Today we’d like to introduce you to Kira Cook.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Kira. So, let’s start at the beginning, and we can move on from there.
I grew up in Chicago and began acting there at six years old. I started in plays – I did a Steppenwolf play when I was in 2nd grade, spending my weekends and evenings after learning cursive at school hanging around with Laurie Metcalf (who played my mom) and my fellow castmates in the basement of the theater. I then moved into TV and commercials a little later. When I was 11, I booked the part of Hortensia in Danny DeVito’s Matilda and my mom, and I moved out to Los Angeles for a few months for filming.
I quit acting for a while in high school, but while I was working on my Master’s in Modern Literature in London at UCL, I hosted the pilot episodes of “Islands Without Cars,” a travel documentary series my mom was directing. We had always dreamed of working on a travel show together, and our first two episodes were on islands off of England and Greece. PBS picked up our series nationally, and we’ve been steadily working on the show for the past decade (!!) – one or two episodes a year. The entire second season will air this spring on PBS!
Filming the first two episodes inspired me to get back into performing, so when I finished studying in London, I moved to Los Angeles to pursue acting and writing. That was nine years ago. It took about seven years to fully make a living off of creative work, but I work in a lot of different avenues — copywriting, voiceover work, commercial acting, hosting, and more. It’s shocking, but I look back on my first day of the very first acting class I took when I moved here nine years ago. The teacher said, “Many of you will give up, but the ones who make a living off of this work will either hit it immediately, or it will take seven years to book a job.”
Has it been a smooth road?
As I mentioned above, the path to making a living as a creative in Los Angeles was probably the least smooth road imaginable. It’s incredibly confounding because there is no “one” way to the goal of just earning an income doing the work of an actor or a writer. There are so many avenues that can take you to an income and so many that can lead to dead ends, again and again.
What works for your friends and your peers will not necessarily work for you. What your friends and peers enjoy doing is not necessarily what will make you happy. I began studying improv and moved into standup because it challenged me and impassioned me and excited me, but eventually after years of doing it, realized that it wasn’t making me happy anymore, and in fact was actively working against my joy.
If you go by the math, the success rate of auditioning is STAGGERINGLY ABSURD. I auditioned consistently for two years before booking a spot I was cut out of, and then four more years before booking again. I was on my last straw – seriously looking into other careers. Then, I started booking. There’s no sense in it – I can point to things that changed emotionally for me – I had a baby and acting no longer was the thing I was most desperate for in the world, which I know changed my attitude in the room, but more than anything else, it really is a numbers game, and a commitment to your own staying power is key.
That said, there are no guarantees! I may never book anything else again! But if that happens, I have emotionally and financially cushioned myself over the years with other work that I really enjoy — writing and voiceover work and my real joy, my twice-yearly gig of hosting Islands Without Cars! — and emotional and intellectual flexibility that might take me to a completely different career, and that will be okay too because I am interested in so very many things in this world.
Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
I love Los Angeles’s unpredictability, its vastness, its unknowable-ness. I’ve lived here for nine years, and I wouldn’t say I have it down pat. I moved to Highland Park from Los Feliz almost two years ago, and it’s been a joy getting acquainted with this neighborhood, especially through the lens of motherhood (can’t quite say I ever really paid attention to playgrounds before).
I love the preponderance of sun. I lived in London before I moved to LA and I didn’t quite realize what an effect near-constant sunlight has on my overall sense of energy and well-being. I love its swimming pools and tall, silly palm trees. I love its extraordinary food culture, both high and low. I love that in any truly any of LA’s 400 neighborhoods, I can easily find: a donut shop, a crystal shop, and a plant shop.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.kiracook.com www.islandswithoutcars.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: @flamelikeme
Image Credit:
Amanda Booth Weidenaar, Tyler Cook, Anna Morro
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