 fourth and welcome back to my channel. I am so excited about today's video. I do have a couple of things to do so I can bring you guys along but also I am excited because today I am going to do a deep dive into the casting websites, the ones that I use, the ones that I have tried, the ones that are scams. I'm going to talk about all of the casting websites. Oh my goodness. So I have been going down a deep, deep, deep rabbit hole on Actors Access Breakdown Services, Breakdown Express. What else is there? Showfax, Side Express, Greenplay Online, Casting About, EcoCast. There is so much specifically about Actors Access Online so you know what? I'm not going to make this video about a bunch of different casting websites because there's so much information just on this one. This video was inspired by a business lecture I heard yesterday. We were talking about acting websites and I always had a question about this specific website called Actors Access because when you go on it there's a bunch of different websites that looks like it's part of it, Breakdown Services, Breakdown Express. There's like Actors Link, something like that. Anyways, it's a bunch of different things and the instructor showed me that there's information online about the history of it and so today I thought it would be so much fun to dive really deep into that because of course he touched the surface of it but I want to go deeper. I want to learn about all of the casting websites. I want to learn about the history of it at the very end. I will also tell you which ones I have, which ones I personally think are worth it but I already know for a fact there's going to be a part two to this video because I want to continue to do a bunch of research and see what the best thing is for self-submitting as well as what happens in the behind the scenes, who gets to see the casting calls, how can you optimize the quality of casting calls that you are able to see or reach and I want to continue to do research and listen to a bunch of casting directors, follow a bunch of casting directors on social media and really see what casting websites they use, how I can audition for certain shows because there are some shows I would love to audition for and I need to figure out what agents specifically are geared towards that type of those type of casting calls so that I can make sure to get the right LA agents and there's just so much I'm excited about today. Also I listen to the podcast in the envelope by backstage as well as the interviews they do on their channel and they interview casting agents all of the time so I also want to continue to listen to the podcast and whenever there's a casting director that's being interviewed I'm going to listen up and see what casting websites they use and see if they open it up to the public or just to the agents and I'll talk about that a little bit more later but right now I am on my last day of trying a new matcha because if you've been watching you know that caffeine has been making me very anxious so I've been trying matcha for the last three days. Today I'm going to try a matcha latte a hot matcha latte from blue bottle which is one of my favorite coffee places well chain coffee places so let's go do that and then after that we can do a bunch of research with a bunch of matcha energy everything is decorated so cute trying to stay away from people so here I am in the car trying it worst one yet so when I first found out about actors access I thought it was in another casting website like LA casting or SF casting casting networks in general where you log in and that's the site one site no there's a whole timeline I read reddit threads about actors access breakdown services and casting directors experiences as well as actors experiences I watched some interviews of gary marsh there's yelp reviews about actors access facebook posts random articles throughout the internet so there's so much information about it definitely some controversy I read about lawsuits but I want to explain as much as I can what breakdown services because it is legit okay so the reason why I was even inspired to do this today was because I have heard of actors access breakdown services and I thought oh did one buy out the other one why when you log in to breakdown services does it go to actors access it's because I'm an actor and that's the website that actors use I'm getting hot let me just give you a quick little history lesson and I will leave all of the links to everything I have I don't know maybe 15 tabs open I will leave all of the links to that and if you go to the breakdown services website there is a page that is our family of companies very confusing why they would have all of these different websites instead of consolidating it there is a timeline over here about breakdown services that talks about gary marsh and all of the the different phases of breakdown services gary marsh is credited for creating the word breakdown services and in one of the interviews that I read he would get into the lots by saying hey breakdown services and then the security people there would be like oh you're here to repair abc and he'd be like yep and he would just go in instead of being like hey I'm here to read a script because I need to get the casting stuff why was he doing this because he was a child actor and when he was 14 his mom became a talent agent and then he started working in the industry in that way so he started to call these summaries of the films or projects he was casting for breakdowns and then he would bring those to his mom for the castings and then the one day somebody was bugging him about a script because back in the day they would do it in the typewriter or not have as many copies as we do now now you can just share a pdf but they would have to share the one final draft of the script or the current draft of the script and somebody was bugging him for that script and he said you know what let me give you the notes and then she said well can you give me the notes that you're taking for all of the the places that are all of the scripts that you're reading this week and he said okay I'll do it for 20 so then that's how he started to give the breakdown so this was in 1971 that he used to create these in 1996 they finally created a website where you could do all of this and upload photos and resumes of actors and do all of this breakdown services online so that was 1996 and it says that they were the first ones but I'm sure there's other websites that also say they were the first ones because I know backstage casting was a magazine in 1960 1961 and they essentially did the same thing where they would publish through a magazine a weekly magazine I'll do another video specifically on the history of backstage and from one of the interviews that I read a lot