Today we’d like to introduce you to Amanda Whyte

Hi Amanda, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.

First of all, thank you for having me. Where do I even start?

Believe it or not, I got into acting accidentally during my senior year of high school. The year prior, I really just wanted to take a keyboard class or a vocal class as my final “elective” class, but the arts were severely underfunded where I grew up in Canada. All of the classes I wanted to take got cancelled and drama class was one of the only arts electives left so I took it despite not having done any of the prerequisites.

When a dear friend in that class auditioned for NYU and told me to do the same, I thought he was crazy, and then I thought, “Oh my god if I do this it’ll be like a vacation to New York in the middle of the school year.” I applied very last minute, wrote my essay in one day in a Starbucks, didn’t tell my parents I had to be there until about two weeks before, changed my monologue the day of my audition, and didn’t think much of it at all—but more importantly, I got my little weekend trip to NYC.

The next thing I knew, I graduated early from NYU Tisch with my BFA in Drama. So long story short, this journey started in 2020, and luckily, I haven’t been out of work since.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?

It has been anything but a smooth road. Although the way I started sounds like a fever dream, there were so many financial hardships, medical issues, rejections, legal issues related to work, and mental health issues that I faced and sometimes still continue to face because of the artistic path I chose.

There isn’t enough conversation about the financial hardship of being an actress in NYC. The cost of education far surpasses the amount that the middle class makes. I felt rushed to finish college as quickly as possible because I have a younger sibling who would soon be entering post-secondary education and my parents could not afford the price of a school like NYU. It was never spoken about since they never wanted me to feel “burdened” by the cost of tuition, but it was the little things—like my little brother “quitting” soccer (a sport he loved)—a year before athletic scholarship season to save money.

I took no winter breaks, no summer breaks, and only came home for the holidays briefly before going back out to school. As you can imagine, the pressure of accelerated study, getting high grades, and saving money, all while navigating filming and performing various things, severely impacted my mental health and sleep (or lack thereof).

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?

Simply put, I am an actress who is also a stuntwoman. I would like to believe my martial arts training in Shotokan karate sets me apart from others. I specialize in hand-to-hand combat as well as broadsword and bo staff weaponry but what I am most known for is playing really unhinged characters. Not even necessarily violent personalities, but just a little bit unbalanced in the head. I think one credit I’m most proud of is this new film called Token, written and directed by Naomi Christiansen, set to come out in the coming months. I got to play this very fed-up student who lets her emotions run wild due to the disparities of winning scholarships based on merit. There was blood, there was drama, there was tears—I loved every second of it and the cast and crew of that film were some of the best people I ever had the pleasure of working with.

Where do you see things going in the next 5-10 years?

With the integration of AI on screen, I can only hope that it changes the industry to grow more authentically. I am an actress but I am also still a consumer of film and TV and even I am sick of the cheesy plots and the remakes (much like the rest of the world). A shift I think we’re starting to see is this craving for original stories and new voices in the spotlight—there is no reason for the industry to not reflect the representation and experiences we’ve been yearning for so long.

We’re seeing this on stage with the commercial success of The Outsiders and Stereophonic on Broadway and the overnight success of the new limited series that occasionally drop, much like Baby Reindeer on Netflix. I can only hope this trend continues as the industry picks back up post-strike.

Pricing:

• If you’re wondering what’s next, Amanda will be reprising her role as Marianne in the hit show, The Gospel of Joan (Crawford), at Edinburgh Fringe Festival: https://tickets.edfringe.com/whats-on/gospel-of-joan-crawford

Contact Info:

• Website: https://theamandawhyte.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amandawhyte_
• Other: Actors Access: https://resumes.actorsaccess.com/amandawhyte