach at the Neighborhood Playhouse for about 50 years. He's like a legend around New York City, and this was his school. So there was something really...

David John Clark (11:19)

Mm-hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (11:35)

really drawing to me about that concept of being immersed in like theater history at a school that's literally 100 years old this in two years I think they're in their 98th year. And so all that being said that was the reason why I came up to New York City. Now circling finally back to your question I was at 40 years old you know one of like you know I think maybe three other people who were like coming up on 40 or close to 40 and everybody else it was different.

David John Clark (11:52)

I love it.

Thomas M Copeland (12:03)

to sure it was different age ranges. was all kinds of different age ranges, which was nice. It was very diverse, but you know, we were like the oldest ones in the group, like obviously. And so there was definitely some self consciousness there for me that took me some time to get over. And it took me talking to friends, talking to my wife, talking to, you know, people at school, but it took a little bit, but I eventually got comfortable and I'm so happy I did it.

You know, I think for me, the question of what does it mean to be a late bloomer, not to be a downer, but to me, it was a little bit, that was kind of my first experience. And it was, a little bit, a little bit of a self-conscious experience, but on the other side of it, you know, I also recognize that having had a full life prior to this, right? Having had, you know, experiences with, with people and with friends and in a workplace and having exposure to

David John Clark (12:36)

Mm.

Thomas M Copeland (12:52)

the business side of what we do through my brother as a producer, having been, exposed to the business side of the world myself and the companies that I founded and started, I kind of came with all of these experiences and there's something that's really irreplaceable about that. There's something really irreplaceable about the fact that you've done things in your life and you've been places and you've met people and you've learned how people

David John Clark (13:07)

Yes.

Thomas M Copeland (13:16)

cooperate and interact with each other and you pick up on that if you're a really astute actor and you like truly have it in your bones, you're really an observer, right? And so on the flip side of that, I also had that and that was incredibly valuable to me too. It's kind of twofold in that regard and I still think about that to this day. But I will say this, I'll also say this just to wrap this portion of it up.

David John Clark (13:24)

Yes, yeah.

Thomas M Copeland (13:41)

I just, I'm coming off of a play that I produced and wrote that I'm happy to talk about, but I literally just came off last night was our closing night. So we just ended our run. thank you, thank you, thank you. We had a great run, an incredible creative team surrounded by some incredible acting by my co-star in that. And one of the actors is a man named Paul Albee, which he may or may not hear this. Hi Paul, if you ever do.

David John Clark (13:51)

Yeah

Thomas M Copeland (14:05)

Paul Albee played a man who's in the play who is written as a character 70 to 80 years old. He is around 70 years old. And one of the things he said to me like before a show in the green room was: the coolest thing about this job is that I can always get hired because I can do this forever, you know? And I just thought that was so special, because, here he is,

it's rough out there, if you're in that age range and you're looking for like a job, it's rough, like let's just be real. He had this really bright insight about we can do this forever. And if you just throw away all like the, worries about like, am I good? Am I ever going to be famous? If that's what you care about, what you shouldn't, if you care about that, but like, am I ever going to be, am I going to have money? Am I going to be able to do this? Am I going to be able to that? If you can throw all of that out and just

David John Clark (14:33)

can imagine.

Thomas M Copeland (14:52)

enjoy getting hired and getting to do this work, then you get to do this forever. There is no start or end. Your start is wherever you want your start to be, but there's no end. You do this as long as you want to until you either give up, which I hope you don't, or you you find something else that makes you more passionate, which happens as well, right? People act for years and then they find something that they're more driven about and they want to go do that, whether it be directing or whether it be on stage or whatever it is. So

David John Clark (15:12)

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (15:21)

Yeah, I thought that was really cool. And I think that, you know, as a late bloomer actor, that gave me some really interesting insight to rethink about, you know, some of those insecurities. When he said that meant a lot to me.

David John Clark (15:23)

Hmm.

And I do love that. And what's really good about my podcast is that obviously it is the Late Bloomer Actor. But it's information for all actors because what we learned as late bloomers can be applied at any stage of your career, regardless of how much background you've got. So, bringing it and tying it in a little bit into the business side of acting that we're talking about, and you alluded to this a lot in that discussion just then. Many actors resist seeing themselves as business owners.

So from your perspective, what are the consequences of not treating your acting career as a business?

Thomas M Copeland (16:09)

Yeah, my goodness. The consequences are, I think, enormous. I've had to learn things that work and learn things that don't work, like many of us have. But boy, if we can get tips and shortcuts, man, that would make us help us out for consequences as much as possible. That would be great. Yeah, I think the most important thing

when we're talking about, you know, this, the business side of what we do. And I recognize that it's difficult to do for a lot of folks. I recognize that either you don't have any experience in it. So you don't know how to think about the business side or like it's icky to you. That's, that's an icky thing to talk to a contract. I don't want to read that. yeah. Or, you know, or you're just intimidated by it. You know, maybe it's just an intimidating thing to, you know, put yourself out there and put a brand on yourself and get out there.

David John Clark (16:40)

Yes.

