Your Spoken Languages

Use this field to tell us which languages you speak. It is one of the main ways casting directors and talent agents find the right people, so it is worth getting right.

For Actors #

Your languages are split into two groups.

Mother Tongue is for a language you grew up with: you were raised speaking it, schooled in it, and you handle accent, idiom and humour without having to think about it. Most people have just one Mother Tongue. Some bilingual people may have two.

Also speaks is for every other language you can perform in. The test is a simple one: could you take a role in that language tomorrow?

That means learning lines in it, taking direction on set in it, and performing without your accent pulling a viewer out of the scene. Being able to hold a conversation on holiday is not the same thing, and neither is having studied a language at school.

If you are not confident performing in a language, leave it out. Listing a language you cannot act in wastes your time and the casting director's, and being unable to deliver on the day does more damage to your reputation than the missed audition was worth.

For Casting Directors, Talent Agents and Other Professionals #

You have a single list, with no mother tongue to mark and no level to set. Just add the languages you can work in.

The standard is different from an actor because you are working in the language rather than performing in it. Include a language if you can communicate freely in it at work: meetings, phone calls, emails, and contracts. As a rough guide, that is around B1 or higher on the CEFR scale, though you are not asked to state a level anywhere.

If you only know the basics, leave it out. Someone contacting you in a language you cannot follow helps nobody.

Keeping It Up to Date #

Languages are easy to forget about once you have filled them in. If you have spent a year working abroad, or finally reached the point where you would happily audition in a second language, come back and update this. If a language has gone rusty through lack of use, take it off.