More Opportunities Are Growing For Actors in Phoenix, Arizona

According to Deadline, in July of 2022 the state of Arizona recently enacted the Arizona Motion Picture Program which incentivizes big movie studios to bring their productions to Arizona by offering lower taxes and making it cheaper for them to shoot their projects there. This move massively benefits actors in Arizona because that means more productions and more opportunities.

Film & TV In Phoenix, AZ

Phoenix, Arizona has a lesser known market for TV and Film production, but it does have a market for it. While a lot of the work that’s available for actors and models are more commercial work for local business like hotels, golf clubs, luxury car companies, or lifestyle and sporting companies coming from out of town to shoot, there are still TV show productions that will occasionally shoot in Phoenix. The Arizona Commerce Authority has these productions listed on their website so you can see that there are actually quite a few projects taking place in Arizona.

So what does all of this news mean for actors in Arizona? It means that it’s time for them to get ready for the shift that’s coming to Arizona. With the massive exodus of people moving out of California and with a lot of these migrants moving to Arizona, the biggest motive for production companies to film in Arizona is the same as everyone else: to save money. But the question is, can local actors in Arizona live up to the changes that are coming to their state?

How You Can Prepare For The Changes Coming To Arizona

The best thing local actors in Arizona can do is be prepared to offer talent that these movie studios would find in Los Angeles. The lifestyle of an Arizona actor is much different than an actor based in Los Angeles. In Los Angeles, you could throw a stone anywhere in the air and it will land on an aspiring actor or model. They are everywhere which means it’s a theme that is woven into the culture. The more production is taking place, the more resources there will be to cater to these productions. That’s why in Los Angeles you can find countless amount of acting coaches, acting schools, headshot photographers, filmmakers, writers, directors, producers, casting directors, wardrobe stylists, makeup artists, and the list goes on and on.

In Arizona, it’s entirely different. If you throw a stone in the air it would probably hit an engineer or a teacher. Meaning, most Arizonans would be shocked to find out that a friend of theirs was a working actor in Arizona. Because the market is so small, it’s almost unheard of for most locals. The unfortunate problem with that is the resources available for actors is very, very limited.

Acting In Arizona

Arizona Actor FB groups to join

In Arizona, the community for actors is relatively small. However, you can still find decent acting schools, acting coaches, and there are a handful of talent agencies that I’ve personally worked with. Even though they exist, it can be tricky for an actor to determine which expert to go to in order to get adequate training that rivals training an actor were to find in Los Angeles. The objective is to find a good school to get good training. If productions are moving to Arizona to shoot their projects and they’re casting for a supporting role locally, you need to be able to have the acting chops to pull it off. Eventually, more professionals like myself will travel or migrate to Arizona and offer our services that essentially feels like “LA” is being brought to you.

Finding A Good Acting Headshot Photographer In Phoenix

When working with nearly all of the major talent agencies in Arizona, a common theme I’ve heard from all of the agents is that finding a good professional headshot photographer or lifestyle photographer has been very challenging. That’s a complaint from the agencies and then when my clients who book me outside of an agency know that I am coming to town to offer my services, they also marvel at the rarity and accessibility of my work. I concede, when googling “Headshots Phoenix” or “Headshots Near Me”, you are hard pressed to find a good professional headshot photographer for actors. Most photographers are decent at taking portraits for professionals or senior pictures, but for actors it is clear they haven’t the faintest idea of the difference.

This is to be expected as their clientele is not made up of actors the way it is here in Los Angeles, so their understanding of the craft is limited and they are delivering a literal headshot for you as opposed to an actors headshot. As a result, most of these talent agencies in Phoenix, Arizona have subpar looking talent that have terrible headshots representing them. It ends up making the agency look unprofessional and the talent look unprofessional. And if you are a production team looking to hire local talent and you reach out to these agencies, the last thing you want is to doubt that you will be able to find usable talent. If it’s going to be the challenging to find talent that is ready for my level of production then I might as well stay filming in Los Angeles, right?

This is one of the reasons why I regularly go to Phoenix offering my professional headshot services because I believe in elevating the content in that market and helping to make Arizona a desirable place for movies and TV shows to be filmed in.

Are Arizona Actors Afraid Of Investing In Themselves?

Shot In Phoenix, Arizona

Another theme I hear from talent agencies in Arizona is that “We tell our actors to get new headshots and lifestyle modeling portfolio shots, but they just don’t want to pay a photographer to do it.” As a result, they have actors and models signed to their boards, with a selfie they took from their Facebook profiles displayed as their portfolio cover on the agencies website. Multiple times do these agencies send out an email blast to their talent informing them that I will be in town offering professional headshots and lifestyle shoots and often times only a few people bite. In two instances I was the first shoot that an actor or model did after being signed for 4 years. It was shocking.

Then talent sits around and wonders why they aren’t getting booked or no one wants to hire them, but they either don’t have a portfolio or the portfolio they do have sucks. Much like with any business you ever do, you have to invest in yourself. When you’re building a portfolio or taking new headshots this is the marketing part of your business. In order to make money, you have to market yourself well with strong images that show you can rise to the occasion when a production is in town. That is the difference between making a lot of money from acting and modeling and making nothing.

In Arizona, the reasons why most talent are reluctant to invest in themselves is primarily because this is a side thing for them. Whereas in Los Angeles people leave everything they know behind to pursue acting and will slave away at restaurants just to afford paying expensive rent, acting classes, headshots, and all of the expenses required to become an actor, in Phoenix it’s not that serious for most actors.

So if you’re in Arizona and you want to actually get work as a talent, you have to decide how serious you’re going to take it and make a decision to invest in this hustle- with the right people of course.

Book A Professional Headshot Session With Me In Phoenix, Arizona

If you want to be added to the list for when I am next in Phoenix, Arizona offering my professional headshot sessions, please fill the form on this page and I will email you with an update when I have my travel dates. Until then, you can find more available resources by following me on Instagram or TikTok.