According to the talk show hostess, creative industries in the UK often attract_

W: Hello and welcome to our talk show. In the next few minutes we’re going to be seeing what it’s like to live and work as a young professional in the UK. Creative industries play a key role in the UK’s economic growth. It’s a sector which covers activities such as architecture, publishing, film, fashion, music, radio and TV, and software. And it accounts for almost ten percent of the UK economy. Creative industries often attract young people who feel naturally drawn to them, in the hope that they can make their mark, their fortune or both, whilst expressing themselves in their chosen field. That’s the dream but what are the realities? Today, we are pleased that our reporter Mark managed to bring a distinguished young creative professional from the film industry to our talk show. Welcome, Mr. Smith.
M: Thanks.
W: Mr. Smith. You are a young professional who works in the UK’s burgeoning creative sector and you won’t be short of opinions. By and large, you are well under 30, extremely enthusiastic. Well, would you tell us what’s your specific job in the film industry?
M: OK. I’m a film and video editor.
W: So what’s it like working in a creative industry here in the UK?
M: It can be fantastic. You know everything has highs and lows I think. But the highs can be particularly high. I’ve worked on a variety of projects, I’ve worked for about two years as an editor so far. Well, last year I worked on Nanny McPhee which was Emma Thompson’s latest offering and I was an assistant on Seed of Chucky which is part of the famous Child Play Franchise. It is a good experience because it was a relatively large Hollywood Film.
W: I see now you’ve become rather successful. And would you share with us your experience when you first plunged into this field?
M: Breaking into the industry is very difficult. And certainly for the first two years that I was trying to break in I had to spend a lot of time working as a carpenter. Or doing whatever I could, painting and decorating, to get by, whilst you are pursuing contacts really. But then when you get more and more established, you get more and more contacts and at the same time you got to perform better. Afterward, it gets much easier.
W: And do you have to work long hours?
M: Fourteen, fifteen, sixteen hours per day, it’s not unusual. There are limits set within the law, but of course everyone does usually do whatever’s required to get the material in the can.
W: What about the social side of things? Do you go out much? Do you have time to go out much?
M: In terms of meeting people it’s a bit complicated. I often work on my own, so I’m effectively directing myself doing camera work and then I’ll go edit, and then I’ll be totally absorbed in editing. To some extent, I’m completely on my own for days at a time working on a project. On other projects which are much more collaborative, you meet an awful lot of people, and obviously you’ve got a lot in common and with some of them I’ve developed really very good relationships that could be called friendships. So yeah, socially it can be great.
W: You have a great social life with the people that you work with but organizing social life outside of that, if you’re working seventy-two-hour weeks, can be pretty rough. Do you think so?
M: Yeah. The flip-side of the coin is that if you’re not working at all, you’ve got all the time in the world. But remember that people who work in other industries don’t really understand your stop-start lifestyle. So it can take extra effort to meet up with people.
W: And where do you hope to be in about, say, ten years?
M: Really fast broadband is going to change the way we work. In terms of transferring big amounts of data around and stuff, it’s going to get easier and easier. So I do think that in 10 years time I’m certain, you know, you’ll want some ’face time’ as they say for meetings and all that sort of stuff. And physically, for filming some things you’ll have to be there. But very often, it won’t matter where on earth you are in the world so I am actually planning on buying a place in Portugal or Spain and continue my post-production stuff overseas.
W: Would you recommend it as a career, or do you have any advice for people who are thinking of taking it up?
M: I would definitely encourage people to come to Britain to work in the creative industries; they are some of the best in the world in terms of content, ideas, execution. The creative talents and the technicians in this country are fantastic. My one tip would be: make sure that you’ve got that endurance, that capacity, that capacity to endure because you’re going to be faced with long hours, some difficult people and occasions where you’re paid very little. So make sure that you’re determined and focused on working in these industries. You can’t be a tourist so to speak. You know Britain is a fantastic place to work in the creative industries because there is a very huge buzz, very high training and people are really passionate about what they do. But it’s also extremely competitive and the number of places for people to work in is a lot smaller than the number of people trying to get work. So you have to be very tenacious, you have to really want to do it. It is glamorous, it’s long hard hours and you have to be pretty thick skinned. So give it a try and if you care about it, do it. But if not, you can make a lot more money a lot more easily doing something else.
W: So. you do think young people should think before act.
M: Yes. They need to be rational. Yet I still would recommend it as a career, it’s enormously enjoyable, much more creative than most people’s jobs are, much more varied than most people’s jobs are. Financially, I hate to say it but I’m now doing really quite well. In terms of the advice I’d give to someone, don’t give up because there’ll be endless barriers in your way. You know you get all these false horizons where you think you’re about to get a big break and then, you know, it just turns into nothing. So, the cost of making mistakes is huge and keep in mind never make any mistakes. That’s the most important thing of all because you only get one chance. So that’s it—be careful don’t make any mistakes! Well as a young professional in a creative industry myself, I can wholeheartedly recommend it. And you do get to meet the nicest people.
W: OK. Mr. Smith. Thank you very much for coming on the show and talking to us.
M: My pleasure.