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (17:00)

But the

truth is like, the truth is, I think that it's a necessary part of growth in this business and in maturity in this, in this world. And let me call it this world of acting instead of this business, but like this world of acting, it truly is, it's necessary for growth and maturity. The reality is, this, I'm going to try to pull a quick quote that I heard from Chris James, who is an actor

here in New York City. He was in like Lost. He's in like NCIS right now. He's in a bunch of stuff. An incredible actor. And he was in my play that I just wrote. He joined my play, which was such an honor to have him and be on stage with him for eight nights a week. But he and I talked a lot. And one of the things that we talked about often was exactly this, sort of like how you cannot romanticize this world. Because if you do, then you're missing a

David John Clark (17:33)

Nice.

Thomas M Copeland (17:55)

the whole other side of the equation of what it looks like when we get hired. You're missing that side of the room entirely and you can't miss that side of the room. In other words, how this works out practically speaking is that let's just say like you wrote a script and like you want to get it out there and you're really excited to get out there. You know it's great. You feel like it's great and you want to get it out there, but you're not sure how or you're not sure how you can grab the attention of the producer.

David John Clark (18:00)

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (18:23)

Well, to grab the attention of a producer, have to think like a producer and producers do not romanticize scripts. They just don't. They are business nuts and bolts. It's all about how much money do I have to allocate to a project? Does this project have some name recognition attached to it? Cause that's what's being funded right now. Or, you know, does this writer have some kind of connection or some kind of money or something they can bring to it?

David John Clark (18:42)

Mm-hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (18:50)

We were just having this discussion about like, if you're writing something and you don't have money to put behind it, then it's just something that's gonna sit on your shelf, unfortunately. I don't mean to sound like a bummer here or a pessimist, but like the reality is that show that I just put up that we sold out a couple of nights on at the theater for the New City,

eight shows, we did really well with it, but it was because I had to put the money up to get it done. Nobody was going to do that for me. Nobody, threw five grand at me asking me, please go put on one of your incredible scripts. Thomas, you are amazing. That never happened. So I can tell you that doesn't happen. Or at least it didn't happen to me. Maybe it'll happen to you, but probably not. The reason why that happened was because I was willing to put money up behind it. And the reason why I had confidence in putting up money behind it is because I know how to budget,

David John Clark (19:23)

Hahaha

Thomas M Copeland (19:37)

I know how to spend money and not spend money. I know what I want out of the production and I know how to create contracts and hire actors and stage managers and directors. And I have the resources part of like some of the unions I'm in, just some of the experience I've had. I know how to put that together and I know how to put a team together and I know how to encourage the team towards an ultimate goal. And I know how to work hard. That's all stuff that like is not...

necessarily, you're necessarily born with as an actor, it's not something that like, as a pure actor or artist or performing artists in some way that comes very naturally. But I think that that's the consequence, to answer your question, I think the consequence is, you're missing out on opportunities to cut the line, so to speak, you know what I mean? To cut the line to create something for yourself that's, puts yourself out there because nobody

is waiting for you to come out. You have to come out and you've got to do something big and you've got to do something bold. And that takes courage and it takes money and it takes understanding how relationships work and how to build a team and how to encourage people. If you've never hired somebody before, then like hiring a director for your first play or film, it's going to be kind of tough. You got to know what to look for. What does it feel like to hire a director? What are you looking for? What are the questions to ask?

That's like one aspect, right? Is like just hiring the people behind your project is like one aspect of what we're talking about here.

David John Clark (21:06)

It's just this talk we've just had now could scare the crap out of a new actor. My son's at university at the moment. He's in his second year for drama. And if he heard this and thought this is what the acting career is going to be like, he might run for the hills, so to speak. it's like anything in acting. can... Connor.

Thomas M Copeland (21:21)

Hahaha

What's your son's name?

Sorry, Connor. I'm sorry, Connor. But this is the reality of New York City. I don't know how it works for you guys. No, I don't know. This is New York City.

David John Clark (21:28)

I loved it.

I love hearing your,

I love hearing your accent too, the way you say Connor. We've had an American friend when he was younger who would call him Connor. And he turned out, says, he says, why are you calling me Connor? My name's 'Connah'! With the Australian accent with C-O-N-N-A, but no, it was quite funny. love it. But bringing it back to that, it's not about being scared.

Thomas M Copeland (21:48)

You

That's right. We do do emphasize our ERs, don't we? We Americans, we like our ERs.

David John Clark (22:01)

You've transitioned from legal tech to acting while you you've founded creative companies as well, which has given you this approach and this bigger picture, so to speak, but you don't have to do it all. It's about having an understanding of it and having a little bit of it. I mean, you've just put on a play so involved having all that, you know, recruiting people and bringing people on, but you could be just making a small film and you just need a little bit of an insight. it's about having that business acumen, isn't it, to move forward.

Thomas M Copeland (22:30)

It is.

It is. And I would also just say like, yeah, you're absolutely right. Like, don't want to overwhelm anybody. You don't need to be me. You're right, there should be a base level fundamental understanding. And I think the way that you get that is if you've never had experience in business, or in any of these things, like marketing or advertising, or any of these things that allows you to talk to and work with people.