of casting directors and agents managers didn't want breakdown services to share this information with actors because then they would get thousands and thousands of submissions but in 1997 he created actors access so that the actors could also log in and upload all that information and that same year in 1997 they created show facts another website where they hosted the scripts why they couldn't just add it to actors access I'm not sure in 2002 they created breakdown express which coordinates the release of casting information submissions from talent representatives and online auditions again why another website in 2004 they created a way where the casting directors could post directly to online which sounds like before that they had to call or email breakdown services directly and submit what they wanted to post and now they can post themselves in 2005 they were able to allow videos and voice recordings on their website in 2010 eco cast became a thing and this is basically self-tape auditions being able to upload your self-tape auditions to actors access in 2013 the slate shots became a thing and that is the ability to record a slate and simply have your slate uploaded and something I didn't know and that we should all be aware is that and this makes so much sense because then one casting call would be bombarded with 20 000 submissions within an hour is that most of the casting calls that are a higher caliber higher paying only go out to the talent agents and managers which makes so much sense because you want to be able to filter that and I assume this is the way of Gary Marsh's way to accommodate both parties so he wanted to share with the actors these casting calls but he also wanted to make his clients happy because there are so many casting agents casting companies that are posting in in his website so that sounds like that was his compromise it says hey if you do want to come use my website I will allow you to filter it you can send it to everybody you can send it to just actors or just agents because sometimes people do have to open it up really really wide when they are looking for something specific so that's something that you want to keep in mind that there are casting calls on these websites that are only for the agents so how do you get those casting calls you get them by having an agent and a few of the interviews that I saw and read of Gary Marsh he said that he wanted part of the website to be free so you can upload two photos and your resume and after that you do have to pay the extra to add more things and to submit to EcoCast and you can also pay just under $70 for the whole year to self submit and again that that is fine if you are okay with doing commercial work that might not pay as much student films indie film stuff for your reel it's it's not bad if you're starting out that's not bad I would say once you have an agent and you don't need to do those lower paying jobs then you don't have to pay for the um annual fee you can simply have a up an updated profile and allow your agent to use all of the information that you are updating your you're updating your resume you're updating your headshots whenever you have that putting your reels putting yourself tapes on EcoCast so let's go through this whole family of businesses family of websites subscriptions etc honestly to me this sounds like it could be one website where everybody could access and they would have access to different things depending on what kind of account they have what kind of credentials they were able to approve so breakdown services is obviously the umbrella company and then under that it is breakdown express and this one is for the talent agents the representatives the talent representatives or the casting people the people that are posting the casting jobs the price I was not able to find it might depend on commission maybe how big the project is actors access is of course for us actors and it is free for the basic membership and you can upload a couple of photos to your first late or you can get it for $68 a year and be able to basically do everything unlimited and this is where we actors see the casting calls and where we submit via EcoCast so this is our site where we upload all of our information our photos our reels all of that stuff show facts is included with the plus account so if you create a an actor's access account and you pay the $68 a year you will already have access to the sides and audition information for these casting calls sides express is another website where you need a code and this is where representatives get their sides and this is free this is a free subscription with the breakdown services screenplay online is also something that you need a code for you can access complete scripts or screenplays with a code and this doesn't show any kind of pricing so I'm assuming it also comes with the breakdown express account casting about is another one for actors so this one is all about who is working on the film TV show etc basically all of the information you can find if you already have an IMDb pro account because you can click on the show and get all of their contact information who's working on what and you're going to be able to contact them through their phone number or email that they have posted on IMDb and that's the gist of this okay you guys I need to take a break because I have been doing this for entirely two longs and I just heard that California is going back into full lockdown starting Sunday at 10 p.m and there's a few things I need from the store and I want to go pick up some stuff so let's go shopping and then we can continue this conversation about actors access slash breakdown services slash show fox slash eco cast slash there's so many websites within this one company why and we're also going to talk about all of the bad reviews there's a lot of people who do not like them so we're going to get into that too I have never had a positive or negative experience with actors access so I don't personally have an opinion but we are going to get into it date about the matcha no it is not making me jittery at all I just do not like the flavor so I'm done with matcha I tried it from three different places and I'm done but let's get back to talking about breakdown services slash actors access slash all of that family of websites that they created we all know that people go to leave reviews usually when they have a really negative experience or a really good experience I can tell you some positive experiences I do have some friends that have agents in LA and their agents very often send them a self-tape audition request from breakdown services slash actors access I help one of my friends specifically all of the time with his self-tape auditions as a reader and it is through actors access that he is able