Today we’d like to introduce you to Fara Boyce
Hi Fara, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
My name is Fara Boyce and I was born and raised in the countryside of England. I started acting from a very young age when my sister and her friends would dress me up and we would create movies on our dads old video camera. My favourite memory of this is when they pretend to pierce my ears for a video and I really believed that they had, much to my mums relief they were clip on earrings. So like many children I would play dress up and I guess I wanted to continue that so I joined a musical theatre company called Stage Coach. There I had my breakthrough role as Baloo the bear in The Jungle Book. I really loved being on stage and performing.
Throughout school I continued my passion for acting in and outside of school. I joined more drama groups and expanded my knowledge of film and theatre. My dad is in the film industry so I kind of grew up in front of the camera because he would film absolutely everything. From every Christmas morning finding out what Father Christmas had brought us to photoshoots with our cats, YumYum, Spaghetti and Truffle. I loved being in front of the camera and I wanted to keep pursing that feeling. After my A Levels I auditioned for drama school which was extremely nerve racking because it felt like such a big and exciting jump into a new world with all of these creative people wanting to pursue acting full time. The audition process is like nothing I had experienced before and to be honest I was very nervous. I was lucky enough to study at The Oxford School of Drama before the pandemic hit and I made such wonderful friends and memories there.
When the world was slowly getting back to normal I started auditioning for drama schools again. I remember lying to bed one morning, scrolling on Instagram when an advert came up for The American Academy of Dramatic Arts. So I decided to sign up for more information, not thinking too much of it. They kept emailing me about auditions. By this point I had already been rejected by a few drama schools, so I thought what’s one more audition. I filmed my self tape and sent it off with not much more thought. Then one day I get an email about housing in NYC. I was confused so I checked my email and low and behold I had been accepted into the New York campus of The American Academy of Dramatic Arts. It was one of the best moments of my life and what made it even better was that I hadn’t told anyone that I had auditioned to that school. I have always wanted to live in New York but I never knew how or when that was going to happen, but it did. I love the quote ‘rejection is redirection’ and that’s exactly what this was.
Next stop NYC. I packed my bags and landed in the city that never sleeps. Moving here has been one of the most challenging and rewarding things I have ever done. I am extremely grateful for my families support and for helping me make this dream happen, I couldn’t have done it without them. They will never truly know how appreciative I am for them.
Drama school in the US is an entirely different experience from the UK. I have learnt a lot about people and life from living in this crazy wonderful city and I’m excited to see what life brings me next.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I have been very fortunate in my life to have such wonderful friends and family in the UK but I have met a lot of different characters in NYC and some haven’t been very kind. It is hard to understand sometimes why people might act the way they do but it is important to remember who you are and stick to your morals and what you believe. During this period of time I did miss my friends from home but luckily I have also met some really wonderful people here who have helped me through a lot and I will always be grateful for them.
Being an actor also comes with a lot of ‘bumps in the road.’ You put so much time and effort into auditioning and doing self-tapes and you get a lot of rejections or sometimes you don’t hear back at all. It is so important to remind yourself why you are chasing this dream and what it means to you. Surround yourself with good people and treat yourself to things otherwise it can be really hard at times to stay positive amidst all the rejection. It will be worth it though. One day when you get that breakthrough role you will understand that you had to be rejected from all of those roles so you could get this one. Also, most actors and artists will have another job outside of their dreams because until you do book that role, which means you don’t have to have a ‘pay the bills jobs’, you will find yourself doing a job that you are less passionate about. Then after you’ve worked 12 hours you’ll have to go home and film 3 self tapes, edit them and send them off. It is not easy and most of the time no one thinks about the extra hours that goes into it all but it will be worth it one day. Living in New York is not easy but there are so many people here because it is one of the greatest cities in the world and I have learnt so much from being here and I wouldn’t change it.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am an actor and I love what I do. I trained in theatre and film in the UK and the US. On my journey so far I am most proud of moving to New York to pursue acting and getting the lead in a series that I am doing called Hashtag. I feel very fortunate to be working with such great people and making connections in the industry over here. It can be challenging starting a new life in a different country where you don’t know the industry as well but once you start to build contacts and make connections you realise that the world is very small and in certain industries such as film and tv, everyone ends up knowing everyone.
I love doing theatre. There is such a rush from being on stage every night where anything can happen and you learn so much from doing live performances like that. As of right now, where I am in my life, I would love to be doing more film and television work and in the future return to theatre once I have built up my career in the on screen world of acting. Both avenues hold so many exciting challenges and opportunities and I can’t wait to learn more about them as my career progresses.
What matters most to you? Why?
In my career what matters most to me is telling powerful, important stories that deserve to be shared with the world and that can hopefully help people and connect with people. I want to inspire people and make them believe and feel like they can do anything that they want in this world. That they should go after their dream job and chase it because it is possible. I believe that film and theatre can really save people and having some form of escapism to find solitude in can be so helpful. Watching performances that we see ourselves in and that make us realise that we’re not alone or that we can also change our lives can be so transformative.
Outside of acting I am extremely passionate about animal rights. I was raised vegetarian and have been vegan for the past seven years and it has been the best decision that I have ever made. I care about animals so deeply and I have never seen them as ‘less than’. I have spent a lot of time educating myself on the animal agriculture industry and the conditions that these animals have to suffer and it is beyond disturbing but it is not nearly as bad as what they themselves have to actually endure. I think that it is a shame that people turn a blind eye to suffering just because they don’t want to feel guilty for doing what they enjoy but they never stop to think about the being on the other end of their choices. These poor animals don’t get a choice or a voice so I try to advocate as much as I can on their behalf and try to get people to find the compassion, that we all know we have inside of us, and make a kinder choice for the animals, themselves and the planet. Much to peoples misguided information, there is no harm that can come from choosing a plant based lifestyle. There have been countless studies that show how much it improves peoples health, saves the environment and as a result, saves lives. I am so passionate about this because there is only good that can come from choosing a plant based lifestyle. If the world went plant based we could help end world hunger, save millions of human and animal lives and slow down global warming. Animal agriculture is the leading cause of global warming and as much as people want to help, they are not willing to give up the main thing that is leading to the heating of our planet and the destruction of habitats. I hope people educate themselves more on all of these matters and chose a more compassionate choice where everyone comes out on top.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.backstage.com/u/fara-boyce/
- Instagram: faraboyce
Image Credits
Luana Seu, Jon Boyce,