Then, that's not a problem. That's not a deficit, but you have to try to find some way. There's nothing to stop you from trying to an apprentice, behind a producer, on a short film or, looking for a mentor. Maybe you're on a project and you found somebody who really seems like they know, their stuff when it comes to business, trying to find a way to attach to that person in a professional, manner.

David John Clark (23:10)

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (23:12)

And I'm thinking, if you're younger, even if you're not younger, and this is just something you're kind of getting into. So there's ways to like, get that fundamental understanding. There's a plethora of, books out there, that, I'm sure many are very good on the business side of acting. Actually, it's funny. There's a, there is, there's a, there's one main bookstore for theater and actors and creatives in New York City. It's called the Drama Bookstore. And it's got like one shelf

of like how to produce a Broadway play. Like I went in there when I first got here and I was like, I couldn't wait to go to like that section. I thought it was going to be like a section. And, and they're like, what are you looking for? And I'm like, producer. They're like, Oh, biographies of producers. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm looking for a book on how to produce. They're like, this guy's asking for a book. I think it's like, like a aisle nine at the bottom, look at the bottom left. And I went and literally it was like, nine books, but the books that I bought like

David John Clark (23:43)

Ha ha!

shelf.

Why?

Thomas M Copeland (24:06)

I didn't buy all of them, I bought a bunch of them and I read them and they were very good. So there's definitely like books and literature out on this as well. But you know, ultimately I think it could be as simple as like just being professional, and showing up professional. And like, if we really want to boil this down to like actionable tips that like anybody who's listening to this can take away from and become more professional. It's as simple as

writing emails well with punctuation and with purpose. And it's saying thank you after opportunities to people. And it's being bold to ask for opportunities and being bold to put yourself out there. And it's showing up on time and it's working hard and it's taking an interest in all the various aspects that are happening. That's all easy stuff that can be done. And, you know, we say business as like a very general term, but like really what we're talking about here is professionalism.

Right. And so I think that that's something that I often see, can be lacking even on union jobs where you wouldn't expect that, but you see it. You can learn so much by just talking to the people that you're on a project with. And that alone, I think personally, just for my two cents, I think, I think that can buy you quite a bit of runway and quite a bit of, of learned experience quickly. So.

David John Clark (25:23)

I love

that.

No, that's, that's wonderful. And it's, I like what you said about that being professional.

So many actors, regardless of whether they're new in the industry or the, or right up to the levels of Tom Cruise, think that I'm the actor here. get to, where's my caravan and feed me and I want my lunch and call me when I need to be on set. And that's not really appropriate, is it? It's having that professionalism and working with everyone.

Thomas M Copeland (25:41)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, totally. When you're looking to get something produced, or you're looking to get something hired, or you're looking to get into the room where it happens, so to speak, you've got to think the way that those people who are in that room think. And it is true that producers don't really romanticize. Do they love the shows they produce? I'm sure they do.

You know, do they love the people? Sure. But like at the end of the day, the people who hire us and fund these projects are business people. They are their executives at either studios or small film production companies or whatever. But they're the ones that green light things. They're the ones that say yes to things. And they say yes to things that they believe they can make a profit off of. It's that simple. Unless you're at a a nonprofit theater or some kind of a community theater where like there's a different mission. Of course, that's a different mission, but like

David John Clark (26:04)

Yeah.

Mmm.

Thomas M Copeland (26:33)

If we're talking about commercial theater, commercial film, commercial TV, it is a business. There are budgets and there are budgets that don't get broken, right? Like they say no to the director when the director wants to flip a bus and there's no budget to flip the bus. But what you can do is you can run the bus into a wall. And like that happens, that happens all day, every day on sets.

David John Clark (26:42)

Yes.

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (26:56)

And we just have to think about that because I think as artists, we're such big dreamers that we don't think about those nuts and bolts, but those nuts and bolts are conversations that are happening every day. I'm not saying you have to do that. I'm just saying being aware of it, I think is number one. And I think the most important thing is just understanding that at the end of the day, no one is just going to hand these opportunities to you, right? You need to be professional. You need to show up. You need to work hard. And if you're lucky, if we're lucky, we get hired.

David John Clark (27:02)

Yes.

Thomas M Copeland (27:24)

we get booked, you know what mean? We get to do the work, but like the work is everything else that happens before we even get on set, in my opinion. You know?

David John Clark (27:26)

Mmm, that's it.

Definitely, definitely.

And you, mentioned a little bit earlier about branding, which can be a bit of a blind spot for actors. So a lot of actors fear the word branding. So what do you see the biggest branding mistakes actors make and how does that impact their ability to get cast?

Thomas M Copeland (27:50)

Yeah, that's a great question. I can answer that in my experience with something that I think I've talked about before on a podcast, there's like a way to do it really poorly. And the way to do it really poorly is to like put your name on a sticker with your face on a sticker and like hand stickers out to people on set. That's literally happened to me. I met somebody who did that. That's a really poor way to brand yourself.

