Is London the best place to be an actor?
After having lived in London for six years, I have truly reflected on my decision whether it has been right for me. I have come to the conclusion that I came to live here at the right age and when I was single, had no attachments, and could just focus on myself. London is a hard city to navigate with more commitments and financial responsibilities. I always understood the compromise of coming to London in that I would struggle to get on the housing ladder on my own with just one salary. At the age of 28, I had the mindset of accepting this compromise for five years to pursue my creativity and then review my choices. I never set out with the intention that I would live in London forever, but it would be a springboard to grabbing the opportunities with both hands and seeing where life took me.
Looking back over the last six years. I often ask myself what would I tell my 28-year-old self if I was starting over and having to make the same decisions but armed with what I know now? When I moved to London in October 2015, it was 100% the right decision to move here to forge my own path and identity, and let the big city distract me from my problems. I very quickly reconnected with old university friends, mutual connections through paid summer work who worked in London offices, and more distant family members who lived here. I was also living 300 miles away from heartache, grief, and loss.
More choices and more opportunities. London is the metropolis and the land of opportunity for anything and everything, but the problem for creatives is it always comes at a hefty price. I constantly walk around with my head in the air feeling like I am the lucky kid in the candy shop but can’t afford the sweets- even to this day, I still feel incredibly blessed and lucky to live in this awesome city. Of course, I get affluenza envy and look at well-dressed women who seem to have it all and feel insecure. I often need to remind myself and physically go back to my hometown to remind myself of how far I have come. When you live in London, you are in that competitive bubble of never being quite successful enough I.e., the perceived judgment on your earning potential, relationship status, size of your house, where you go on holiday, etc.
Life seems to be working out well. Even to this day, I am stunned life seems to be going well for me. I might not be where I want to be in terms of my acting progression but I am blessed with my partner, friends, and other successful ventures. For a lot of young people who don’t have family or a strong network of friends, London is a tough place to be, both in terms of affordability, work culture, and the pressure to live well. However, I never found it an isolating place as I always found entertainment with people, places, and things to do. As any seasoned Londoner will tell you, it is the rent, bills, and feeding yourself that is the killer. You can do a hell of a lot of things for free if you search hard enough. I settled almost immediately when I moved here, although my living situation was far from easy in the first few years. I don’t consider myself to be a selfish person but London made me realise I am selfish with my space.
On a personal level, London has given me lots of scope to explore myself and try things out. Whilst I was incredibly single-minded about my acting when I moved here, I was under no illusion that it would be easy and that I would have to work very hard at a 9–5 to sustain myself in the process. The first couple of years were well spent in London with my part-time training at Rose Bruford. I met lots of like-minded and kindred souls who still advise and inspire me to this day. However, I should have had a game plan for the years that followed. I would probably be further forward if I had been more strategic about networking, not doing as many courses and focusing on the work, and getting exposure. Thankfully, I have a more business mindset now with my acting and am constantly mapping out my day-to-day, weekly, monthly, and yearly end goals, whilst also not forgetting to enjoy the process and people I meet- it is the best bit!
Where else would I have lived? I have had lots of success in other areas of my life here in London but don’t necessarily feel as though I have moved forward with my acting. Six years on, I am still struggling to get seen for parts, get an agent and land any tv or film work. I don’t want to be overly wistful but there has almost been too much choice to dabble in everything here that you can easily get distracted away from your goals and vision on a daily basis. I struggle with laser focus at the best of times and I am generally someone who needs less, not more choices put in front of them.
I have come to the conclusion that if I was starting out again on my acting journey, I would have probably decided to move to Manchester for a few years where I would have been more likely to secure a northern agent and more realistic castings. Although, I can’t say hand on heart that it would have been guaranteed. I just feel as though I would have been performing to an audience closer to home and to my northern roots. The London acting market is still very much focused on middle-class talent, even when trying to make positive moves through diverse and colour-blind casting. The northern working-class actor still doesn’t quite fit into the jigsaw and is often out on a limb or very much typecast to being the villain or single teen mother roles.
Written by Louisa Robinson, 9th February 2022.
