Some people choose their life paths based on finding financial security.
Not 25-year-old Ryan Spence. He wants to do what he loves. If he makes more than a living, that鈥檚 a bonus.
Ryan, a graduate of North Battleford Comprehensive High School, is getting ready to start his second year at one of several Seneca College campuses in Toronto. Since 1967, Seneca has been training executives, senators, pilots, fashion designers, police officers, broadcasters and entrepreneurs.
Ryan is enrolled in the college鈥檚 performance program, taking acting for camera and voice, ACV for short.
In high school, he wasn鈥檛 interested in taking trades training such as welding, automotive or shop, he says. Apart from sports (he admits he鈥檚 a fanatic), the only extracurricular thing he was involved in was drama club.
鈥淚've never really considered anything else and I enjoy doing it,鈥� says Ryan, who is home with his family for a few weeks before returning to Toronto. 鈥淭here are other jobs that would make me a lot more money. Sometimes people do jobs or take courses and end up in places they don't particularly like, and you see them coming home after a nine-to-five shift complaining and grumbling about what they are doing.鈥�
He says, 鈥淵ou have to like what you do and if you like what you do and you earn good money doing it you're in a pretty perfect spot.鈥�
Of course, his family would like to see him financially stable, with a good wage and benefits. Most families do want financial stability for their kids, he says, but his family has been supportive of his decision to follow his dream.
His dad, Darrell Spence of Battleford, said, "We'll support you 100 per cent whatever you do."
Ryan says, "It's nice not having any negative judgment from them [his dad, his sister, his aunt and his grandmother], and for the most part they are really supportive."
He's confident his mom, the late Karen Spence, who passed away when Ryan was 10, would be just as supportive, as well.
"I know she would be 200 per cent supportive of what I'd be doing right now," he smiles. "I'm sure she'd be. When anyone would come and ask her at any function she was at she'd probably be gushing to tell everyone where I am and what I'm doing and how well I'm doing it."
Not everyone understands why he's chosen the route he has.
"When I tell people that I am in an acting program it's like, 'Oh that's nice,' and just by the tone of it you know they're thinking, 'Oh, that's something fun you'll enjoy, but you won't make much money doing.鈥�"
For Ryan, although he hopes to make ends meet, it isn't about the money.
鈥淚 didn't want to be somewhere where I wake up and ask myself 鈥榳hat am I doing?鈥欌�� he says.
He doesn鈥檛 see the attraction in doing the same thing every day.
鈥淭his way, every day is usually something different and there is no telling what you are able to do ... it's exciting,鈥� he says. 鈥淚n some cases getting a good paying job, for the most part, you know exactly what you鈥檙e getting and you're going to be doing that for 25 or 30 years. That's a long time.鈥�
When he was in high school, he developed a love of performing.
"I liked being on stage and performing for people, it was fun to do, mostly because I was just doing it with my friends," he says.
He found encouragement from his first drama teacher, Sherron Burns, and his second, Kali Weber. From them he learned to work hard at whatever you do and to love whatever you do.
Janice Staff, the school's cooking teacher, was also supportive, he says.
"She always loved the arts and theatre, even though she was in a completely different profession."
After high school, he had to start thinking about what he wanted to do.
"I couldn't really think of anything outside of performer."
It wasn't until he went to a Comic-Con in Calgary and met some voice actors, some of whom had voiced cartoons he'd watched as a kid, that the idea of being a voice actor occurred to him.
"I [thought] it'd be pretty fun, go behind a microphone and do some voices, although now that I've learned more about voice acting, it's not just go in, do a voice and that's it, and you cut your pay cheque and go home."
That Comic-Con experience helped him make his decision
Ryan already knows it won鈥檛 be easy to follow his dream. He鈥檚 learned it鈥檚 a process.
鈥淚 can be an impatient person,鈥� he says. 鈥淚 enjoy seeing results right away, and it鈥檚 hard sometimes to keep going with a process not knowing if it will put me in the right place or if it is taking me in the right direction.鈥�
But, he says, you have to 鈥渢rust in the process. Trust in the work that you do.鈥�
Ryan's first steps into the acting business didn鈥檛 work out the way he鈥檇 hoped.
After graduation in 2008 and a year of taking upgrading classes, he entered the four-year theatre program at the University of Regina in the fall of 2009.
鈥淔or one reason or another it just wasn't working for me,鈥� he says. 鈥淚t was partly my fault,鈥� he adds.
鈥淚 was undecided about the program because, while it did offer me valuable things and had a lot of great theatre classes, the program itself had you taking a lot of other classes that may have connected in theatre in some way, but a lot of them, to me anyway, had nothing to do with what I wanted to do.鈥�
He decided to take some time off, work and save up some money for further schooling, even though he didn鈥檛 yet know what that would be.
鈥淚 put that to the wayside and tried to figure out what I could do next.鈥�
He wondered what was beyond Saskatchewan. So he began researching programs across Alberta, British Columbia and Ontario. He came across the Seneca program.
It was a two-year program, so it wasn't as big a commitment, the website outlined exactly what one would be doing as a student.
"It gave me a good idea of what I'd be learning and I liked the list of stuff," says Ryan.
So he sent an email.
A short essay was required, as well as an audition, which he was also able to send them by email.
"Initially I was put on a waiting list," he says.
Then a spot opened up.
"A few days later, I remember I was just cleaning my apartment in Regina at the time, and I got a phone call. The program co-ordinator said, 'One of our spots has opened up so are you interested in taking classes in the program?' I said, 'Yes! Absolutely! So that was that. From there it was just prepping to move.