David John Clark (28:01)

Hahaha

Thomas M Copeland (28:14)

Nobody likes that. Yeah, don't do that. But, being clever with, how you present yourself and what you're putting time into, I think is like one aspect of this. I don't know how good this is, but like, you know, my social handle is 'CastingTom'. And so some people hear that and they're like, 'CastingTom', is it like, are you trying to get cast?

David John Clark (28:15)

Don't do that. No.

Thomas M Copeland (28:37)

Or are you doing the casting? Are you a casting director? Everybody asks me all this. And in some ways it's already worked. You know what I mean? Cause like, in some ways it's already worked because they're already thinking about it. They're asking questions or wondering what it is and it's easy to remember. In one way it's mission accomplished already. It can be as simple as that. It can also be, as simple as thinking through your resume and how you're presenting your resume.

David John Clark (28:45)

Beautiful.

Thomas M Copeland (29:01)

Being judicial, at some point in your career to be able to kind of choose what goes on your resume and what doesn't. Something interesting for me that I realized recently was that my resume was running into two pages and you never want to be in two pages. Everybody, if you have two pages, don't please one page. Yeah. Because people who read this don't have time. Why? Cause they're busy business people. They're busy business people that don't have time to read your two pages. So like, recognize mine was starting to run into two pages. I wonder if you've ever had this David.

David John Clark (29:15)

So it's...

Thomas M Copeland (29:27)

Mine started to run into two pages and I started going, damn, I've got two pages now. Is that good or is that bad? And I realized, well, that's not good. That means I'm putting everything on there. And so because I'm putting everything on there, it's muddled and it's too much. So for the first time in like three years, I just went through my resume and took a bunch of old stuff on it that like, you know what I mean? Like just stuff that I kind of maybe started by filling in, when I first started to kind of filler stuff, because sometimes you have to kind of fake it till you make it. That's another part of this conversation.

David John Clark (29:37)

Mmm.

Thomas M Copeland (29:55)

A little bit, fake it till you make it. I had been beyond that. So I was able to like get rid of a bunch of fluffy junk. And then I realized it was the first time I realized wait a second, I'm in New York city as an equity. That's a, that's our stage union as an equity actor going up for equity jobs. And I realized my theater credits were at the bottom of my resume. So it was this epiphany that needs to go at the top. I think, I think so much of this can be just little things like that, just little learned experiences like that. And just being

David John Clark (30:08)

Mm.

Thomas M Copeland (30:21)

being aware of how you're presenting yourself in your writing and how you speak and who you're associating with. That's the way I think about branding as a whole.

David John Clark (30:32)

I like

that. And it's not something that you have to do every day. I mean, when we speak about the business of acting, people think, I've got to have, I've got to set aside an hour every day, but it's not. You said it yourself with your resume, you, you hadn't looked at it for a while. And so you had to tidy it up. So you might not need to do that again for a couple of months. So it's about just being on top of these things that make us stand out amongst the myriad of actors that we're all fighting for, because we're, it's in a different world now, you know, especially with self tapes and that.

Casting agencies are looking at hundreds of actors, whereas before they might look at 20. So you've got to, you've got to showcase yourself to them. Don't you.

Thomas M Copeland (31:09)

Yeah, totally true. And

I was just thinking through as you're talking about this, you need to set an hour aside. Yeah, I've heard that too. And I agree with you. I don't I don't think it's I don't think it's that militaristic. If you're out there and you're not sure even where to begin, I would even say just a good book can get you going in the right direction of these kinds of things, personally, in my opinion.

One of the most fascinating books I ever read was a, I'm not gonna know the title of it, but it was book from the drama bookshop by a producer who wrote How to Produce a Play on Broadway. And it goes into everything. Now I'm kind of a nerd and a geek about this stuff, so I was able to get into it very easily, but it really, maybe other people might read it and snore from it. But for me, it just went through how a producer approaches projects and

how table reads happen and then how staged readings happen and how do you get theaters interested and how do you get investors pooled and what happens, when a musical comes together, there's like three different creative voices on the musical. How do you split those rights up and rights and licensing. I got really interested in that maybe because that's part of my personality, but I would even venture to guess if that's maybe difficult, if that doesn't sound interesting, I'd almost I'm such a contrarian. I'd almost say you should

David John Clark (32:05)

Mmm.

Thomas M Copeland (32:21)

push into that and learn that because those are the people that hire us. So we need to, and I know I'm repeating that. I know I recognize I'm repeating that, but again, that's just another point you have to put yourself in their shoes and what better way to do that than to be in their shoes, and learn what it's like in their shoes.

David John Clark (32:26)

Mmm.

that. it's about, I mean, you're not just the actor, you need to know what's happening in your world and to improve your chances, isn't it? That's what we're doing.

