Squire Fridell - Acting in Television Commercials for Fun and Profit: Fully Updated 4th Edition

It is always foolish to give advice. To give good advice is absolutely fatal.

Oscar Wilde

In 1941, the very first television commercial interrupted a live baseball game in New York on WNBT-TV with an endorsement for Bulova watches. Even though WNBT probably received a few letters of complaint from baseball fans, local sales for Bulova immediately skyrocketed. Television advertising was born as a result of that ad and its success, and the television advertising industry has since grown to a multibillion-dollar business. Now, in this day of consumer awareness and the shrinking dollar, most of us buy one product over another not because of Consumer Reports rankings or even the cost of the product. Instead, we tend to spend our money because of the power of TV and the persuasion of television advertising.

For those who may doubt the influence of television, the following statistics may help change your mind.

• Ninety-eight percent of homes in America have at least one television; 74 percent have more than one.

• There are more TV sets in American homes than there are toilets or people.

• After work and sleep, watching TV takes up the largest segment of our day.

• The average household in America has a television set turned on for 7 hours and 45 minutes each and every day. (Not in MY house!)

• This year, the average American youth will spend 1,500 hours watching television, while he will spend only 900 hours in school. (Not MY kid!)

• During those 1,500 hours spent in front of the TV this year, that average kid will have watched over 30,000 commercials. (That's my NEIGHBOR'S kid!)

• What's over 2 million? That's the number of commercials you'll have seen on TV by the time you reach 65. (Yep! YOU!)

• By 65 you'll have spent 9 years of your life glued to the tube. (Nine YEARS! That's my NEIGHBOR!)

• The country's biggest advertiser, Procter & Gamble, spent over $2.5 billion on television advertising in 2008. During that same period, the nation's fast-food industry spent another billion dollars.

• Advertisers were willing to fork over more than $2.5 million to air one 30-second television commercial during the 2008 Super Bowl. (And you were in the bathroom and missed it!) Over $5.5 million were also spent for TV advertising during the 2008 NCAA basketball playoffs.

Advertisers are well aware that American households have their TV sets turned on for close to eight hours every single day. And those advertisers (who are pretty smart folks) know that they have a captive audience in which they can effectively pitch their products. How many of us watching afternoon or late-night TV haven't fallen for the familiar pitch BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE!, followed by BUT ONLY IF YOU ACT NOW!? And tell me you haven't been the one to call that NUMBER ON THE SCREEN!, TO GET NOT ONE, BUT TWO!, and then get something that you didn't really need? I've ended up with everything from Ginzu knives to Bullet Blenders and / ought to know better! Advertising works. And television advertising works best of all.

Although there are a lot of ways advertisers can pitch their products on television, one of the most effective ways has always been to use actors and actresses, either as spokespeople for the product or acting like Veal people' in mock scenarios touting those products.

When most folks are asked to think of actors and actresses, the faces and names of superstars and celebrities usually come to mind. Their faces are all over the supermarket tabloids with headlines that scream out for our attention, and we can't seem to escape their latest scandals or whom they happen to endorse for president or the fact that they are working very hard to save some whales somewhere. And, strangely enough, we can't seem to get enough of them. These famous faces and big-screen idols may be who most folks think of when asked to name successful actors, but, amazingly, if you look at the income for all the actors and actresses who are union members, those folks appearing in television commercials represent about half of the total revenue!

Its hard to believe, so let me repeat that.

Actors and actresses make almost as much money acting in television commercials as actors and actresses make acting in movies and television combined! Here's the earnings breakdown.

Talking with other actors and students in classes over the years, I often hear folks particularly new to the business say that they only want to work on the stage' or they are only interested in doing a television series' or even they only want to be a movie star. My response is always the same: Why on earth would you want to eliminate half of your potential income?