The Seneca campus Ryan attends is called the Senaca at York. York University is lending out one of its buildings, but there are several around the city.
"There are a lot of different programs," says Ryan. "On top of us, things like graphic design, business, English, engineering, radio and TV broadcasting. There are students around all the time with tripods and cameras.
His class is acting for camera and voice, so he's not pursuing a specifically voice-actor career.
The program is all encompassing, he says. He has so far learned from movement classes, basic acting classes that cover the fundamentals, camera acting and writing.
"We recently did things like screenwriting," he says. "We learned about how to properly write movie and TV or even play scripts and in our final project we had to actually write one. That was fun."
He notes actors have been known to write their own screenplays, although no one should expect the Oscar-winning fame Matt Damon and Ben Affleck achieved with theirs.
"That's a rare case," says Ryan, "but more often than not if you are not getting anywhere, then maybe try your hand at writing. It can create some more doors for you."
This past term also included dance.
"Recently, we took dance, which was very interesting. I can honestly say I sweated a lot 鈥� too much, I think, for a regular human," laughs Ryan.
In the upcoming term he's expecting more new experiences, including learning about dialects.
Everything the students do in front of a camera this coming term will be kept and made in into a visual resum茅 for each student. At graduation time, next April, a gala event will be held with agents and casting directors from throughout the city attending. They will be able to see these resum茅s, which will help them decide on whether they want to hire or represent the students in the future.
Completing the course also earns students a credit toward becoming a member of ACTRA, the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists, a union of more than 22,000 professional performers working in English-language recorded media in Canada.
The next step involves building a body of work.
When asked about his dream job, Ryan says, "As crazy as it sounds, ultimately I'd probably want to be a working actor that makes a comfortable living doing acting, whether it be film, TV, maybe some plays here and there."
He plans to stay in Toronto after graduation, because that's where the industry best suits what he wants to do.
"It would be great if I could encompass a variety," he adds. "I think I'd like to do work in film and TV because I enjoy it a little more 鈥� It would be nice to be a kind of jack of all trades."
Comedy or drama? Either.
"Since I've gotten into theatre and learned about comedy over the years, I've found that comedy is a lot harder than people think it is to do, so right now I wouldn't put any priority on doing comedy as opposed to dramatic work," he says. "After seeing how hard comedy is to do and to do well, I don't think I'm up for that kind of challenge, yet."
Nor has he pursued any musical challenges.
"I haven't included musicals or anything like probably based on the pure fact that I'm not a great singer."
But he doesn't rule singing lessons out in the future.
"It isn't out of the realm of possibility, because singing lessons actually do help with your voice and voice work,鈥� says Ryan. "So if I happen to get a little better at it, maybe I will look into that. Who knows?"
Ryan says he and his fellow ACV students are realistic about their futures.
"The people that are in this program wanting to get into the industry, we know that we won't be making money and we'll probably have to scratch a lot to make ends meet," he says. He adds, however, "I will say that I am lucky enough to have money put away for me [a legacy from his mom], so I don't want to say I am ahead of the game, but I have got a little bit of a safety net in that regard."
He hasn't been working while attending school at Seneca. The teachers actually advise students not to work during the program.
But he did work when he was going to school and afterwards in Regina.
"Really, I'd love to say I've been doing jobs that pertain to my profession, but to be honest the only real jobs I could ever find outside of my program were retail jobs just to get by, things like working in an off sale and stocking shelves."
A highlight of the past year for Ryan was a school trip to Europe.
Through Seneca MILE, or mobile intensive learning experience, Ryan travelled to Berlin and Munich in Germany and to Prague in the Czech Republic. The trip, paid for by the students, allows them to earn an English credit by handing in a written project following the trip.
"Luckily I had the money set aside for school," says Ryan. "That's the only reason I could justify paying for it."
He was intrigued by the architecture and how much older the history is there.
"It's crazy to see, over in Europe, people just wake up and go to their everyday jobs with this gigantic hundreds of years old architecture everywhere!"
Following his trip to Europe, Ryan took a personal trip to Glasgow, Scotland, to visit a friend from his days as a theatre student in Regina. She is with one of the most prestigious conservatories in Europe.
The atmosphere there is different from what he was used to here when it comes to the arts.
"The arts are a big priority there," says Ryan. "They do heavily favour the arts in front of a lot of other things and you can tell walking around, not only from all the museums 鈥� but there's the conservatory [his friend] is in, a couple more acting schools that I saw just kind of walking by, so they do heavily favour the arts."
Here, he says, the arts are often the bottom of the totem pole.
"There, it's paramount."
Now that he's back in Canada, Ryan's next steps are all about getting ready for his second term at Seneca.
He's found two roommates to share a dormitory with, both of whom have already graduated from the program he's attending.
They will even have a dishwasher.
"That is fantastic, that's what I call a start!"
A member of the Rider nation.
Ryan Spence is a Saskatchewan Roughriders fan.
"I absolutely am. Why would I not be?"
Ryan is heading back to Toronto this summer to resume his acting for camera and voice class at Seneca College and he already has his ticket for Aug. 8, when the Riders come to town.
He's been known to "dress" for Rider games.
"I don't think I'll have a watermelon on my head because that was pretty uncomfortable, to be honest. The watermelon wasn't big enough to begin with to fit on my head fully. It was big enough that I could fit most of it without having it fall off, but the watermelon juice, it was sticky and gross. That will be a one time thing, I think."
He'll be sticking with body paint and. "Maybe I'll get one of those plastic watermelon helmets that they sell."
Ryan vows he will be and has always been a Rider fan.
"It's hard to avoid, growing up here and not being a Rider fan."