Thomas M Copeland (32:47)

And it's

so true, like if you want to create something of your own, right? We're all driven people. We're all ambitious people. Everybody's unique and different. We bring something different to the table. And I think a lot of us have this ambition to do something for themselves and want to create something, whether it be a short play or a short film or whatever. And I think that's wonderful. And I think I think we should lean into that. But

just being aware that if you truly want to get that done, that takes money and understanding of how to put that together. I have probably like six scripts sitting on my computer right here that like, if I don't, if I don't take them up and do something with them, they're going to sit on my computer forever. Nobody's going to see them.

There's ways to send your script out. You can send it off to theaters and theater festivals and all things like that. But again, like you said a minute ago. You're just kind of getting in line when you do that, right? To allude to kind of what you were saying a minute ago about how there's a bunch of actors out there everybody self tapes and so we're just like one so we're like self tape number nine 297 out of 600 right and that's what I call getting in line and being in the line versus, what I've come to think of as cutting the line

David John Clark (33:48)

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (33:55)

which is just doing something for yourself and putting it out there and then inviting casting directors to that, and putting your stamp and your map on it. But I will tell you, it would be absolutely, it absolutely would not have happened. I would not have been able to put this play up if I didn't have the experience of having known how to hire and work with people. And like I said earlier, how to budget and how to plan for your production, how to promote and

David John Clark (34:16)

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (34:18)

push on social media, how to create ads and marketing. It's a lot that goes into it. And again, not to overwhelm people. If you want to do it, that's doing it. You know what I mean?

David John Clark (34:24)

Hmm.

Yeah.

And, that's doing it all. And you don't have to do it all. You just have to have an understanding of that aspect of it. So, but to bring it back to the, a bit of the nuts and bolts of the area, I've got a question in relation to self-taping, but could you just give us a bit of an insight before I ask this question into you built an app called ShowCoach. Can you just explain to us what that is and what it's for and how actors can use it? And then I'll go on with my question about self-taping.

Thomas M Copeland (34:57)

Yeah, thanks. I didn't think that you would ask, but I appreciate you asking, David. Yeah. So, so ShowCoach was an idea that I had that just kind of hit me because I had a self-tape due for something that I, that was pretty important that I really cared about. I don't remember if it was like a co-star or something, but it was something that mattered. And I like, didn't know who to show it to. I was actually in between agents, so I didn't have an agent and I didn't know who to show it to.

And I started looking online, I started searching Reddit and Facebook groups and TikTok. I'm looking for like, is there a thing out there where you can share self tapes and just get feedback? And there was nothing. And so that was, that's where that came from. It was really creating something that I had actually looked for and came and couldn't find. So what ShowCoach is, is it's a mobile app that allows you to upload your self tape and it goes into community feed,

David John Clark (35:32)

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (35:45)

where other actors and other, what we call coaches. So these can be casting directors or acting coaches or other actors who have, quote unquote made it to a particular level. Where they'll critique your self-tape and it's critiquing what we call structured critiques. It's not just hey, good job. It's five levels of critiquing everything from how's your technology to how's your execution? Do we believe you? Words, your acting skills that you're using?

How's your lighting? And, are you doing too much? Actors like to, like, they think they need to, like, do things. And, like, you don't really need to do things. They need to act. That's right. So there's like that. There's like, we call that category aesthetics. Like, just like learning that, like, you know, yeah. So that's what this tape is. It does have some generative AI stuff in it, which also freaks people out. But the truth is, it's really designed to

David John Clark (36:17)

I need to

Nice.

Thomas M Copeland (36:33)

give you instant feedback also on how your self tape looks. And so we're constantly tweaking this technology and working with it. I'm kind of a technologist, I guess you could say. So for me, this was kind of my spin on, something that I find incredibly valuable. And the other cool thing that it does is when you're in between self tapes, it generates scripts. So you can just practice self tapes, which was something else that I just never found and just absolutely loved. So

That's the app, it is out there, it is available. I definitely appreciate you asking about it. It's a new app, it's been around less than a year, but it's growing. We're getting quite a bit of people on it, it's pretty exciting to see. I actually just love opening it up every now and then, And just going and looking at some self-tapes that are on the feed and just dropping some critiques in because I love doing that. I love seeing other actors put work up and put time and work into it and I think they deserve...

David John Clark (37:11)

That's awesome.

Thomas M Copeland (37:27)

some feedback when they do that. We don't get feedback when we put up a self tape, right? And even when we're in a room, we don't get feedback.

David John Clark (37:30)

No, no, you very rarely.

Thomas M Copeland (37:34)

Yeah, so I don't know, David, it is in your neck of the woods. I'm curious, do you guys have live, do you have live auditions coming back or is it still like pretty much all self tapes?

David John Clark (37:45)

I think we're pretty much the same as the States now. Most of it's self-tapes. I haven't heard of anyone doing in the room stuff, especially for that first audition. It's all self-tapes. And I'm assuming that there's in the room stuff for callbacks. In my market here in Adelaide, it's a bit smaller, but I know that in Sydney, that's what's happening. But I believe it's very similar to what's happening in the States now. It just makes perfect business sense. It's not...

Thomas M Copeland (38:04)

Yeah.

Yeah.

David John Clark (38:10)

laziness, people think it's just a result of COVID. That's why people are being lazy, but that's just the nature of the market now. It's moved on. It's different.

