Broadcasters Can Be Freelancers, Too

By Charles “Stoney” Richards, WDSY-FM

Back in “the day,” a broadcaster only did freelance commercial work when he or she lost a job at the station where they’d worked for years. They’d do a few spots for car dealers, a window company or a local supermarket and in a few months be back on the air at a former competitor, usually the station that contributed to the firing! 

        Cut to the current broadcast climate. Broadcasters who are “let go” face a consolidated market that frequently has as many as six other stations owned by “the company” and a conglomerate across the street that owns the rest. Most talent is syndicated from other markets. Opportunities are limited. Add the fact that freelance voiceovers are big business. What you see is a professional quagmire that might only be solved by uprooting your family and leaving the market.

        If a broadcaster embraced the freelance community and established himself as part of it, the situation could be less volatile when his number came up on the Broadcast Wheel of Doom! Unfortunately, broadcasters usually haven’t a clue about “how to get into legitimate AFTRA freelance.”

        Back in the early 1960’s, a young talent from St. Louis named Danny Dark went to Los Angeles looking for work.  He did something that no one had thought to do: he produced a voice reel of spots he’d done and some he imagined doing.  Before long, he was working.  He became one of the biggest, well-known and highly paid freelance voices in the industry. Others - Chuck Blore, Joe Cipriano and the late Ernie Anderson - followed. All former broadcasters.

        It’s sad that most broadcasters don’t pursue freelance work until they have no choice. Until recently freelance voiceovers were an actor’s domain. It was a world, as the movie trailers always say, of agents and actors and mysterious and entertaining voices.  Broadcasters should learn about this fascinating and lucrative part of the business.  Granted many broadcasters have been “taken care of” by their stations. But you all know these companies now serve only the stockholders. If your company isn’t looking out for you, you have to do it yourself. 

        This is not unprecedented. In the Hollywood glory days, actors were “taken care of” by studios that signed them to sometimes lucrative but often restricting contracts. Actors fought to become independent and finally with the Screen Actors Guild’s help broke free to sell their wares on the open market. It was a great day for talent agents. Before, the studio negotiated your contract, chose your movies, how long he’d have you in his studio stable. With agents came bidding wars, media packages and production companies.

        So yes, the freelance world may seem rather unstable, closed and perhaps a waste of time. But consider how unstable, closed and mysterious the major broadcast chains have become recently.

        Call Suzanne at AFTRA about who’s running freelance. Get a list of franchised talent agents. Produce a voice tape.  Learn the rates for spots, voiceover, on-camera, and industrials. It’s all available at the AFTRA office and website. Once you begin working with an agent you’ll begin to see the opportunities. Word of these opportunities never reaches the broadcast conglomerates. 

        Remember this is a business. You don’t make quiet little deals at less than union rates. A franchised agent guarantees that for you. If someone tells you that they don’t like to get “tied up with union contracts” but they pay about the same, do two things: walk and then call AFTRA or your agent…or your mother! Every time a member does a non-union job it makes it tougher for all of us. Members have told me they are reluctant to say anything to anyone who may take non-union work. But I say they certainly had no qualms about taking that job away from you and undercutting future collective bargaining agreements. It’s not a slam-dunk that you’ll get every job that comes to your market but at least it’s a hedge against being out in the cold one day.

        Most important: don’t consider yourself an outsider when it comes to freelance. First and foremost we are AFTRA union members. You can get all the information you need from your shop steward or AFTRA. If you know someone who does strictly freelance or only broadcast you both need to talk! If the broadcast companies can consolidate so can we. Talent defies definition. We can be broadcasters, voiceover talent, actors and radio imagers.

        It won’t be too long before radio stations start hiring out voices for voice tracking on 13-week freelance contracts. If you cut a spot, it can only run 13 weeks before you must be paid for another cycle. Many stations already abuse the relationship with “Voice Imaging Talent” by offering them a flat fee for a number of station image spots. With home studios, digital equipment, ISDN lines and Zephyr boxes available for less than the residuals of a national voiceover spot we are on the brink of a newer, even more mysterious world. AFTRA and SAG have the resources, websites, knowledge and experience for you to draw on so that you can follow your dreams and fulfill your talent potential. The choice is up to you.