Mandy.com – The #1 Jobs Platform For Cast, Crew And Creative Professionals

Mandy.com – The #1 Jobs Platform For Cast, Crew And Creative Professionals

We talk with Danny, Gina and Alexandra about the #1 jobs platform for cast, crew & creative professionals: Mandy.com.

Panelists

Transcript from Talk

Sarah Marince:

Hello, everyone. Happy Wednesday. Welcome to crew talk brought to you by shoots.video. I’m your host, Sarah Marince, and I’ve missed you guys. It’s been a few weeks, but I’ve been wedding planning and just going crazy with all of that fun stuff. So I’m glad to be back here tonight with you. And we have a very fun panel today. I’m going to go down the line and have everyone introduce themselves in a moment. But before I do that, just wanted to remind you if you have any questions or comments during this webinar, feel free to drop them in the chat box and we will get to them as we go along. So I’m just looking at my screen here and up first, we have Alexandra, Danny and Gina with us today. And so Alexandra, do you want to start off and just kind of say who you are, where you are, and just like a brief little sentence about what you do.

Alexandra Boylan:

Hi, I’m Alexandra Boylan currently in Savannah, Georgia, but I live in Los Angeles, California, and I am a writer producer and I make female-driven family friendly.

Sarah Marince:

Well, we are so glad to have you. Thank you for being here and next we have Danny. Hey Danny.

Danny Farber:

Hey guys. My name is Danny Farber. I am a Business Development Executive for mandy.com – the number one jobs platform and online digital talent database. I’m also an actor, and director myself.

Sarah Marince:

Very cool. And Gina.

Gina Hall:

Hi, my name’s Gina Hall and I also work at Mandy. I run the crew side here in Los Angeles, so yeah, very excited to be here.

Sarah Marince:

Well, thank you guys for joining today and I’m just going to jump right into it and Danny or Gina, you can take it. What is Mandy?

Danny Farber:

Yeah. well, so Jean and I kind of work on, on similar sides of the same coin. I work with the the cast and Gina can kind of take over the, the crew side of the answer, but specifically we are a talent database, a roster where you can find either your cast or your crew for your independent projects, for your commercials, feature films, union non-union. We kind of do it all

Sarah Marince:

Very cool.

Gina Hall:

I always described it as LinkedIn for the film industry. People can put up profiles people can search for you, you can we’re and you can also hire people really easily. And that this makes it super much easier on producers and line producers that come in and want to hire quickly because things happen fast. And this districts

Sarah Marince:

Absolutely. And I have to ask before we go any further, what is the name Mandy like? Where did that come from? Mandy?

Gina Hall:

I’ll probably handle this and I’ve been here. I think I know the story. So Mandy would actually be, I believe the wife of a cinematographer in the early nineties, that those buildings built a crew list that her husband went to from time to time. And then that list got bigger and bigger. And then people then, you know, the internet got a little broader and people started using that list and then also treat, you know, posting jobs and things like that. And it just really kind of became the kind of informal job board for the industry. And then it kinda got, you know, just a little chaotic until you know, people came in, you know, are basically the people that run the company now came in and cleaned it up you know, make sure it made sure that everybody that was posting jobs is legitimate. Does a lot of that. We do background checks for everybody. I just make sure that, you know, nobody’s worried about scams or anything like that. So Mandy would actually a woman that capitalist

Danny Farber:

And I like to say that it’s kind of Mandy more side project. She doesn’t know that she’s involved with it, but it really gets our foot in the door. Yeah.

Sarah Marince:

Well, yeah. When you hear Mandy, you, do you think Mandy Moore? So yeah, I could see that. So kind of walk me through how the site works, so I’m talent and I want to kind of go on and explore it and I did go on the site and it’s very cool. I love how you have all the different, like areas where you are, you can click on and get in, but do I need to create a profile first to see everything kind of walk me through how the site works?

Danny Farber:

Sure. Yeah. Well, on the talent side of things, you know, it’s, it’s pretty comparable to a lot of other digital talent databases that are available on the market. We are the cheapest option. We’re we’re based in the UK, but we’re I’m stationed Los Angeles. So we’re really starting to grow our, our domestic footprint here. Nationally speaking, you can create your profile for free. And if you want to upgrade for $7 and 50 cents a month, less than a bowl of Chipotle is what I usually like to put it as you can go ahead and you get a premium membership, which allows you to add unlimited media to your profile, submit to auditions and casting calls either in your area or kind of expand your net a little bit further and do your research on service agents that, you know, we, we are able to provide within the company of agencies or headshot photographers. So, you know, it’s a little bit more involved than a couple of other, you know, competitive platforms as an actor. You’re not only able to find, you know, the casting call, but then do a little bit of research on who’s posting the casting call as well.

Sarah Marince:

That’s kind of nice. You can really go in depth into like you’re auditioning for potentially working with. And I, and like I said, it was kind of browsing before this and I saw you do have like agencies, production companies, like everything, and you can click on, which is a nice feature to have for the talent side. So is there like a vetting process for who can sign up on, on the clients that, you know, I guess, talent or production how do we know they’re legit.

