Auditions, call-backs, cold read, table read, extras, principle, in the can, dailies, SAG, non-union, reel, pilot, feature, short, point of view, voice over ….are just a few words from the very long list of ‘in the biz’ lingo. Living in Los Angeles, otherwise known as La La Land, is quite complex. Actors introduce themselves with a headshot while writers are ever ready with a treatment or film script. Directors and producers are never short of drawing a crowd while agents and managers strategically hide their professions.

Writers are in every street corner coffee shop with laptops, an Apple is a dead give a way. Waiters are really actors waiting to be discovered. Many writers and producers tried acting first, but shifted gears in order to generate their own opportunities to make “it.” Actors who give up and become agents and managers want to make “it” by avoiding direct rejection, and live vicariously through their clients.

Not only is the economy in LA driven by the working people ‘in the biz’, it’s also largely subsidized by the non-working wanna-be’s. Thousands of wanna-be actors spend thousands of dollars of their ‘just above poverty’ income on photographers, graphic designers and printers, video editors, acting teachers, life coaches, membership to databases, breakdown services, and casting workshops, hoping that they will book the next audition and their investment will be repaid in full. And that’s just the wanna-be actors.

Then they have to pay the essential almost $3,000 SAG initiation dues, pay commission to their agents and managers and stop working their “regular” job while they film. After which, they are unemployed again and again. But talk to any wanna-be actor and these are mere trifles on the road to stardom.

Wanna-be’s here throw aside family obligations since committed relations are impediments. They network and cultivate as many superficial relations as possible with people ‘in the biz’ as simply the next opportunity. Who you know and getting through the door are crucial, and just as many relationships are discarded as quickly as they are initiated. One year you are ‘hot’ on the set of a pilot with Oscar winner Holly Hunter, the next year your talent agent drops you and casting agents tell you your look is out. War stories of the stars are used as evidence that failures and rejections are de rigueur.

The road to stardom in La La Land has the strongest pied piper I’ve ever met. I’ve asked many why they keep going for “it” even though they’ve suffered many, many more defeats than successes. Most answer, “I have to; it’s all I want to do.”

Maybe that’s why we pay triumphant survivors of the agonizing journey such ridiculous amounts of money when they do become stars. They deserve it for overtaking and thrashing the Pied Piper.