Peter Vincent

Sydney Morning Herald

2 Feb 2000 

Lisa McCune remembers being taken with both veterinary science and marine biology as a teenager, and even toyed with the idea of becoming an astronaut. Eventually she decided on a job that would let her pretend to be them all.

"One day I thought: what better way to do all of them than to become an actor? I just fell in love with the idea of becoming other characters."

McCune got her break in 1994, when cast as Maggie Doyle in the police drama Blue Heelers. Although she's been the most popular personality on Australian TV for the past three years, McCune, like most actors, has had lean times. She spent eight months without work in 1992.

"I think my greatest strength has been my ability to stay sane and not let the rejections get to me," she says.

So grim are actors' unemployment rates and average annual incomes - 85 per cent and $14,000 respectively, according to the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance - it's clear that perseverance is perhaps the most important quality an actor can possess.

Happily, John Knight, the head of acting at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA), says the legend of the big break is true.

"It doesn't come often, and when it does you've got to jump at it. The common thread in those who go on to become stars is luck. Cate Blanchett was a wonderful student - talented and highly disciplined - but there were other people in her year who were equally talented - but the break didn't come for them.

"Most [new actors] will get one or two jobs fairly quickly. But then you've got to create your own work rather than waiting for the phone calls. Put on a play, or get involved in something like Tropfest."

There are also hopes that Fox Studios will provide extra job opportunities - particularly in foreign productions. Filming has started on Baz Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge, for example, employing between 600 and 700 actors, crew members and extras each day.

As glamorous as movies sound, they are not always the best-paid work. Minimum rates for TV and film are $564 a week. However, earning more than the award rate is common - a week's work in a minor speaking part for an American movie or TV series can pay up to $2,000. The cast on top-rating Australian TV series usually earn at least $5,000 a week, with the lead actors earning up to $15,000. The cast members of most local series would be paid between $1,000 and $3,500.

Commercials tend to offer the best pay. You can expect to be paid about $1,000 for a regional ad and $10,000 for a major national campaign.

Theatre tends to be the poorest paid. Although minimum rates are above those for TV and film, you are less likely to receive a rate of pay above the award.

For emerging actors, the million-dollar question is "What is the agent looking for?" Whizzy Ringer, of Mullinars Casting, says there are three things.

"Having energy is very important; that they have talent and a screen presence; the old thing about the camera loving them."

An acting degree usually helps - the three big schools are the National Institute of Dramatic Arts, the Victorian College of the Arts and the Western Australian Academy of the Performing Arts - but it's not essential.

Ringer says: "After doing a degree, we tend to look at them a little bit more seriously, but we're looking for faces all the time, and fresh faces. It could be their eyes that stand out; it could be a confidence; it could be an energy. It's a uniqueness - something that's different."

the point

You'll need energy, talent and the capacity to deal with rejection to make it

as an actor.

Lisa McCune

Age 28.

Qualifications Bachelor of Musical Theatre, Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, Perth.


What you do At the moment: eight, three-hour shows each week of The Sound of Music at the Lyric Theatre. She works about 40 hours a week, with most of it spent in singing lessons and preparing for the show. "I find it far more physically demanding than television. On stage you've got a larger area to cover and you have to have the energy to make sure the audience can read what's going on all the time."

Job history: Her first major gig was as the "Face of Coles" in 1991 for a national TV ad campaign. But she is best known as Maggie Doyle in Blue Heelers, whom she played from 1994 to 1999, winning three Gold Logies. "To walk away from that was the biggest decision I've had to make. I felt that if I was going to have longevity I needed to move on and explore something new. It's like any job - if you want to move up the ladder you've got to accept new challenges." She has just completed filming a mini-series called The Potato Factory, to be shown later this year on Channel Seven.

Highs: "Just to be working in an industry that is flooded with amazing talent I feel is a real achievement."

Lows: "The fact that you can be unemployed for long periods."

Ambitions:"I want to help create work for talented people that I know."