Danny Farber:

Totally. Yeah. So, well,

Gina Hall:

Oh, I was going to say on the cruise side, we make sure I’m usually there either. I mean, they either come from me a lot of times or we have an admin side that actually goes through and just make anybody can post a job. You know, you are, I can go into if you’re going to make a short film, as long as you’re, I mean, we have an opportunity section for internships and unpaid projects, but if you’re to be posting on our job site, it has to be paid at least minimum wage and above. And so we do actually call people and, you know, if they don’t have a, you know, their website is, you know, we know that we’ve seen before we will call them and speak with them and make sure that they’re, they are who they say they are. So we do actually have an extensive vetting process to make sure that nobody’s worried about, you know, not getting paid.

Danny Farber:

And then on the flip side of things, if you are an employer looking for qualified candidates, we made sure that every actor, every model, every, you know, voiceover, depending what you do, there’s a few different criteria that you kind of need to meet our standards, our company’s standards to apply and have your profile kind of green lit on the site. The number one thing for actors is like, you have to have a professional quality headshot. I think that immediately kind of weeds out people that like, you know, are just starting to get into it. And then people that are taking this as a serious profession and as a part of their, a step in their career. So that’s our number one, like bottom line base layer. And then from there, you’re able to add your specific credits and then have those be verified by other members of the network that either worked on that project or that know you similar to how Gina said to LinkedIn, you kind of have those people endorse your profile.

Sarah Marince:

Okay. Alexandra, do you want to jump in and add anything like you come from the production side and how something like this can help people in the industry?

Alexandra Boylan:

Oh yeah, this is wonderful. I actually just finally signed up to be on mandy.com you guys. And I actually would love to use it for my next film. I think it’s amazing. I mean, it would a great way to I’ve usually I used to be a part of something called women and moving pictures slot, and we had like a email list. It was like 30, 3500 women on it. It was amazing. Cause you can just like email out what you needed and this is kind of what it is. Like, whatever you need, it’s a quick way to get it out there and find your crew. So I think this is awesome. Anything like that is great resource.

Danny Farber:

Yeah. I actually, I’m an independent producer and director myself, like I mentioned earlier and you know, before I was hired on with Mandy, I would utilize the company as, as an employer and as a, you know, an independent freelancer, who’s looking just to kind of crew up or, you know, looking for auditions or whatnot. Like it’s a great resource for not just outside of me working for the company, like as a member of the community of the film community. I definitely think it’s, it’s a, it’s a good resource to have. Mm

Gina Hall:

We’ve had a lot of people tell us that they weren’t sorry that they were there. A lot of first jobs come off Mandy and talk to people that have worked in the industry, even for, you know, like 10, 15 years. They’re like, oh yeah, my first job came from there. And so, I mean, we had everything that ranges from, you know, people who want experience and skilled cinematographers to production assistants that are just coming into the industry. So it ranges, but you know, a lot of people do get the first jobs off Mandy before they have lots of connections.

Sarah Marince:

I mean, you need to build up your resume and experience somehow. So that’s great. One thing I was going to ask is earlier, somebody mentioned rates and how, you know, there’s jobs that are, you know, non-paid and paid. So for the paid jobs, is there some kind of like rate card or scale that you guys go off of that standard for your site? Or is it up to the individual person posting the listing?

Danny Farber:

Yeah, totally. So we, we make sure that, you know, on the admin side between Gina and I and our team that works with us as employers go ahead and, and post listings because our members are the candidates pay for a premium subscription to join the site. It’s our responsibility to make sure that they’re going to in turn book jobs that are paying them appropriate wages and fair wages. So for us, our standard is just wherever your state, local minimum wages at that’s what we reach out to. So it’s a global company. So we kind of have teams set up all over in different countries and different parts of America. So if, if it’s, you know, posting something in Texas versus Alabama versus Los Angeles, all have different state minimum wages, it’s kind of our job to do that research and our due diligence to see, Hey, is this employer meeting the, the verifications and the the minimum that we’re requiring. And if they can’t, you know, it’s an open, honest conversation sometimes, you know, we’ll pick up the phone and call a production company and say, Hey, you’re offering 75 bucks a day. Can you meet us at $118? You know, it’s, it’s asking a company to do a little bit more on their end to make sure that our members are kind of satisfied on our end, but often we, we find that they’ll get better candidates. And in doing that anyways,

Gina Hall:

And we also, I mean, a lot of, most of our ours knows that a lot of our jobs platform are way above minimum wage, but we also understand that producers that are trying to make projects, you know, are shoestring also exist in people that are doing their very first thing for their reel may want that opportunity just to get some more experience in local and work for, you know, minimum wage or slightly above. But we also have, you know, jobs that pay, you know, what’s the industry industry standard, what people would expect for something with more experience. So we do have a wide range, but

Danny Farber:

I put up a couple $850 a day acting jobs yesterday or the day before. And I was like being, I I’ve, I’ve been an actor I’ve been on those sets and that’s always a great day day. You know what I mean? Like it’s solid, it’s solid work. Yeah,

Sarah Marince:

Absolutely. One of the cool features I saw on the site, it was like the, the forum where people could chat with each other, like do the different pick the different topics. And I was just scrolling through them. One of the ones on the top was voiceover. So I clicked it cause that’s my world and whatnot. And so I thought that was really cool. Cause somebody posed a question and there were like tons of responses and just feedback. It seems like a very active community, which is nice. It’s, you know what you want?

