Are Webseries Experience?

Alex writes in:

Recently, I’ve had the opportunity to work as a set PA on a SAG webseries. It was a great crew, I am unsure about how this rates as credible experience. What are your thoughts about PA experience on webseries?

All experience is experience. Put it on your resume.

Here’s the thing that’s hard to understand until you work in the business– there is way more video content than you can possibly know about.

Major studios put out maybe 20 feature films a year; the biggest networks create around 18 hours of primetime programming. That’s usually what you people think about when you say you work in Hollywood.

But the truth is, there are many, many more hours of television to be programmed, thousands of small and independent features, not to mention commercials, music videos, sports, and industrials.

If you list “Roxie’s Big Night” next to “Big Bang Productions,” no one’s going to know if that’s a feature that hasn’t been released yet, or a pilot on a small network, or a webseries no one will watch.

And that’s fine! Because when it comes to PAing, your job isn’t that much different. Especially if we’re talking a SAG series, which must meet certain minimum levels of professionalism, even at a lower budget.

Now, the webseries you made with a bunch of friends in college? That’s a bit trickier. That was probably not professional, and didn’t really teach you anything about how to behave on a real set.

Still, if you have no, or few, other credits, I’d go ahead and throw it on there. Why not?

Here’s the real trick: don’t label it as a webseries on the resume. While there is now plenty of high-quality work being created just for the internet, there are still people who regard these as somehow lesser than “real” television.{{1}} There’s no sense in turning off a potential employer by adding “webseries” to the credit.

[[1]]These tend to be people who watch CBS and don’t understand how to use The Google.[[1]]