As an actor, having a website is crucial in today's digital age. Your website serves as your online portfolio, a place where you can showcase your talent, experience, and skills. It's where industry professionals can find you, learn more about you, and potentially offer you work. But what exactly should be on your actor website?
Your actor website should include:
- Your headshot
- Your resume
- A way to download your headshot & resume
- A way to get in touch with you and/or your representation
- Any footage you have (reel, commercials, demos, etc.)
You might also want to include:
- A bio, artist statement, or “about me”
- Additional portraits, photos, production photos, or stills
- For all images, you’ll need photo credit — usually the photographer’s name and a link out to their website / instagram
- Links to your social accounts, imdb page, etc.
- Press links
- Pull Quotes
A calendar for upcoming events — this is great if you’re someone who does a lot of gigs, like a comedian, singer, musician, etc. If you’re an actor who primarily does longer runs, this may be more annoying than beneficial. For each event, you may want to gather:
- Ticket Links
- Event image
- Blurb
- Related images (production photos, publicity stills, event photos, etc.)
- Related video
An archive of your past projects. I think of this as a more in-depth look at your resume. It can be a great way to keep track of production photos, press, and can allow you to offer more information on workshops, readings, concerts, anything! I like keeping this, to consolidate everything in one place. Especially as press links can eventually break as pieces come down, it’s nice to know you have a record of everything for yourself. But it’s rare that CDs or agents are sitting and going through every project you’ve worked on. This one is for you. For each project, you may want to include:
- Key art / poster image
- Blurb
- Related images (production photos, publicity stills, event photos, etc.)
- Related video
- Press links
- Pull quotes
- Collaborators / credits
A note to multi-hyphenates
Lots of us do more than one thing, and that’s great! Your website can be a great way to show off all that you do to people who may only know you in one context. Here’s what you might want to gather:
Writers
- Blurbs for each play
- Details (think the kind of information you'd need to upload on New Play Exchange
- Information on productions of your work, workshops
Musicians
- Links to your music on SoundCloud, Spotify, Apple Music, etc.
- Music Video links
Directors
- Artistic Statement
- Director's Notes from past productions
Choreographers
- Footage from rehearsals, footage from productions
