If you're looking for reps, write letters that are short and professional. Make sure you have a really great reel of yourself. If there are friends you know who are making short films, do them - it's all material for your reel.

For me, the banner that I want to wave in terms of giving a jump start to writers of any gender is just to make female protagonists as complex as their male counterparts.

The actors I admire always have something to say, or a level of poetry, belief, activism or intelligence about what they do or how they feel.

I had a meeting a while back with a big group of women - actors and producers and writers - who are all ethnic minorities and we just aired what we thought was happening and why, and someone said that, as a black or mixed race actress, you feel like you're renting space instead of carving out a career. But I'm just going to get on with it.