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Stagemoms: When Push Comes to Shove
I took three-year-old T to another Toys-R-Us booking last Friday. We have our routine now: I bring an abundant bag of snacks, she picks the movie. T opted for “Wizard of Oz” (“Muzard of Oz” —I love the mispronunciation phase). As Judy Garland’s unforgettable voice filled the Minivan, I couldn’t help but think of overbearing stage moms. Hers infamously kept little Judy (then Frances Gumm) stage ready by giving her speed. When she signed with MGM, the 13-year-old was addicted and the studio maximized her movie output with uppers by day and downers by night. Garland says she was never asked if she wanted to perform; she was just shoved onto stage at the age of two.
Judy Garland in “Wizard of Oz”
Clearly Mrs. Gumm took things way too far, but few stars would have made it without a push. The key is to find a way to gently push in the direction where a kid shows potential, not shove them so hard they get whiplash (and lasting emotional scars/drug addictions). As my nine-year-old is pretty serious about dancing (and acting), I’ve asked any serious dancer I encounter about how much is too much. Almost all say they wanted to quit at some point when they were kids, but their parents pushed them, they stuck with it, and they’re glad they did. I guess the question is when does push come to shove? It takes work to become great at anything and kids tend to be lazy. Although Amy Chua took pushing (and shoving) to the extreme, I think her book Battle Hymn of a Tiger Mom made some excellent points about coddled, unmotivated American children.
For now, pushing and shoving don’t work into the toddler modeling equation. The wee ones have to love it or they won’t last past the first booking. On these little breaks from real life, there’s more hand-holding between T and me than there would be in our chaotic house of six. I don’t offer her speed but perhaps break a few nutrition rules when packing the snacks. I carefully assess her response when I say, “We’re going to New Jersey for pictures.” So far, this statement still yields a huge grin and a question of what toys she’ll get to play with this time. The big motivation for me, stagemom/chauffeur, is not the money (read about that here) or the tear sheets (these shots were for packaging; we’ll have to buy the toys to get the tear sheets!) or the blog material. I’m pushing open doors. Print modeling leads to commercials, which lead to acting opportunities. I was obsessed with acting as a kid, and I see that gene in two of my kids. What I would have given for the chance to audition in New York. J will be auditioning for Sesame Street this week and Matilda on Broadway this weekend. Being a realist, I suspect these experiences will be great opportunities for learning to deal with rejection. That is a lesson that is blatantly absent in most kids activities these days.
Are stage moms any different from parents who are paying for expensive extra training for their young athletes or intensive tutoring and SAT prep classes to plot a course to the Ivys? Maybe we’re worried about child actors ending up like Lindsay Lohan (see the latest news)? Comment and let us know what you think!
Stay tuned for my Stylemama pic and the skinny on Fashion Week.
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My thoughts are that you have to be extremely careful because, unlike being pushy with sports, in modelling (and in a lot of ways acting and dancing) the focus is on how you LOOK. Society is hard enough in that respect. My feeling is also that many kids would rather play on the beach, be with friends etc rather than being in auditions and shoots for hours on end. I saw A LOT of damaged kids when I was modelling. These parents were pushy and awful, living through their kids (which it is what it is all about for many stage moms/dads). But with a loving and grounded mom, the situation will be different.
I definitely saw some of those awful parents too. See the story “Dear Jill: I Want My 6-Year-Old to Model”: https://www.modelingmentor.com/img/pages/38/file/1.pdf
That’s a must-read for parents ushering their kids into modeling.
Acting and dancing are more clear-cut. You can tell pretty easily if your kid has a passion and talent for any area of the arts. (Posing, an art? Not so much, though some extraordinary models almost turn it into one.) You can tell if your kid would rather play on the beach than be on stage. Mine would rather be no other place than on stage, performing. Of course the performing part is the prize. To reach it, you need to do the work—and the auditions. Plenty of swimmers must grow bored of those 5 AM training sessions, but winning the race at the big meet makes it all worth it. Advice for acting parents: A management company will be more selective than an agency about what auditions your kid is sent on. If a casting director specifically asks for your kid, the job will be great career-wise, or will pay really well, then you get the call. This translates into a few auditions a month for my 9-year-old during the school year. There weren’t any in the summer—that’s slow season. The “print” castings (which means modeling) are always optional. We skip most of those. Print castings are more likely to be mobbed with kids, with half-hour waits. (Actually not bad compared to what adult models deal with!) With acting auditions, kids are given specific times, so wait time is minimal. But then you have to consider travel time. We have an hour train-ride, which is good for homework and prep on the way in, but J flops around like a dying fish on the way home. He is not the type of kid who could do this every day (I hear of kids in New York who do, every day after school!). He needs to run around with his friends. He’s down to two hours of dance during the week and a half-hour voice class every other week—that’s not the kind of drive that will take a kid to Broadway. Another kid in our town has had a long run on Broadway. As a dance instructor described him, “He is like an adult in a kid’s body. He was made for it. He doesn’t need or want to be running around with friends. He wants to be hanging out backstage with actors.” So, it’s up to the parents to decipher whether that is their kid, or that is who they are trying to make their kid be. And then there’s the opposite dilemma. My neighbor’s teenage daughter is dying to act in New York. Her mom is resisting because she doesn’t want her kid zeroing in on an acting career and letting her school work slip. I’m sure you’ve heard the rule, Only act if you MUST act! Writing is similar. I write because I must write. Which means a blog comment becomes blog-post length!
I agree 100% with Sophie!
Every situation is different, J it seems as though he was born with the passion. That’s different. Pushy stage Mommy’s make my skin crawl.
Me, I am looking forward to baseball, swim meets, and soccer if that is the way my son wants to go. I will give him every opportunity to decide what he likes and is good at and has passion for. From there, we go forward.
Ricky