With all this chaos, power has shifted away from the creatives and into the hands of people designed to "protect" the decision-makers from the creatives: the gatekeepers.
They have one job: setup systems, rules, and filters to make it hard for people like you to reach the industry decision-makers.
And we've been playing right into their hands!
We're told we need to have gone to a certain school, taken classes from the guru of the week, made a bunch of shorts, directed your first feature, premiered at a specific festival, be repped by a top agency, have a long imdb, or go "viral" with millions of followers in order to be taken seriously by decision-makers.
And then, despite these impossible standards, we achieve them (or spend all of our time trying to achieve them) and still don't have the careers we were promised!
Because checking gatekeeper boxes doesn't matter for $#!T if the ACTUAL decision-makers still don't know who you are!
Does that list of accolades help? Sure. Totally.
But the pursuit of that list is sapping your time, energy, and opportunities.
If you can build authentic relationships with the people who ACTUALLY decide what gets financed and made, then you can bypass the gatekeepers and have the career you want!