Danny Farber:

Totally. We go a little bit, we go to kind of that, that step further, just being a place where you can find listings or jobs and kind of, we want to build that network out and happy to that kind of resonates, you know, that’s good.

Gina Hall:

And right now it’s all digital. And that’s been the way since the pandemic began, but before we actually had in-person meetups and especially in Los Angeles and New York, we would actually, you know, all get together at a bar. You know, we had a, a page where people just sign up and we had great turnout. So, you know, hopefully we can get back to that, you know, or if people are still a little, especially in Los Angeles, so reticent about that at the moment, but we did do it. It was fun. I hope to be able to do it again. And we, we did, you know, more expos and we were at, you know, there’s those things kind of ramp back up. I hope to do some more in-person in VR community. In-Person

Sarah Marince:

Absolutely. I mean, those kind of events are always fun and always a good time. We just had a voice, a conference here in Dallas, I guess, a few weeks ago. And I mean, as a voice actor, you’re by yourself all day anyway, like even when you’re working, you’re not like on a set with people. And so it was nice, but weird to kind of like almost two years, you know, you don’t see your community or your people, but it’s like, we were all interacting for the first time and like learning how to be social again. But it was a good time. Like I love that kind of stuff. So you brought up the pandemic and I was going to ask how the pandemic kind of affected Mandy or just, I mean, Alex, if you want to jump Alexandra, if you want to jump in and just talk about production overall and the pandemic.

Alexandra Boylan:

Sure. I mean, I shot a movie July of 2020, I’m one of the first Indies to go and we shot in Columbus, Georgia, and we were so nervous obviously to, to make a film. It’s the height. I mean, we were past the bit. Yeah, it was on the only people making a movie was us and Tyler Perry and Georgia. We were like, no, no pressure. We were like doing the trades, put it out and we hadn’t even wanted to put it out because we were so afraid that if we got shut down, we didn’t want anyone to know.

Danny Farber:

I got to do it. Cat’s out of the bag. That’s always the best.

Alexandra Boylan:

But yeah, we performed 342 COVID 19 tests on our set, not a single positive test. It was unbelievable. It we were advised by some doctors in Georgia to come when it was like really hot. So our COVID officer was definitely more afraid of people passing out a heat stroke because I don’t know if you guys have been to Georgia in July. Oh my God. So hot. It was so hot, but you know, we did, we did all the protocols and we were safe and we had actually written the script to be one location and only five family members. It’s like all like kind of like a knives out kind of movie where family all comes home to bury their mother. So it was the perfect film. We couldn’t have had a more perfect film to shoot. That was literally five actors. We, I was scripty on top of being the writer producer. I also like did scripty and we all had, we all carried a couple of extra crew positions so that we could keep it as, you know, as few people on set as possible. And and we shoot for 18 days. So we just got in and got out and were safe. So that was amazing. We have a movie finished,

Danny Farber:

Which is great, which is a miracle to say that even by itself.

Alexandra Boylan:

Exactly, but it’s simply making an independent films is already so much headache putting the COVID on top of it. I’ve gone completely gray. It was so stressful. Just, you know, so you can all

Danny Farber:

Imagine,

Gina Hall:

I think a lot of producers are failing that. I mean, we had a lot of you know, it, when it first, you know, all kind of came down, you know, I think a lot of employers were just not knowing exactly what to, how to hire, like what the protocols were going to be, what the costs were going to be on top of everything. So that was, you know, making a lot of people nervous. And now I think we’ve seen that they employment just go right back to where it was because largely they had to, you know, people had to get back to work. And so I think the people how to do everything properly,

Danny Farber:

I know that, you know, from, from a Mandy side of things, we, I noticed a few things specifically when the, when the pandemic hit in terms of a whole new job department opened up COVID compliance and health and safety, like that’s those are paying positions and, and, you know, it’s you know, making hay while the sun is shining or finding a silver lining there’s there’s people that are, you know, making, providing a salary for themselves, finding work as a COVID officer. We, we had a ton of, we still have a ton of those listings up on our site and then voiceover work really, really increased because that, that didn’t really skip a beat. Sarah, I’m sure you can attest to this as well. That like stayed very, very consistent on our side of things. So luckily we are a company that, you know, we kind of attack things from a couple of different standpoints in terms of on-camera or voiceover or modeling and stuff.

Danny Farber:

So we had a couple of different outlets personally though, like as, as a freelance filmmaker as well, like, ah, yeah, Allegheny tracker. Totally. I can totally relate. Like I did my first branded content digital series that I directed in the middle of the pandemic. And then I created my own short film that I acted and directed in and crowdfunded for it in the middle of a pandemic. And like everything that you, all these small wins that you have, you know, as a, as a filmmaker, just generally, it’s just amplified because now, you know, you can kind of add that like little asterix with like, we did this and we like, we survived the production and the pandemic, and now we’re all and we’ll get t-shirts and we’ll be happy about it. You know,

Sarah Marince:

You’re stronger for it. Oh, do you know where you’re going to say something? Sorry.