Thomas M Copeland (38:19)

Totally, totally. And the reason why I ask is because what is unique about New York, you're absolutely right, that is how the States is too. What is unique, the only pocket of this that's unique is that theater in New York City, that still casts even on first audition that does in the room. But I will tell you this, reason why I say that is because even that, you don't get any feedback. So this idea of romanticizing, I miss all, I miss in-person auditions. Do you? Because I don't know if it's been a while since you've done an in-person audition, but I do them all the time.

David John Clark (38:32)

Okay.

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (38:46)

And you walk in and you do something like you've gut yourself if it's a monologue or you sing and you, put your body into it and then you look up and they're thank you, David. Thanks very much. Thanks for coming in, David. And you're great. Thanks. And you're tired and you're gutted. We don't get feedback period. We just don't get feedback. Why ever not.

David John Clark (39:02)

No.

Thomas M Copeland (39:03)

You know, and

so that's kind of really what this app is about. So that's why I just, I just love jumping on it and just like giving people feedback. Cause I love watching actors work. And I think actors have a lot of heart and they put a lot of work in and I think they deserve to get some tips back. I will also just go on a, on a tiny tangent, if you'll allow me to, I'm like sort of a, yeah, I'm sort of like an obsessive, learner. I love to learn as much as possible. I'm always trying to

David John Clark (39:22)

I love tangents!

Thomas M Copeland (39:30)

push a little further. I have kind of been in the habit of, especially in theater, when I get about a week into a show, week and a half, 10 days into a show, I start to kind of get lazy. I know my lines, I know my moves, I know my block, like I'm good. And we're putting out good shows and they're great. The shows are good. it feels like there's not much else to do. So I can go on with other aspects of my life. But it was this play that I just did that I wrote and produced where Chris James was the actor in it.

David John Clark (39:42)

You

Thomas M Copeland (39:56)

Chris was the one running lines with me every single night on the phone, showing up to the theater before the show every day and spending time working through, blocking through and just trying new things. And it was fascinating. And we got, I kid you not David, we got to show eight and he was still like, what else can we do? And it was amazing. And so to me, that change, that really was an eye-opener for me. And it really,

David John Clark (40:15)

Wow.

Thomas M Copeland (40:22)

It really dovetails with like what ShowCoach is no matter how good you think your monologue is no matter how good you think you've done that self tape because you've done it six times and like you are ready to submit it, the real the truth is you could probably tweak or do a little more here or take that away over there or make this change over here or turn that light down over here or hey that background's a little distracting. There's always something that can be done, that can be improved and so I'm just a firm believer in that.

And that's got to be doubly true for self tapes, right? Because how often are we just doing self tapes and just sending them in so to speak, you know, we're just knocking them out because we all work or we've got busy lives. I got a toddler You know, like it's difficult to find time for it And so often I find myself doing it once doing it twice and on the third time if it wasn't bad I'm like great. I'll send it in. The truth is we shouldn't we shouldn't be doing that We should be putting more, time and energy into it.

David John Clark (40:49)

I love it.

Thomas M Copeland (41:15)

I mean, at least if it's something you care about, you know what mean? If it's at least if it's something that that matters to you.

David John Clark (41:19)

Definitely.

into where my question was from the outset of this. From a pure business standpoint, why should actors view their self-tape game as one of the highest return of investments that they can make? Because that's what it is, isn't it? It's an investment.

Thomas M Copeland (41:33)

Yeah, totally.

Yeah, totally. You know, and I think that's and I think the answer is just the investment of time, you know, and obviously like investment of money too. I will say like through ShowCoach, I've seen a lot of students and actors like putting up tapes that, you know, I find myself sort of saying the same kind of tips over and over again. It's kind of the basic stuff. Like make sure your lighting is better than what you may have.

Professional lights are not terribly expensive. You know, ring lights are crappy. So don't do ring lights. But professional lights are not terribly expensive. And you're right, that is a business to say I mean, that is that is an investment. Not only is that an investment, it's a tax write off talk about business. And if if you hate business, you're gonna hate tax write offs. Nothing gets more business than a tax write off. That's what we're talking about here.

David John Clark (42:02)

No.

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (42:19)

It's those things, it's recognizing that you don't need a green screen. Most people don't want green screens. If you could just find a flat wall, that's fine, that works. You don't need to rig up a big thing. You don't need to have five lights. You just need a good, clean, simple setup that you've put some time and money into. Then you just need to do it over and over and over again. And while...

that may or may not have much business influence on it. It is an investment, you're right. And what it is, is it's an investment of time. The truth is in any business, I don't care what it is, in any business you either have, you have two things to invest. You either have time or money to invest. Sometimes, rarely you have both, but you're probably in a situation where you've either got one or the other. And so if you've got time to invest, good, invest your time, and do that self tape,

David John Clark (43:05)

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (43:10)

over and over again and put your heart into it and find ways to play. And I'll say, even looking back on it too, the bottom line is you can do all those things and then you can have a great self tape that nobody notices. And then I've had self tapes that I kind of shipped in that I didn't actually spend a whole lot of time on that those are the ones that I got booked on. So like at the end of the day, we could, yeah, at the end of the day, like we could have all this planning about like how we're going to go about this and strategize on it. And then

David John Clark (43:27)

Yeah, I've heard that over and over.

