Should You Move to LA or New York for Acting? How to Decide in the Self-Tape Era

Somebody in your acting class just announced they’re moving to LA. Somebody else swears New York is the only place to train. Your teacher says you’re ready for a bigger market, your landlord wants an answer on the lease, and every video you watch was filmed by someone who already made the move.

Most of the advice you’ll find was written before self-tapes became the normal first round. Now you can audition for a show in another state from your bedroom, which makes the question feel both easier and more confusing. If tapes travel, why move at all?

The short version: self-tapes changed where you can audition from, not where you can work. Some screen roles are cast as local hires, so where you live still decides which jobs you can take. Decide by your medium (stage or screen), where your representation books, and how long your savings last. And for most people starting out, build credits and a reel in the nearest real market before you pack.

What self-tapes changed, and what they didn’t

The first audition is now often a tape, and union rules have made that round more predictable. SAG-AFTRA’s June 2024 contract bulletin on self-tapes sets limits for self-tape auditions under its TV and theatrical contracts: sides for a first self-tape are capped at 8 pages, and 12 for later ones.

That’s real progress for an actor in Ohio. You can be seen for a series shooting in Georgia without buying a plane ticket. But a tape gets you considered. It doesn’t make you hireable for a role whose budget assumes you’ll drive to set.

The other thing tapes didn’t change is everything around the audition: classes, theater, short films, the people you meet on set who remember you for the next job. Those still happen in a place. So the question isn’t “Do I need to live in LA to audition?” It’s “Where can I take the work I’m auditioning for, and where will I build the relationships that bring more of it?”

Local hire: the term that decides which jobs you can take

A breakdown that says “local hire only” means production will not pay your travel, housing, or per diem. A casting-site guide to what local hire means traces the term to union payment zones, which were set up to protect actors from spending their own money to get to work. It’s explicit that being willing to pay your own way does not make you local.

How close is local? It depends on the production and the contract. Atlanta-based casting director Kimberly Wistedt, on a podcast episode about local hire, describes it as living within a 60-mile radius of the producer’s base. Treat that as one casting director’s working description and read the notice for the real one.

The same local-hire guide warns that claiming an address you don’t live at can get you recast and leave you liable for production costs if you can’t make the shoot. That’s the trap the self-tape era set: it’s never been easier to audition for a job you can’t legally take.

So local hire is a big part of the decision. Where you live decides which shoots you count as local for. A move is really a choice of which productions you want to be local to.

Stage or screen: pick your medium first

The old split still holds as a rule of thumb. New York is the center of American theater: Broadway, Off-Broadway, and the training programs that feed them. Los Angeles is where much of American TV and film is cast and made. If your dream is eight shows a week, LA is the long way around. If it’s a series regular role, LA is where more of that work is cast.

A few years ago, a trade-press roundup asked seven New York-based casting directors how the two coasts compare. Casting director Mark Saks described one pilot role that drew 4,700 submissions: about 900 from New York and the rest from LA. His point was that the smaller pool can make it easier to get into the room in New York, and another casting director in the piece said it’s easier to get started there.

That’s one casting director’s experience of submissions for one role, not a rule. But it’s a useful way to think about it: a bigger market can also mean a bigger pool of actors submitting for the same part.

The cities in between

LA and New York aren’t the only places with union work. SAG-AFTRA has locals outside the two coasts, including an Atlanta local for performers in Georgia and a New Orleans local for Louisiana and Mississippi. If productions shoot near you, being local to them is worth checking before you look farther away. Wistedt herself is based in Atlanta, a reminder that casting offices exist outside the two coasts.

Build credits where you are first

The advice that’s lasted longest is also the least glamorous. A guide to arriving in LA for pilot season urges actors to build credits first: onstage, in commercials, in local TV, in whatever medium is available. A more recent guide to becoming an actor in LA adds that moving for pilot season used to be common but generally isn’t the wisest idea now.

Credits at home make the move cheaper and faster when it comes. A reel with real scenes in it gets an agent to watch. A resume with regional theater and a couple of student films says you can work. If you have no footage yet, that’s the first thing to fix, and it’s easier to fix where you already have a couch and a day job.

There’s a second benefit. Local work is how you learn whether you love the actual job (early call times, waiting, saying the same line for the eleventh take) before you bet a lease on it.

Follow your agent, not the skyline

If you already have representation, the question often answers itself. Your agent submits you to projects their contacts are casting. If most of your auditions come from one city’s offices, being local to that city’s shoots is what turns tapes into bookings.

If you don’t have an agent yet, look for one in a market you can actually get to for callbacks and shoots. Our guide on getting an agent with no experience covers how to check that an agency is licensed and franchised. A regional agent who books you every month beats an LA agent who forgets you exist.

And when you’re choosing between offers, ask where their clients book. An agent’s roster is a map of where the work for actors like you comes from. Once you’re submitting, log every audition in our free audition tracker to see your own callback and booking rates.

A decision checklist before you sign a lease

Run through these honestly. If you can’t answer most of them, you’re not ready to move yet, and that’s useful to know.

1. Medium. Write down the three jobs you most want in the next two years. If they’re mostly stage, look east or at a strong regional theater city near you; if they’re mostly screen, look west or at the nearest production hub.
2. Type. Look at the roles you get called in for now. Are those roles cast locally in the city you’re eyeing, or flown in from somewhere else?
3. Runway. Add up rent, deposits, transport, headshots, and classes for your first several months, assuming no acting income. Have that saved, plus a plan for a day job.
4. Local-hire math. Read a month of breakdowns for the new city. Count how many say “local hire” and how many you’d be right for.
5. Representation. Do you have an agent there, or a realistic route to one? Who do you already know in that market?
6. Credits. Do you have a reel, a resume with real work on it, and current headshots? If not, build those first.
7. A test visit. Spend a couple of weeks there. Take a class, see shows, go to a workshop. Notice whether you want to live there, not just work there.

If you stay put, compete like you’re local everywhere

Staying where you are is a real choice, not a failure of nerve. If you do, the self-tape is your main audition, so treat it like a craft. Learn the rules above, keep a simple home setup ready, and be off book enough to look up from the page.

The hard part of taping from a smaller market is often the reader. You may not have a castmate around at 11 p.m. when the sides arrive. Offbook helps with the preparation part: upload the sides, pick your role, and realistic voices read every other character and wait for your line. Rehearse on your laptop with the full script on a big screen, and listen to your scenes on your phone anywhere.

Keep your skills sharp between tapes, too. Run a classic scene with the free run lines online tool, pick a piece from our monologue library, or read a public-domain play from our plays collection out loud. That way you’re ready to start work the day the sides land.

Questions actors ask

Do you still need to live in LA to act on screen?

Not to audition, but often to take the job. Self-tapes let you be seen for projects anywhere, while some roles are cast as local hires to the shoot. You can work without living in LA if you live near a city where productions shoot and hire locally.

Can I list a friend’s address to count as local?

Don’t. Local hire means you already live within the production’s zone. The local-hire guide cited above warns that misrepresenting it can get you recast and leave you liable for production costs if you can’t make the shoot. If you’re not local, say so, and let casting decide.

Is Atlanta or Chicago a better place to start than LA?

It can be, depending on what you want and where you live. If productions shoot near you, building credits there first is the path the LA guides cited above recommend, and the credits go with you if you move to LA or New York later.

When is the right time to move?

When you have a reason in the new city (an agent, a job, a school, steady callbacks from its casting offices), credits and a reel to show, and enough savings for several months without acting income. Moving only because pilot season is coming is what one LA guide cited above calls generally not the wisest idea.