Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Christina Renee. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Christina , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

One of my most meaningful projects is my short film called Through The Modern Looking Glass which is currently in post production.

Through the Modern Looking Glass showcases the different forms and causes of depression. The characters interact primarily through social media, which makes their depression worse as they compare their real lives to the posts of those they follow. Online those characters look like they have it all, but in reality are also struggling with issues of their own.

I was the writer, producer and I acted in my own film. I also couldn’t be more grateful for the cast and crew who helped bring my story to life.

Christina , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I moved to NYC to pursue acting and began doing so full time about four years ago. Acting is both an extremely rewarding and challenging profession. I think what makes it most challenging is that we are all striving for that one break out role, but it is difficult to get feedback along the way as to whether or not you are getting closer to that goal. I strive to do each of the following to face that challenge:

1. Do something each day to continuously improve: While you can’t necessarily get booked for that great role on any given day, you do things each day to get closer to that goal. Whether studying a new monologue, meeting a new casting director in a showcase, learning a new dialect or a special skill, pushing yourself to do that self tape, etc.. you can set and achieve those specific action items with the discipline of any full time job. I find when I do that I can see my own improvement.

2. Join a community of actors and learn from them. Because we are all struggling with the same issues, I think actors are probably more supportive of one another than peers in any other profession. The actors I have met through informal networking as well through my class work at Stella Adler and with Anthony Abeson have been invaluable. While it can be difficult to see your own improvement, your peers can absolutely see it and vice versa. Learning from your peers, receiving their feedback and commenting on their work is the best way to learn and the relationships and support along the way are invaluable.

3. Create your own opportunities. I think when I started in this business I thought I just had to wait until my talent was “discovered”. I soon realized that isn’t how the business works. You need to create opportunities for success. When I started as a background actor I would challenge myself to speak to three people on set who might be able to help me in the future. I wrote dozens and dozens of emails to agents before finally getting represented by DDO. I taught myself voiceover to broaden my opportunity set. And most meaningfully, when COVID created a pause in our industry, I started to write … and write and write some more including short film concepts, a pilot and a feature film. I am currently in post production on my first professionally produced short film called Through the Modern Looking Glass. The process of raising money for that project, revising the script countless times, reviewing thousands of submissions and reviewing dozens of self tapes to select an amazingly talented cast, learning all elements of production, reviewing hours and hours of raw footage in the editing room and watching my own work as an actor in that context taught me more about this business than I could have learned in any classroom. More importantly, I realized the breadth of my potential and that I am able to create amazing content.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

When I would not get booked after an audition, I would purposefully critique myself and convince myself I knew why I wasn’t booked. I would take that self given insight to my next audition and try to perform it in the “perfect” way. After working as a casting director on my own project, I realized that, while well intentioned, that effort was entirely counterproductive. So many things go into a casting decision from your specific look, the fit with a scene partner you have never met, your fit with the rest of the script you have never been given, the diversity of the cast, etc. It is really not possible to know what the perfect self tape is for any audition. Rather I learned that the best thing you can do is to create a genuine performance in the way that you see the character and the scene and hope it fits with all the factors that are beyond your control. In addition, I learned rather than trying to create the perfect take, force yourself to do the audition 2-3 different ways and submit those alternatives if you can or be prepared to adapt to real time feedback in a live audition. The best way to increase your chances to fit into any given role is to highlight that versatility. Once I made these changes I started to get booked with much more frequency.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

The one book that really changed how I think about my career as an actor is Destiny: Step into your Purpose by T.D. Jakes. While T.D. Jakes is a well known Christian pastor, I think this book has so many great lessons that are applicable beyond religion and applying them really inspired me to make so many positive changes. Rather than complaining about lack of opportunity, I think everyday what I can do to create opportunities for myself. Rather than associating with negative people who I know did not think of acting as a real job and weren’t really rooting for me, I started to surround myself with other amazing talented, supportive and self-motivated people in acting and other fields of work. Taking inspiration from this book, I get up everyday by 6am and start doing the things to prepare myself for the opportunities that have come and the bigger ones that will come my way. That’s really the main message of the book–even if your destiny is to be a successful actor it isn’t going to happen if you aren’t prepared for it and you don’t seize the opportunities when they arise.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.christinarenee.info
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/itschristinarenee/?hl=en
• Other: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4579282/