Gina Hall:

I was going to also say that anyway with Mandy, we also really, and we still are actively pursuing remote work for people so that people that still don’t feel comfortable or, you know, are kind of emerging it, you know, but we always do also provide remote work opportunities. And those, I think those things are here to stay in terms of, you know, editor position and you know, a lot of post-production is, you know, things that don’t have to be on set, you know, people aren’t asking people to come into the office anymore. So if you have the facilities to do it at your house, if you’re a writer, you’re a editor, editors, anything that does it on here at home. And we have that too. So yeah, there’s a lot of those kinds of opportunities now. And I think those are the say,

Sarah Marince:

So I have a question about like finding like, I guess, listings. So say I sign up for a talent profile and I’m on camera, I’m an actress and I want to find work. Do I, the way I fill out my profile, will I be emailed alerts that when something matches with my profile or how does that work?

Danny Farber:

Yeah. I mean, you could, you could make that as, as specific as you want. We can do there’s alerts when specific jobs are posted within your area, within your breakdown. We also give you a daily or weekly roundups as well. Oftentimes, you know, there’s a lot of people that get too many alerts, so you can scale that back to as minimum as you want. You know, it’s, it’s really kind of a, it’s very user-friendly in terms of how active you want to be involved and how much you want to get these alerts. Because there are a lot that come in and sometimes they, they apply and sometimes they, they don’t always hit the mark. So if you want something that’s very geared specific to your demographic, your breakdown and your location, you can absolutely sign up for that alert within our system.

Sarah Marince:

Do you find that a lot of people will travel? Like, so say I’m, you know, in Dallas, but I see this listing in, you know, Utah, I got like do a lot of people kind of travel around with what they find on the site.

Danny Farber:

Totally. Yeah. And we, we actually, on our end and the, on the administrative side, we’re able, when we’re mailing out jobs and I’ll often pitch this when I’m, you know, trying to get an employer to, to just post on our site and just check out our, you know, our service. We can keep it within just the state, but we can also expand that within a 100 mile radius of that, of that city or a 500 mile radius, or all states are target specific states. So what, I just had a, it was a feature looking for a, a teen girl of mixed ethnicity in New Mexico. This was something that I did like recently the basketball weeks. And I knew on our, our demographics and our breakdown. I didn’t have a lot in New Mexico, but with an Arizona, Colorado and New Mexico, there’s a handful.

Danny Farber:

So I, I, and I asked the production company, do you mind if I expand a little bit further, are you guys able to accommodate, you know, those kinds of you know, those travel accommodations and it’s per the pretty serious kind of discretion, but we are able to target and kind of expand that search a little bit more in depth for those people, if they have money to do so. And if not, you know, we say, you know, most workers, local hire, but feel free to travel as far and wide as you want to go to get that job, you know,

Gina Hall:

And we have a lot of producers that are hiring out of their zone that they usually hire. And so, you know, if you’re a Los Angeles based that your production, you know, next month is in Arizona and you aren’t familiar with Arizona through our Arizona talent we can really cater to that and make sure that you find whether it’s local talent or if you’re willing to fly out talent. We have a lot of that kind of thing happening.

Sarah Marince:

Do you know what’s your favorite like favorite thing on the site? Like what, what’s your favorite thing that you can do?

Gina Hall:

I mean, I, I do like the chat feature, cause I just like seeing people interacting and learning from each other. And and also, you know, I like to, I mean, I, my job is to help people and make it easy for them to post. So if somebody does have a lot of crew to add and take them all, you know, they feel like it’s going to take a huge time out of the day. They can send that through with, to me and between me and our admin team, we can help them get that up. That’s one of the perks of meeting with me and knowing me and stuff like that, same with Danny. We can kind of help people get, you know, there’s a backend feature for us that we can help people get approved faster. So, you know, definitely reach out to us if you have a lot of through or having questions or things like that, because we are very helpful.

Sarah Marince:

Awesome. And the word I was looking for was feature or tool. And so, Danny, what is your favorite tool on the website?

Danny Farber:

I would have to be the talent directory. I think that’s the thing that like for anybody, for both sides of the coin, you know, if your employer or Canada, I think it’s really helpful to see kind of who’s available at your discretion or kind of who your competition is as well. You know, you can break down as specific as, you know, location at age, gender ethnicity. Like we you’re able before posting anything to kind of see the roster that we have available, you know, and that’s, I’m, I’m, I’m pretty sure it’s on the cruise side as well. You know, if you want, I know a lot of cruise, if you’re looking for a female DP specifically, like, you know, you can make sure that you’re, you’re really implementing colorblind casting and kind of making sure as many people get these opportunities as possible. So I really liked the talent directory feature.

Sarah Marince:

Nice. Are you able to filter that based on experience?

Danny Farber:

I think there’s a button between one and three years, three and five years, and then five plus years I could be wrong, but I figured that was a thing at one point in time.

Sarah Marince:

Okay. And Alexandra, what is like a feature or a tool that you find most helpful or you want to see on a website like Mandy?

Alexandra Boylan:

I think, I think their website is pretty amazing. I have, I’ve been on there and played around and looked at I would like to get a little more versed in it. So I’m in pre production. I shoot in January. So I think my next thing will be to be poking around the site and see it now that I know you guys get a little help, but I think, I think it’s really such an incredible resource, a tool. So I think it’s a whole, I think the talent part too is really, you’re supposed to, you’re looking for something very specific that, that, that, like right now we’re looking for twins to play freshmen in college. Like we’re going to do like a nationwide search to find the next big twins for this movie where this girl clones herself and in high school. So that might be something I could go to Mandy for maybe right.