Thomas M Copeland (43:36)

It just hits. And then you're just gonna put out a tape.

But it's true. It is an investment of time. There's no question about that.

David John Clark (43:43)

I love it. And I'm mindful of the time. So I just wanted to ask one last big question in relation to income for actors. So you've created companies alongside your acting career. How important is it to actors to diversify their income streams within or adjacent to the industry? And what, what examples do you think work best?

Thomas M Copeland (44:02)

Yeah, great question. I don't think I've ever been asked that, so I never really thought about it. That's great. I think that having an income stream that is adjacent to acting may or may not be that important. I come from a background where it's legal tech and services. It couldn't be further away from acting. Although in a lot of ways,

David John Clark (44:07)

Okay.

Thomas M Copeland (44:24)

like as the founder, as the CEO of the company, I've had to spend many, many, many hours on calls with customers and clients and sorry, I hope no of my customers listen to this, but that's kind of acting. You've got to be able to face somebody with confidence and have a game plan and have a strategy and lay it out,

and they've got to able to say yes. And if they say yes, you've just made a customer. So there's that aspect of it, which does feel a bit adjacent to acting in some ways. But I don't think it really needs to be I don't think it needs to be there. I've seen people who work on film sets, they work on crews for film sets, and then they will go act, you know, when they can when jobs come through.

I've seen people, be dog walkers in New York City. That's like a big thing. It's like being a dog walker. You can quit your bartending job and be a dog walker. That's a thing here. So I think there's just in the gig economy, there's so much out there. There's so much that can be done. But my real hard practical advice would be find something that you're good at. So notice I didn't say interested in because a lot of us do jobs that like, you know, we're not all that interested in, but that we're

David John Clark (45:26)

Hahaha!

Thomas M Copeland (45:30)

good at. I love my company and I love our customers and I appreciate them. But this is my passion. This is what I love to do. That is not what I love to do. I do that because I'm good at it. It makes sense for me and it works with my schedule and it allows me the freedom and flexibility I need to be able to pursue this and write and put things up. I think that like the best advice I can give is find something you're good at.

It doesn't matter what it is, just something that you're good at that can somehow be translated into money. I know a lot of people who have done graphic design. I know a lot of people who have worked as freelance marketers. There was a time actually when a lot of us could work as freelance writers before AI. AI is probably one of the few I would even say right now, casualties of that, rest in peace. But those writers have found other things to do.

David John Clark (46:08)

Wonderful.

Thomas M Copeland (46:16)

I think that you have to find something that that you're good at and that is marketable that other people are willing to put time and money into. And maybe that seems a bit grand and a bit obtuse, but, maybe if you think about it and really apply it to your life, you might find something there that that makes sense. You know, I've just seen I've seen so many of my friends do so many different things. But the one through line that I see with all of them is that they're good at whatever it is that they chose that they're doing. They're just good at it.

you know, it's something that came to them either naturally or otherwise been good at it.

David John Clark (46:46)

It's about finding something that works for you so that you can make your career as an actor work until obviously acting pays for everything 100%. That's what we're all aiming for in the big picture.

Thomas M Copeland (46:57)

We're all going for it, David, but the truth is, even that is so difficult. I think should be, a point at which you ask yourself, is that worth chasing? Or can we just accept that, like, we're to get hired when we get hired. We can't control that. We can't control when we get hired, right? So we'll get hired when we hired, we get to do the work of auditioning. You don't even need to audition full time because

I've tried to audition full-time here in New York City and it's not a full-time audition scale, at least not right now in summertime. Summertime is slow for us. It may or may not be the case for you down under, as they say. The reality is that there's actors out there who have been on network TV stars who aren't working right now. So if that's true, like.

David John Clark (47:26)

Hmm.

Yeah.

Thomas M Copeland (47:43)

Where do we fit in that? And so I just, that's why I think it is so important to circle back to why you asked this question and why it is important to have multiple income streams. It's, it's a wonderful and exciting thing to say, I'm going to go do acting full time and I'm going to abandon everything. I'm just going to focus on this for a year. And if nothing doesn't happen in a year, then great. I'll go back. I think that is the biggest fallacy that you can do. I think there's no bigger mistake you can do frankly than doing that because what you're doing is a giving yourself a cap on, you know,

David John Clark (48:03)

Yes.

Hmm.

Thomas M Copeland (48:13)

You're giving yourself a cap that you're gonna, you're gonna hit because a year goes by fast. So you're hit it. Yeah. And you're not going to be, you're not going to be where you thought you would be. So that's going to happen probably. And the other thing too, is that you're trying to define your career and your life. And I don't know about you, but in my world, some of the greatest success I've ever had in life and some of the most enjoyable things that have happened to me have happened to me unplanned. You know what I mean? Like, like unplanned stuff.

