Gloria Iatridis said she can still remember the determined look on her daughter’s face when she told her she wanted to pursue a career in acting.
“My daughter was 13 years old,” she said. “So, I decided that I was going to invest all my energy into supporting her while she was younger, while I had the ability to do so.”
Fast forward more than a handful of years, and supporting her daughter, Olivia Kate latridis, is just what she’s done. Together, the dynamic duo have written and now published a book.
Titled BOOKED: A Strong Start For Your Child Actor, it’s both an instruction manual for acting, but also a peek behind the scenes.The book was published late last month and is now available from The Friesen Press Bookstore.
Olivia explained it goes into detail about some of the nuances in the acting industry that no one really talks about, while Gloria added that the book emphasizes how a parent can keep their child safe in this profession.
“I’ve learned a lot about that. I couldn’t emphasize it enough, that if your child wants to be involved in acting, the parent needs to be there,” said Gloria. “I’m a firm believer that all it takes is one incident to harm a child, and it could impact them for the rest of their life. And I wanted to make sure that, especially when she was a minor, I made sure that she was safe.”
Gloria added that, in the book, she details some examples of personal experiences and red flags to look for.
Olivia seconded how important having a parent safeguarding them is in this industry. It’s something she didn’t quite realize in her youth, she said.
“Me and my mom did everything together for my career until I was 18,” said Olivia. “I didn’t realize how much she was doing for me. I really did take her for granted for a long time without realizing just how much work she was doing behind the scenes for me.”
Olivia said she knows for a fact she wouldn’t have made it this far in her career without her mother’s help. Now, she gets to share that experience with others, including what it means to not only be a child actor, but also an Indigenous one.
“Indigenous people don’t always get as much slack unfortunately, as other folks in the industry because — and I see this a lot — that Indigenous people are perceived in this negative light. That they’re unprofessional, or because they come from communities or reservations that they cannot be professional.”
Olivia explained that Indigenous films and sets will differ from more traditional ones. Her and her mother’s book serves as a guide and to take some of those pressures off. It’s something a lot of people in the industry might be afraid to talk about, she said.
“I think that people are scared of the repercussions because the industry can be really finicky. And there is really no direct guide. There are no books that really give you step by step, how to get in there, what are do’s and don’ts.”
Apart from sharing some wisdom, Olivia said she’s getting a steady number of auditions and her motivation is high for her future.
And as for Gloria, although she doesn’t look after her daughter like she used to, their memories of each other are as strong as ever.
“There’s one that I always like to share, because looking back on it now, I laugh every single time,” Gloria started. Apparently, Olivia had landed an audition, and had to create a tape of herself acting. It was the first time she’d ever done something like this, Gloria said.
Safe to say, the two weren’t exactly pros at making tapes.
“We were given the script for her to perform and I researched a little bit online to see what a self-tape looked like. And I thought ‘jeez, these are really terrible’,” Gloria explained. She said she now knows the formalities of it all - having the right background, introducing yourself, sticking to the script and so on.
She said she knows that now, not then.
“We decided we were going to make our self-tape more exciting. So, in the script, this character was in a park, so we decided to go to a park and we had the audition at the park, which first of all was the worst thing you could do,” said Gloria, who had already begun to chuckle at this point.
Gloria also said Olivia wasn’t a fan of how her character talked in the script, so she changed it herself.
But Olivia wasn’t the only one making embellishments for herself.
“I decided she should act out some of the scenes, like do cartwheels,” said Gloria, who was now laughing at this point. “And I decided to make it nice by putting in some music. So, it was like the craziest video of this audition that I submitted. And all I got back from this casting director was, ‘please redo.’”
Gloria clarified that Olivia did not land that role. She did, however, insist that the youth ought to pursue their dreams, despite how hard it might seem.
“There’s not a lot of support out there for young people who really have a passion and, and can excel in the arts,” said Gloria. “Especially as an Indigenous person, I think, for a long time. children, you know, didn’t believe that they could do things that other races could do.”
Gloria added that adversities like Covid or the SAG-AFTRA strike only made things harder for her daughter to pursue a career in the arts. But it hasn’t stopped her.
“All these experiences are only going to make her stronger. And she shouldn’t give up on her dreams.”