Danny Farber:

I got you!

Alexandra Boylan:

Yeah. So that’s good to know. See, I love that.

Sarah Marince:

And Danny and Jenna, are there any new or upcoming features to the site that people can get excited about that you can talk about?

Danny Farber:

Totally. There’s a lot going on internally right now that I’m not super. Yeah. Well, I know that we’re, we’re able to talk about, you know, there’s, we’ve been acquired by backstage. And so we are working in tandem with, with backstage right now one big happy company, and there’s a lot of that versatile crossover between the, the back end of our site and kind of, you know, the, the functionality and kind of adapting some of the similar attributes that backstage uses as well. More specifically than that, I don’t know how specific we can get over the airwaves nor do I know. Do I have a full grasp of understanding of what that really looks like to be way above my head, but there’s a lot going on and, you know,

Sarah Marince:

But that’s exciting, I guess. Well, I’ll have to stay tuned to kind of see what’s going to roll out. So you said you’re based in the UK, so is, is mandy.com like in the UK kind of just like a known website. Like everybody goes to that, like that’s the site they go to and it’s kind of gaining traction here in the U S is that kind of

Gina Hall:

Actually it’s the Mandy brands to go back? We based in the US required by the Mandy brand got acquired by UK-based company, and then they re completely rebranded Mandy. So the Mandy brand is actually well known over here and they had to kind of rebrand it over in the UK, although they are, and have always been the main casting site that people use over there. They were a little newer crew in the UK and with the brand Mandy brand whereas over here, the Mandy brand was it’s synonymous with crew in the industry and it’s a little bit newer to the casting side of it. So that’s kind of how it works. The Mandy brand has been in the U S and I think, I mean, I remember using it when I graduated from college, however, blah, blah, blah years ago. So so I’ve been around awhile. Yeah. In the U S and Philip’s newer, the brand is newer in the UK, but they

Danny Farber:

We are headquartered out of the UK.

Gina Hall:

Oh yeah. That’s, you know, the brand within acquired by the UK and then that’s technically our Mandy headquarters.

Danny Farber:

So we’re just bringing it back to America. So what we’re doing here in Ireland. Yeah. Having a good time.

Sarah Marince:

Awesome. And oh gosh, I just forgot. Oh, I was going to ask, who do you find uses it the most? So like, is it crew, is it talent? Like, you know, actresses, voiceover, like who do you find benefits most from a site right now?

Danny Farber:

That’s a good question. I think everybody can benefit from using the site. I think it’s always as an actor or voiceover, you know, if that’s your, your lane, if you’re a crew member, especially like as many places to find work for yourself, if you’re a freelancer the better. Right. I think that it’s always going to be helpful and positive. Employers are sometimes a little bit more complicated because sometimes you get too many applications and you don’t want to sift through, you know, if it’s a, if you’re producing a single day commercial for 300 bucks and whatever, that’s your, that’s your rate for your actor? And you already have 500 applications in there. You’re not going to want to put your, your, you know, your, your breakdown out on a couple of different sites. But like Alexandra said, she’s looked for twins. You want as wide of a net as possible with like niche casting and stuff like that. So it really is a double-edged short. I do think that a lot of people can benefit from using our platform

Sarah Marince:

Now, is there a cap? So say, oh, sorry, who I just interrupted. I was going to say

Gina Hall:

The paper crew you know, I, I find that, you know, when employers are hiring, I mean, they, they get an inappropriate amount of applications sometimes every once in a while, I’ll have somebody say, oh, we’ve got way too much. Take it down. I think what’s really nice about our community is that the appropriate people apply and the people that aren’t qualified don’t. So I think that’s really nice about what we have for employers is the people that you’re gonna see that the profiles are, are, are qualified to do your job.

Sarah Marince:

Okay. And I was going to ask you to say you know, Alexandra is looking for twins, is it something like where it’s capped at like 30 submissions? And so like, once you, like, she’s received 30, like she can’t receive anymore, like, is that an option or is that something that happens?

Danny Farber:

I don’t know if we do submission caps, I’ve never seen submission caps. Okay. Yeah. But that’s something, you know,

Gina Hall:

I don’t think so. You can always stop. You can take down the post, so nobody else sees it and you can manage the applications from our backend. If we, if you’d rather see them come in through email and have you have a dedicated email box or something like this, or you can manage them on the site itself and just, you know, look at everybody that’s applied. And if you just want to look at the first 20, then you can, or you can go deeper depending on who you got to apply for yourself.

Sarah Marince:

Okay. And just to clarify on something we talked about a few minutes ago, is the Mandy in the U S more popular for crew and then the UK used more for talent, or is it kinda a little bit everything

Danny Farber:

That’s sort of where things are lining up right now. You know, we are, we were available on both in both areas on both platforms both sides of the site, but yeah, I would definitely say there’s a larger footprint in America, you know for the cruise item mandate and then in the UK where like, like all into big casting directors and we, we are very, very, very prevalent in the UK for like how those shows and productions get booked.