to get that so yes actors access is reputable not going to be able to get huge speaking roles in a movie or tv show etc on your own because when it is something really well known they don't want to have to go through thousands and thousands of auditions which is why they will go straight to the representatives so let's let's talk about these and negative reviews um I wanted to look at one that is more recent so something in 2020 and that way we can have a good perspective of what's happening now what people are feeling about the website in general right now April 28th 2020 MJJ said no one uh no one I know likes breakdown services everyone should go to casting networks LA casting IMDb pro film local New York casting I've never heard of film local but I've heard of the other ones of course uh they're miles better than breakdown breakdown is run by really mean spirited people though they'll disable your account if they don't like you or your project no one needs that so for this one it sounds like it was somebody who wanted to post their project on uh breakdown services they are going to filter this a lot and if it's something that's not professional enough or they're not able to verify it then they aren't going to allow just anybody to post these people could then go to casting networks or backstage and they would likely be accepted over there this next one is from February 15th of 2020 and it is a very very long one but basically it says that they are a casting agent for commercials and film and um they're at their customer service is bad and that for some reason they the casting directors aren't allowed to ask for your phone number or email uh or else you get taken off of the site and that's strange because I I mean if you're gonna get a call back how are they supposed to contact you if they don't know your email or phone number I haven't personally ever submitted to actors access I do have an account not a paid account so I'm not sure what's going on here but they said that they also said that breakdown services wants to be listed on whatever project they are doing as additional casting as breakdown services and that's also strange because they're saying we want to be listed even if we didn't actually help you find somebody which seems strange because why would you credit somebody when you weren't able to use them I mean if you did use them to try and find somebody but weren't successful then you shouldn't have to um and then of course there's a few positive reviews on Yelp here which Yelp is a funny place to find reviews for this but there's a few positive ones saying you know they use it they use it for selfish omissions they use it with their agent and then on reddit um there's somebody who goes on a little bit of a rant saying that breakdown services actors access is not good at all and then somebody replies to them why would I stay away from actors access if it is literally where 98% of my auditions from my agent come from SAG and non SAG projects I understand if you're not operating with an agency it can be frustrating but there is just a system in place to prevent casting directors on SAG projects from getting thousands of submissions from amateurs I can tell you which websites I have and I like but you need to keep in mind that I am in California and I am working out of LA in San Francisco so I am in those two markets eventually I want to be in more markets but depending on where you live you want to think about which websites you get as well as where you are in your career right now if you're starting out and you have little to no training I would definitely suggest backstage because that is really user-friendly extremely user-friendly has so many postings for student films indie films commercials extras roles so I would suggest backstage if you are in New York or LA San Francisco I don't know about Atlanta but I would imagine that it's good in Atlanta as well any market that's decently big now if you have a real headshots a decent resume training and possibly an agent I would definitely suggest getting actors access so let's take the agent portion away because I have agents in San Francisco but I don't have any in LA so for me the websites that I have without an agent in LA are actors access casting frontier LA casting SF casting and backstage those are the five casting websites I have and then now of course I have made IMDb pro which I was scrolling through IMDb pro and I realized that you can also get castings through there but basically what they do is they give you castings from a different a few different websites and then you can filter them and click on them and that will take you to the actual website you really have to think about two things before you go and make any account one where are you in your career and where are you physically so you can make sure that you are getting the appropriate website and if you do have an agent you can still self submit to the lower stuff the stuff that your agent doesn't send you to submit you to submit you for but for example my agents I am not allowed to submit for anything higher than five hundred dollars on SF casting because they are already submitting me for that so if there's any kind of self-tape audition I need to do they will let me know but I don't have to pay for my SF casting account because I am already connected to my agency so if my agency gets me a casting call they are already submitting me I don't have to do any of that I just go online and click accept for the audition if there's going to be some kind of callback zoom audition but I don't have to self submit I don't have to pay for SF casting same thing for actors access I can just put all of my basic information there and then once I have my LA agents I'll be able to not have to pay and they can submit me for everything and you don't have to pay for all of them you can make your profiles so at least if you do ever start submitting to agents or want to do self-submissions to develop your reel or make some cash you can already have those profiles ready to go and you can just subscribe and pay for it and be able to submit and get jobs I hope you guys enjoyed this video all of the links to everything that I read today is going to be in the description so you guys can read more about everything I talked about today the whole family our family of companies was very confusing for me so I would suggest that you go back and read it but if you are an actor just know that you have to worry about actors access thank you so much for watching I'm going to end the video here and I'll see you guys tomorrow for another video and at the end of every video I feature another channel this is today's feature if you would like to be featured on my next video make sure subscribe to like this video and leave me a comment