The GotAuditions Academy · The Acting Résumé

The Acting Résumé

An acting résumé is a one-page credits list — not a work history. It is stapled to the back of your headshot, laid out in three columns (project, role, company or director), and it never includes paragraphs or an objective statement. These 16 free chapters cover every format rule, section by section, plus a free template you can fill in today.

Beginner → Booked

16 Chapters

Free Template

Pairs with: Coach Me

CREDITS
Project / Role
/ Director

3 columns

NO OBJECTIVE

ONE PAGE

SPECIAL
SKILLS

Only if true

Trim: 8 x 10

NO ATS HERE

What you'll learn

The three-column rule — and why column two changes depending on the medium

What goes on it when you have no credits at all (and what marks you as green)

Theatre, musical theatre, film, commercial and the UK CV — five different documents

Age, student films, and what actually happens when you lie

Pairs with this tool

Coach Me

A résumé gets you in the room. It cannot act for you once you are there. When the credits start coming, the work has to hold up — and that is what Coach Me is for.

The Chapters

All 16 Chapters

It is not a job application. It is a casting document, and the rules invert.

What It Actually Is

The industry-standard layout, free, in Word and Google Docs. Nothing to sign up for.

The Free Template

Two résumés, one actor, one career. One gets him in the room. One gets deleted.

Good vs Bad Example

An empty credits section is a stage, not a shame. Four things honestly belong there today.

One line got an actor two years on The Wire. Another one stopped a shoot.

Column two changes meaning by medium. Role type for screen, character name for stage.

The Three-Column Rule

One page. Everyone agrees. Almost everything else you have been told is unsourced.

Format & Length

Theatre outsearches film nineteen to one — and it wants the theatre, not the tier.

The Theatre Résumé

The only acting résumé with a hard technical spec. Get the range notation wrong and you have told them you are not a singer.

Musical Theatre

Screen credits use tiers, not names. And the commercial world has one rule nobody tells you: conflicts.

Film, TV & Commercial

The staple is on life support. The PDF is not. Here is the honest state of the paper résumé.

Headshot + Résumé

Contested. To an agent: yes, four sentences. To a casting director: usually a red flag.

The Cover Letter

A4, not 8x10. Playing age. Spotlight PIN. And no personal statement — whatever the template sites told you.

The UK Acting CV

You can’t. Not because of a law — because of a phone call from a line producer at six in the morning.

Age, Lies and Student Films

Actors Access lets casting sort submissions by “Profile Completeness.” That is not a metaphor. It is a dropdown.

Where It Actually Goes

A child’s résumé is handed to strangers. Four things must come off it — and one of them is on almost every template you will find.

Child and Teen Résumés