Gina Hall:

Oh, we’re growing on either side in both places.

Sarah Marince:

Yeah. Cool. So, Alexandra, I kind of want to ask a question to you because you’ve been doing this for a while and have had wonderful success. So for somebody who wants to be you, or just like you, what kind of advice would you give them besides using mandy.com? Yes.

Alexandra Boylan:

Go to mandy.com.

Alexandra Boylan:

Just do it. If you want to be an independent filmmaker or a filmmaker, get friends together, get a camera and just start going shooting stuff surround yourself with people who want to do something different than you. When I first moved to LA 21 years ago, and I was only pursuing acting all my friends were actors. So when I decided I wanted to get behind the camera and start writing and producing, I realized that my actor, friends were not going to direct or hold a boom for me. So it was really good to get out of my comfort zone and start making friends, or like, oh, you want to be a director. You want to be a cinematographer. And my first feature film, which is called home sweet home, we made it for $10,000, five people in the middle of nowhere, New Mexico ended up selling it to RLJ releasing.

Alexandra Boylan:

And it was on the shelves of Walmart. And the key to that was that we wrote the script around a location. We knew that we had, and we did a thriller and we went to the house and we literally wrote it for that. And I think that’s one of the best advice I give somebody is like, if you can do a one location and you can write your entire script around it and then get some friends together, pawns some actors and just make something don’t be afraid to just get out there and start playing. Because you’re not going to know anything until, you know, something, that’s just, you gotta do it.

Sarah Marince:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think like, especially now with an iPhone, like you can just go out and shoot whatever. And I’m what I’ve heard just through these webinars is a lot of people during the pandemic. That’s what they did. I mean, there was free time and, you know, your ideas were flowing. So they went out and kind of just started creating.

Alexandra Boylan:

And we literally made that movie just to show our parents or to prove that we could make a movie for district two for stuff like investors. And then we ended up getting a sales agent and selling it. And so to me, it’s like, you’ve got to always give it a try because you never know, you know, you never know what could happen. It could end up jump-starting your entire career.

Danny Farber:

Great. That’s a great point too. Just like from an indie filmmaker, like spirit of, like, I know a lot of people that put the cart way before the horse and they’re like, well, how do we, how do we, you know, get the money or how to, what are we going to do? How do we sell it? Or how do we get into festivals? And if you asked yourself all of these questions before you ever go through the motion of making the thing happen, you’ll never make the thing happen. If you know exactly how hard it is to make a movie, nobody, we make a movies. You know, it’s a very complicated, difficult thing to do as soon as you get into it though. And you’re like, I have to finish this thing. Or there’s that, there’s that filmmakers fiery spirit within you, that like the drive that forces you to get up at four 30 in the morning, drive 45 minutes to set work 12 hours, then go home and do it again. Like when you find your community and your people that are like in it to make it with you. And you’re telling a story that everybody’s passionate about. I mean, there’s really nothing better that that’s it, you know,

Alexandra Boylan:

And that’s the key right there. You have to love it and be passionate about it. And you’re right. Not thinking about, you know, the forest for the trees. I mean like, well, where is this going to go? I’m like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Just like, if you don’t love making it, you’ll, won’t finish this project even to get it out there to even try to get sold or go to a film, I suppose. So I’m with you on that. We made the movie really for fun and to show our, our parents. And that’s probably why it got finished because we really just bring enjoying the process of learning and making it and creating it without any pressure of where it would ever go. It was really just something we wanted to do.

Danny Farber:

I also think, sorry, I’m so sorry. I get nerdy about this stuff, but it’s something that I’m you know, every project you learn more lessons, right? And every time you make a thing, it’s, you’re, you’re always kind of adding more things to it, to the reservoir of knowledge and stuff. And what I am starting to come to terms with, I think grappling and realizing is that everybody holds their project to be the most precious thing possible. And as soon as you let that go, you understand that this won’t be the most groundbreaking thing that will shatter the academy and everybody will know your name, just take all of that ego out of the process and just have focus on telling a story. Hopefully if this isn’t the best story you’ll ever tell, the next one will be better. And like, it’s just, it’s making sure that you’re not, cause I have friends that never make their, they’re getting their projects out of development, or even just like finish a script because they’re like, well, it’s not perfect. It’s not, you know, the department or whatever. And it’s like, it’s not, it’s not like Scorsese started there. You got to work to it. You know, you gotta make bad movies. We’re we can make good movies. And I’ve made a lot of bad movies in a couple of good movies. So it worked, you know?

Sarah Marince:

Yeah. I mean, but I find that that’s a common theme when we do the crew talks is that when you’re passionate about it and you love it so much and that’s, you know, that’s what you’re pouring into it. That’s usually when things work or start to click for people, it’s like the passion that goes into it, which is very important. You should be passionate about what you’re doing. That’s right. So we have a question in our Q and a box from Louis Gonzalez. Hi Lewis. Thank you for joining us. He says, hi there. Any advice or information in general regarding Mandy international, I’m a composer from Mexico looking for new opportunities.

