We’ve all heard the term, “time is what you make it”. But to an actor, “time” can be a period that leads to greatness, failure or possibly insanity. As actors, we all have probably too much “time”. Most of us don’t work steadily, going from one job to the next. Yes, all is well when our time is consumed creating a character for a play, waiting on the set for a movie or learning lines for a commercial. But what about the “time” in between. The “time” when seemingly nothing is going on?

That’s when we as actors have to use that “time” to our advantage.

A friend of mine, a great character actor Ben Slack taught me a valuable lesson when he was alive. We would get together from time to time, usually when he had some down-time which he had much less of than I did. We would come up with projects, acting projects, one act plays, short film scripts, a study of a play. I would usually get all involved with the project saying I would get something together for the next time we met. A short time would pass, I’d call Ben and ask if he wanted to see what I had only to be told that he just got a TV series or he was off to Europe for a months worth of filming and we’d talk when he got back. The next time we’d meet, he’d have a new project he wanted to explore. After a while I learned that these “projects” was how Ben spent his downtime. “Time” to keep his mind off not working and “time” to keep his actor muscles working.

Think about it…but don’t take too much “time”. Get busy.