The Actor From Burning Sands, Jeremy Rudd, Has Something to Say about “Business Mindset” in Film

Lights—camera— action.

The film industry is changing, and if you’ve got a business mindset to tally along, it makes things much easier. Generally, the entertainment industry is gradually becoming a realm of entrepreneurs. And no, not entirely in the sense of ‘establishing’ a business— but more about the ‘mindset’ that entrepreneurship succinctly entails.

If you want to be truly successful in the film industry, a great start would be thinking and acting like you’re running a business. It doesn’t matter if you’re a director, producer, cameraman, sound engineer, or the lead role. What matters is that you use an entrepreneur mindset how you see fit and to the best of your advantage.

In the general sense, this refers to how you handle challenges, bounce back, improve your skill-set, and overall, how you get by each day. When you embody that ‘grind’ mindset, you become more committed to your vision regardless of whatever comes your way, and you also strategically position yourself to experience growth. 

What the Business Mindset Gets You

In Hollywood, it’s a bit different. Although, it still revolves around similar concepts. 

For example, in Silicon Valley, the essence of a venture is to add increasing value to existing technical infrastructure or create a new one. There’s a focus on existing constraints in the technological understanding of the market, and if something different can be devised, investors become interested. Brainstorming brings forth questions like “Is the market ready for this?”, “Is there an existing competition that we don’t know about?”, “Who is our customer?”, amidst several other questions. 

Drawing a similarity to Hollywood, the point of a film is to affect the culture on a much more base level. Not to alter the viewing experience though, but to reshape the perception of life or events as a whole. Brainstorming may bring questions like “Is the market ready for this?”, “Has the audience seen something like this before?”, “Who would want to watch this?”, “Is there any cultural bias or sensitive content in this?”

Asides from that, the ability to raise capital for projects, map out budgets, cost-benefit analysis, intelligent risk-taking, and efficiently maintain costs draws from the tenets of a business sense. 

Standing Out From the Crowd

A real-life example is how Jeremy Rudd was able to get into the film industry and is gradually becoming a force to be reckoned with. Jeremy Rudd was the manager at Ezells’ Famous Chicken— a popular Seattle fast-food restaurant. The business was a family one, and Jeremy had to take an active role in the family business. 

Asides from managing the business, Jeremy was also in charge of the social media pages. With the help of his uncle— Lewis Rudd, and his father— Darnell Rudd, Jeremy was ingrained with the core tenets of business; how to sight opportunities, navigate hurdles, and the tenacity and grit of it all.

With the business mindset ingrained in him, Jeremy capitalized on it and put the same energy into landing major roles in the film industry. From previous experience, he understands how important it is to have a scalable system to grow a business, and he has applied that in the gradual process of becoming a household name.

The Grit— Maximizing Opportunities 

Letting go of the “this is how they do things” mentality in the film industry, to a more receptive business approach can make all the difference. 

One pertinent thing about the entrepreneurial and business mindset is never settling for less or taking no as an answer. There’s that grit that comes with the mindset. On average, actors audition about 67 times before landing a role. You’ve got to show up several times. And well, those are the resilient ones— the ones that don’t give up. 

Showing up and trying, no matter what your outcomes are, is a very ‘active’ attitude. When you constantly show up, you commit to taking a step forward. Although, this may not be true for everyone. Some people just get lucky. 

However, luck doesn’t simply cut it anymore. Some degree of grit and resilience has to go into your efforts. 

Jeremy had a similar experience; “for every 50 no’s, you’ll eventually get a yes and get cast for a role. You just have to learn from your mistake and perfect your craft as an actor each time you go into the audition room,” he recounts. Before Jeremy landed his first major role, it took him a lot of audition, self-tapes, and constantly reassuring himself that he would feature in a film soon.

Putting aside a personal approach and advantage, small independent studios could also apply a new entrepreneurial methodology to their structure and production operations, while also making use of a similar thinking toward the scriptwriting processes as well. 

Zero-Fear of Trying New Waters

You simply can’t get comfortable. You’ve got to take a seat at the ‘expansion’ table.

When businesses start doing well, they spread their wings and fly— penetrating every possible location there is. At this stage, they have to be bold enough to take the leap and all the risks that may be to it.

The same applies to the world of Hollywood. When fame comes, you have to take advantage of it and use that window of opportunity to get leading roles in blockbuster films.

“There’s a point where you feel the impact of your work. And at that point, you can really see how far you’ve come. As for me, there’s still a lot I want to accomplish with acting and my passion is forever burning. I won’t stop till my name is well known around the US and the world. Although I’ve taken on a few lead roles in films that are streaming now, I still want to work with A-list actors,” Jeremy states.

When you look at it, a business mindset can be applied in most areas of life, especially the career path. Capitalize on it and get the best from your career.