Gina Hall:

Yeah. Side of things, probably. You, you’re putting them read if you’re interested in something like Mandy putting a profile up and having the ability we have fields up. So if you have samples that people can listen to you and composers, one of those things that can be done remotely now, and you know, a lot of people are looking for, you know, I, I do post, it’s not the most common thing that I post for. But there are people who are looking for composers on our site and that visibility there is fantastic. So really it’s, it’s so easy to set up a profile. And then, you know, if you want, you can poke around the site and look for jobs or have people discover you. But, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s something that you could just put your samples up your resume up. If you have stuff that you’ve already done for films, you can put clips up and just, you know, start, start connecting with people.

Danny Farber:

And then I have a non Mandy endorsed little hack for closers that I recommend go to Indiegogo or Kickstarter and look at all these short films that are fundraising that are features or anything that’s like in development, because that’s the most public forum was like, Hey, you can see exactly who who’s on the production team. Who’s making this thing happen. Whether or not they’re getting their money from it and then donate to the campaign and reach out and say, Hey, I would love to get in front of you. And here’s my stuff. And that’s, I mean, like that’s the way of like kind of, you know, hacking the system, definitely utilize the Mandy international resources, but also like the internet. It’s a very wide and vast place.

Sarah Marince:

That’s a great tip. And I’ve never heard that. Never thought about that to go to like the Kickstarter and stuff. That’s yeah. That’s one to remember. Do you have any more of those tips you can share?

Gina Hall:

It’s like, you’ve been in the industry for 20 years.

Sarah Marince:

Very cool. One question I had was is there an app for Mandy?

Danny Farber:

I don’t even think that ever crossed my mind and my tenure. I mandate

Gina Hall:

It has crossed ours. Several times don’t worry. But eh, right now it’s, it’s best as a web based platform and that’s how it functions best stated optimized for you going on your browser on your phone and use it that way, but there’s not a specific app for you.

Sarah Marince:

Yes. So you said, yeah. So is that something that might come down the road?

Gina Hall:

I don’t see it on our calendar necessarily, but they don’t tell us everything.

Sarah Marince:

Well, we’ll look out for that and the other announcements that you guys couldn’t quite talk about yet. Very cool. So I, I think, and I hope I’ve covered most of mandy.com, but is there anything we haven’t touched on that you think people should know about the site and that there’s a feature that they really need to utilize and you’ve seen success when people do this or that, what do you think, Gina?

Gina Hall:

I mean, I think one of the, you know, I definitely seen the most success for employers and that’s like deal with a lot. When you are looking for talent to be very specific in your posting, not just saying I’m looking for a DP and call me, you know, we get those sometimes and you’re like, nobody applied to this because of these processes in particular posting. So, you know, the more you don’t have to put this as a sort of specific rate, but, you know, let people know what, you know, maybe with the ballpark, [inaudible] that, you know, you’re looking to pay a day rate of, you know, that that is, you know, maybe you’re ultra low budget, maybe your budget, maybe your, you know, big budget and the more detail you post you can, you can’t be terribly specific about all the details you know, the better response you’re going to get.

Gina Hall:

And then if you’re applying, filling out your profile and completion making sure that you have a real up there that you have your most recent credits, your most impressive credits at top and signing up for our alerts because people hire fast in this industry. I mean, sometimes it, you know, it’s like, I remember, you know, I, I, when I was, you know, plank crew and even assistant positions in my early career, I would go in and they hadn’t even hired the person that came in. And, but right before me, and they didn’t even have time to call me and tell me not to come in. So people hire quickly. So, you know, set up an email, there’s an apply fast because people, you know, want some results that day, you know,

Sarah Marince:

Absolutely pays to be first sometimes. Yeah. What about you, Danny?

Danny Farber:

I mean, Gina, that, and then that was all really great. I would say on an employer side of things, a little, a little insider tip, but from right from our marketing department is on your role name. So, you know, if it’s whatever the character’s name is also specify the day rate in that name, because the way that our mail-outs work is that’s the number one, that’s the top line that our candidates see, oh, Billy two 50 a day or whatever the thing is. And then below it you’ll do your breakdown and all the stuff. That’s just a little, what I’ve learned, works for our employers. And then for candidates. And if you’re an actor, especially nowadays, I mean, you, your morning ritual, should it just like looking at the trades back in the day, like your morning ritual should be hopping on seeing casting breakdowns, applying to everything and anything that fits you within reason, and also make sure that you’re qualified for the job, but I mean, that should, you should really get into that habit of like spend 10 to 15 minutes at the top of every day and like, see what was, what did he miss from yesterday?

Danny Farber:

Or what do you have what’s coming on this morning? Or, you know, find way maybe that makes sense better at the end of the day to make that happen, but really carve out that time to stay as involved and get your name and face and profile in front of these candidates. Are these employers?

Sarah Marince:

Yeah, that’s perfect. Like do it first thing every day. Just part of your routine, part of the routine, like making coffee.

Sarah Marince:

Alexandra, do you have any advice or like insider tips for people who are watching? The advice that kind of helped you when you were beginning?