David John Clark (48:17)

Pretty quick, yes.

Yeah, definitely. Especially in this industry.

Thomas M Copeland (48:42)

Totally, totally,

totally. In life in relationships and careers in this industry, and beyond. I would just say if you're sitting back there, and you're like, I need to go work full time as an actor, really challenge yourself to maybe try to think about what it might be like, if you don't put that constraint on yourself, you don't put that pressure on yourself. And instead, you just work at something that you're good at, that's marketable, that's industry that makes some money for you.

And then you do acting when you can and you do it in a way that fulfills you and you you do it, you do it for the work, not for anything else. You do it for the work. You do it because you love to audition because every day that goes by that you're not auditioning, you're bored, right? And you're unfulfilled. If that's you, then you're on the right path.

David John Clark (49:28)

And all my talks that I've had with people about the business side of acting, it's always come back to that bigger picture. We're in it for that creative side of acting. So don't lose that focus if that's what we're in it for. So thank you very much. That's awesome.

Thomas M Copeland (49:41)

Yeah, no, it's my pleasure, man. It's been a pleasure.

David John Clark (49:44)

Now, Tom, as we wind up, as we finish, I'd love to ask this question of all my guests. What is your t-shirt quote? That ultimate quote, good, bad, motivational, life-changing, whatever floats your boat that you would love to put on a t-shirt and be seen in public with.

Thomas M Copeland (50:02)

Yeah. Thank God you gave me a heads up on this. Cause I have to say even like leading up to this, I thought I was going to be like, no problem. I'll cover the quote. No problem. And then like five minutes before I was sweating and panicking because I hadn't come up with a quote yet, but I'm actually going to lean on, I'm just cheating over here. I'm going to actually lean on someone else, not my quote, but a quote that I feel pertains to this discussion and me as a person. And it's from, let's see if we do the math.

David John Clark (50:04)

Hahaha ⁓

That's cool.

Thomas M Copeland (50:27)

Something like 250 years ago from a man named Benjamin Franklin, who was a founder of the United States of America, one of the founding fathers and his quote famous across the world, of course. but his quote was industry. And I would just put not that, but on the shirt, I would just write lose no time. That's part of the quote.

David John Clark (50:30)

Wow.

Love it. Love it.

Thomas M Copeland (50:48)

lose

no time. And in fact, if you're interested real quick, the full quote is lose no time, be always employed in something useful, cut off all unnecessary actions. That's right from Benjamin Franklin and what he wrote about 250 years ago in the poor, what's called the, the, the poor man's almanac, poor Richard's almanac, which was a very famous publication he did way back before the United States was even a country yet.

David John Clark (51:00)

Wow.

Wow.

And not even, not even in an acting realm, but with everything that's happening in the world at the moment, something from 250 years ago just puts it all into a light and say, why aren't we doing just that?

Thomas M Copeland (51:27)

What are you spending your time on? That's what we're saying right there, all right? Like what are you spending your time on? So if you walk away from this episode and you have to ask yourself that and it blows your mind, then wonderful. And you have a breakthrough and you have an epitome. Beautiful, we've done our jobs, David.

David John Clark (51:31)

Exactly.

Love it. So thank you very much for coming on the show. This has been awesome. That's always amazing how quickly the time goes. You know, I have a hundred questions we're going to write and you very rarely get through half of them or any of them. So, the information that we've had to chat about has been brilliant. Exactly why I wanted to chat to you. So Tom, thank you very much. I'll throw all your socials and your links to your your podcast and the Show Coach platform into the show notes so everyone can check them out. So thank you very much for coming on the show.

Thomas M Copeland (52:12)

It's been a pleasure doing this with you, my late bloomer friend, my compadre in this journey. Thanks, David.

David John Clark (52:18)

I love it. Thank you. Cheers, Tom.

Thomas M Copeland (52:21)

Cheers.

David John Clark (52:21)

Well, there we go. That was such a powerful conversation with Tom. What really stood out to me is the reminder that talent and training are only half the equation. The actors who treat their careers like a business, who think about branding strategy and sustainability are the ones who create longevity in this industry. I was struck by how Tom blends his background in business and tech with his artistry as an actor. It's a perspective we don't hear often enough.

And it really drives home the idea that being a working actor isn't just about waiting for opportunities. It's about building systems, making smart investments in yourself and approaching your career with the mindset of a business person. For me, that's the perfect way to wrap up season four, because the whole theme this year has been about the business of acting and Tom's insights put a clear exclamation point on why this conversation is so critical for all of us, late bloomers or not. But what was

big in our discussion, we really ended it with was that regardless of how much effort you put into the business side of acting, whether it's all of it or a little bit, you just need to do, make sure you do some of it, but it all boils back down to the creative side and why we're in this industry together. And that is for the acting. So don't lose that focus. Next up, we've got the end of year special in October, where I'll be joined by a whole panel of incredible guests. But for now, I'll leave you with this.

Keep sharpening your craft, but never forget, you are the CEO of your acting career. Cheers guys. We'll see you on set.