Hi Kris!
You don't have to be in the Screen Actor's Guild (SAG) to do Hair and Makeup.
Here's a short excerpt from the book:
You’ve been practicing on your own. You’ve taken a class or two. You’ve got a starter portfolio to show what you’re capable of. Now what?
Obviously, you need to live where the work is, be it Los Angeles, New York or anyplace in between where the kinds of projects are being made that you want to work on.
You really have just two avenues to pursue. The first is to work on freebies or low-budget projects. The second is by working at a special effects studio.
Working on freebies, deferred payment jobs, or the “this is a great project” call gives you more experience, a larger resume and portfolio, and more contacts to call in the future. But more than that, it gives you “days.” In order to work on the big stuff where you can make better money, you almost always have to be part of IATSE Local 706 and there are 3 main ways to do it.
1. Do 30 days on a union show to get in union. Hmm, this is an obvious Catch 22 of course. How do you get on a union show in the first place if you’re not already in? If you have created a special makeup in an effects shop and you are the only one that knows how to properly apply it, and it (the effect and you) works for 30 days on a union set, then you get in.
2. 60/60/60: Work 60 days every year for 3 years on anything doing makeup. Take proof of your employment (checks stubs and callsheets) to the union office.
3. Star request. If you catch the fancy of a big movie star while you are both working on a non-union project and that star specifically requests that you are on his/her next big show, the union isn’t about to argue. You’re in.
Everyone enters the union as a trainee. After you take the classes and workshops they offer, you advance to Journeyman level. While this may seem like a positive thing, the reality is that you still get hired based on who you know and what you are capable of, not because of any certification or special credit someone bestows upon you. If you’ve established yourself as qualified and good, it doesn’t really matter what your union classification is.
Ideally, you should do two things. The first is to read the first five chapters in
What I Really Want to Do: On Set in Hollywood as well as the chapters on Hair and Makeup. There is so much more that you need to know than I can possibly write here.
Also, go to the Local 706 website for more information. You'll find a link to it in the On-Set Resources section of this forum.