Alexandra Boylan:

Oh gosh, well, going to small towns that really believed in what we were doing. That was a big thing. I left LA I’ve never shot a movie in LA. So all of my movies I’ve shot either. I went for my Christmas movie, actually went to my hometown in Georgetown, Massachusetts. And I went to my high school that I graduated was like, can I shoot my movie here? And they were like, of course you can. And then I went to the mayor of the town, that’s like a tiny town. And they were like, no, one’s ever asked us to shoot a movie here. Yeah. Just let the police know. And there was like, no permit needed. So, you know, go to small towns that are really excited about what you’re doing. And they’ll like, we at cops volunteer all my Christmas set just to be a part of it.

Alexandra Boylan:

Cause they were really excited that we were making a movie and we didn’t have to have any permits just and that, and so small town and go or go to your hometown and do it, especially if you’re well connected. Cause that our Christmas movie looks like millions of dollars and it’s it’s much smaller budget, but it was cause the whole town came out to support us and help us and give us everything we needed for free every location we have an entire we have a apple orchard that gave us the entire apple orchard to shoot the movie in. So those are my tips. And also when you’re starting out and you don’t have a lot of money, one thing I’d really love to give the advice is to try to make trades with people, instead of just saying, can I have this for free?

Alexandra Boylan:

Think about what you can offer them. When I was shooting a movie called at your own risk, we had no money. We were shooting in the middle of nowhere, New Mexico. We wanted to use this national historical society land and we didn’t have any money to offer them. But we said, we have a drone and we will shoot aerial photography for you and give it to you. And they love that. They were like, you can shoot here. If we can have that footage for our museum. And they ended up using all that music, it now plays in their museum. And in return, we got to shoot our movie there. So finding ways that you can actually give back to the person who’s giving you something, we shot at a wedding movie and this bridal shop gave us, donated all the dresses and the location. And we promise to do Instagram social takeovers with the stars, would their dresses as a give back. So it’s like just finding ways. And then people put marketing is so expensive. So if you can find a way to market for people, they’ll give you a location for free, if it is marketing. So that’s another tip.

Sarah Marince:

Yeah, that was brilliant. And I love the like hometown feel of like a Christmas movie. Like when it’s, you know, take like all the hallmark movies, you know, like it takes place in the small hometown. Like I love that. And so that’s a great idea, I guess, for any thing you’re living,

Alexandra Boylan:

We shot in December. So the entire town was already lit up. We had that for free. It was already lit up for Christmas. So that was, it looks like a million bucks and it was free.

Sarah Marince:

Awesome. So cool. We had one question pop in while we were chatting and it says for the email notifications for crew, can you select specific roles such as DP, gaffer or grip jobs?

Gina Hall:

Absolutely. In fact, that’s what we encouraged because you don’t want to, you know, if you’re not a, if you’re a VP or sentiment, you know, you don’t want things for wardrobe or, you know, greens or editor or things like that. So yeah, he can absolutely click the boxes and we have a lot very specific redrill drill down to, you know, just the app, you know, every role that is possible on a set. And you know, like recently we also, as the COVID roles, we were trying to keep on top of anything that’s modern or new or you know, developing in this, in this era. So yeah, we can get just the precise things you’re looking for.

Sarah Marince:

And make it as specific as you want it.

Sarah Marince:

Yes. Very cool. Well, I think we’ve kind of covered everything I need. I think we need to cover right guys. Did we cover all? Okay, perfect. So I’m just going to do what I do every, every week or every crew talk where I go down the line. Like I see it here. If you just want to say your social is like where people can find you, if you have a website or if you’re more active on Instagram and Alexandra I’ll start with you.

Alexandra Boylan:

Wonderful. Well, I actually published a book, so please go out and buy it. It’s called Create Your Own Career in Hollywood. I literally started with nothing and I created an entire career from so people are always asking me how I did it. Well, I published a book so you can find out exactly how I went from nothing to having a production company in seven feature films in 10 years, create your own career in Hollywood available on Amazon. I am totally active on Instagram, Alexandra Boylan or Facebook reach out to me. My website is mustardseedent.com. If you want to check out my films.

Sarah Marince:

Wonderful. Well thank you for being here and your advice on everything was perfect. So thank you. Wonderful. Thank you, Danny. You are next.

Danny Farber:

Yeah. If anybody wants to check out any of my work or kind of get in touch, stay in touch. I’m very active on I think Instagram is probably the best. @SirDannyFarber, one day I will be knighted and it will all kind of make sense for manifests. So it’s either SirDannyfarber.com is my full creative portfolio. You can check out all the music, videos, and movies that I’ve made as a producer, as a director, things that I’ve started in as an actor or, you know, reach out to me via email for Mandy, happy to help anybody and everybody out there. My email is danny at mandy dot com. I’m happy to answer anybody’s question.

Sarah Marince:

Awesome. And you guys can feel free to put this in the chat box too, for people to wrap and last but not least

Gina Hall:

Active on Twitter and Instagram it’s other @Capra_girl that’s you know, Frank Capra, big fan the CAPRA underscores the IRL on both Twitter, Instagram, and then you can reach out to me at Mandy.com for Questions specifically that is gina at mandy dot com.

Sarah Marince:

Very, very cool. Well for everybody watching those links will be up whenever this goes up on shoots.video. So you can find them there too. But to the three of you, thank you again for being here and for all of your advice and knowledge and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your Wednesday.

Sarah Marince:

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Sarah Marince

Gina Hall

Alexandra Boylan

Danny Farber

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