Dear Readers and esteemed guests,
Happy 2025. I hope the new year brings joy, variety and abundance to you all (I’ve decided that ‘abundance’ is my word for the year, seeking it in all things… love, luck and cheese). I’m coming at you from my flatmate’s superior room, as I cannot fit a desk and am reluctant to sit in the medium-messy kitchen.
I thought for 2025’s first instalment of the Freelance Diaries, I’d share what my year has looked like thus far. It is only day nineteen, and I feel I’ve already ticked off some classic freelance experiences including, but not limited to, crying on the floor of a bank. To hear more, read on.
I kicked off the new year with an acting job — and I count myself very fortunate to add this to my CV. Since my parents brought home the Roald Dahl Storybook CD collection, I’ve loved listening to audiobooks.
I spend a lot of money and time with Audible, and though it is owned by Amazon, I do love it. Whilst at drama school, we were fortunate enough to go to Audible HQ and record an audio drama. Not only did I love the free kitchen and drinks fridge (thanks Bezos), but I was thrilled by the challenges that audio performance poses. You have to put your whole physicality into your voice, and I learnt a lot about what goes into audio production. They even invited me back for an audition later that summer and that experience was equally delightful. So my first job this year was an audiobook. A whole 220-page novel. Narrated by little old me. I booked the gig in a roundabout way; my old religious studies teacher from school published a fictional retelling of a bible story and contacted me to record it. We set 3 days in the diary for me to come into a studio and bash the whole thing out. I borrowed my mum’s old iPad to prep — from my audio training, I remembered it was important to mark up the script ahead of time, highlighting when different characters speak, prepare accents, noting key moments of tension to build pace or drama, focusing on tenses, time and place etc. Going into the studio, I wasn’t sure what to expect. The longest I’d spent in front of a mic was only a few minutes, to record my audio reel or some foley sounds for production, and I was now faced with 6 hours of recording a day, for 3 days (18 hours in total, for you boffins out there). I did my vocal warm-up and downed from Raspberry Lucozade Sport (iykyk) and got stuck in.
It was a brilliant challenge. I had to make sure that my accents and pronunciations of unfamiliar words were consistent and that I kept my burps to the end of sentences (Alexa, play Harder Than You Think by Public Enemy). I made good friends with the sound engineer, Oli, who is now facing the painstaking task of editing out my giggles, farts, burps and other audible bodily functions — sorry mate. Even though I consider myself a professional yapper, after 6 hours of talking even my voice started going hoarse. So we would have to stop for the day, otherwise, every 10 chapters the narration style would turn from Lisa Simpson vibes into Patty and Selma territory. But it was a wonderful job, and it will be available on Audible soon! Salome’s Wish by W.J Worham!
After that, I returned to London hoping to continue my nannying job. Sadly, however, the family #letmego. Turns out the most crucial element of childcare is reliability, and in the 4 months I worked for them, I had to take 7 weeks off for my acting work. I was sad but I understood. I realised that for a long time, I was reluctant to fall completely into the cliche actor side hustle of hospitality. Not only because I make a terrible waitress (small hands), but I love working with children. Alas, the flexible shift patterns and lack of personal relationships in hospitality work beckon, and I found myself back on Indeed.com searching for ‘cute cafe jobs for silly little girls, London’. Unable to make barista-grade coffees and having zero experience working in a pub since the tender age of 17, nobody was interested. I do however have an interview at a local pottery cafe this week, so fingers crossed for that. Aside from the stage and the bright lights of Broadway, I reckon that’s a bit of a dream job for me.
And so began my first ‘funemployed’ period of living in London. 6 months out of drama school, that’s not bad going. So I decided to do some grown-up things until my next break. I walked to the bank to see if I could open up a savings account. I feared that the funds I had saved from my last show and the audiobook would quickly disappear. I have a nasty habit of burning through money, buying lip balms and tulips and fancy crackers. I confidently approached a bank person and asked for some advice in opening a proper savings account that I couldn't dip into. She went through my financial profile and offered some options for different ISAs and savings builders. The conversation went a little bit like this:
BANK: What is your monthly income?
ME: It depends.
BANK: What does that mean?
ME: Well sometimes it can be a lot, and sometimes I don’t earn anything.
BANK: Right, so what does that mean?
ME: I’m an actor.
BANK: So you’re unemployed?
ME: I prefer the term freelance/self-employed
BANK: Wow, okay. Here are some savings account options. But to ensure you earn the interest, you have to put in at least £150 a month.
ME: Aaand what if I don’t have £150 to spare every month?
BANK: I’m not sure I can help you today, Miss.
And the meeting carried on like that for a bit, until I started to cry a little bit. I just wanted to do something sensible and grown up and apparently, I couldn’t even do that. I walked out without a savings account and with a new level of self-loathing.
I walked past a Whole Foods supermarket and was handed a free gut health shot. I downed it on the street and wanted to vomit into a bin. The day was about to turn around, however, as I had a Zoom meeting with an agent…
Downhearted and red-eyed, I logged onto the Zoom meeting. I’ve had meetings with agents before, where I market myself so hard I feel like I’m pitching a product rather than me. For people not in the business we call show, a meeting with an agent can sometimes feel like Dragon’s Den. You go up to an office in an elevator, checking your hair in the shiny walls, hiding your sweaty palms in the pockets of your smart-casual outfit. You go in strong, with a well-rehearsed pitch — ‘This product is amazing and you NEED it. It will make you MONEY and it will be so GRATEFUL if you choose to invest in it. PLEASE BELIEVE IN THIS PRODUCT. I am offering you 12% of this product in return for my life’s purpose. YOU WON’T REGRET IT I PROMISE.’ Then the conversation fizzles, the Dragon has another pitch to get to, and you are shown out of the office by a nice young person who probably had the same dream as you, once upon a time.
But this meeting was different. It wasn’t a dragon on the other end of the call, it was a woman called Nina who had read my email, watched my showreels and liked my work. 20 minutes into the meeting, she said she wanted to sign me and I cried. I said YES and called my mum. She didn’t pick up so I called Dad. I signed the contract the next day and got my first audition from her the day after. If I book this job, it would cover my rent for a year, and then some. Fuck you, Natwest.
And that’s how my year is going so far. The one thing that freelance life guarantees is variety. One day you're crying in a bank, the next you’re taping for an advert filming in Bosnia. It is difficult, and nothing is for sure. But it is always interesting. And I’d take that over an office job any day.
Until next time,
KTF x
"Fuck you Natwest" an epic finish for a freelance foray. - #newsubscriber
excellent substack, thrilled about agent, laughed about bank- fuck em and if youre still unemplyed on sat , your uncle Geof could do with a hand at the decorative art fair in Battersea park- Im off on tour, text him - he'd pay you and you would have a mooch around the loveliest stuff in all of London, also cute boy on next door but one stand, tho poss an arsehole/ ?