The Space Between Roles

by Francisco Marquez

No one talks enough about the in-between.

Everyone celebrates the booking. The callback. The shoot. The post about being “grateful and humbled” under perfect lighting with a coffee in hand.

But what about the space between roles?
The waiting room of your life — where you're not exactly working, not exactly resting, and not exactly okay.

That’s where I’ve been lately.
Somewhere between the man I’m trying to become… and the one life keeps throwing punches at.

I’m currently preparing for a role in an indie film. layered, psychological, volatile — the kind of part that asks you to go deeper and bring out those parts of yourself you don't usually want others to see. I’ve also just auditioned for a few big projects, including an M. Night Shyamalan film. It’s the kind of opportunity that gets your blood moving again after a quiet season.

But here’s the thing:

While I’m doing all that — I’m also driving my father to oncology appointments.
He’s sick again. The cancer is in his bones this time. What started as a broken collarbone is turning into something deeper, darker. The kind of thing that doesn’t just pause your life — it rewrites it.

There’s no script for this.
No rehearsal. No blocking.

Just raw, unscripted life. And it doesn’t wait for you to be ready.
It’s a strange feeling — being hopeful and terrified at the same time.
Trying to memorize scenes for a role while worrying if your father can walk to the car without collapsing.
Trying to manifest a future when your present is buckling under the weight of responsibility and uncertainty.

Most days, I feel like I’m stretched too thin.

But even in that — in the weight, the noise, the unraveling — something keeps pulling me forward. Through the static. Through the storm.

I’ve always been introverted. When things get loud, I go quiet. I retreat into thoughts, dreams, memory. I journal. I study. I train. That’s how I process.
But lately, even the quiet places feel full.

And this is what I’ve learned from living in the in-between:
You don’t need to have momentum to have meaning.
Sometimes your growth doesn’t look like movement — it looks like endurance.
It looks like staying rooted when the storm is trying to rip you apart.
It looks like making art in your mind when the world won’t let you make it on a set.

And those chapters — the ones no one claps for — are the ones that build you the most.

The space between roles isn’t dead time.
It’s where your instrument sharpens.
Where your empathy deepens.
Where the work you haven’t booked yet starts to take shape inside you — so that when the opportunity finally shows up, you’re already ready.

Actors like to think our job starts when the cameras roll. It doesn’t.
It starts when you decide to keep going without the cameras.

When you show up for yourself when no one’s watching.
When you’re shaping scenes in the dark — on your floor, behind the wheel, or locked in a voiceover booth whispering into a void — still rehearsing while the world thinks you’ve vanished.

That’s the work.
That’s where the edge lives.

So if you're reading this — maybe you're also in the in-between —
I want you to know it matters.
Even if you haven’t booked in months. Even if your feed is quiet and your inbox is dry.
You're still in this.
And what you're living through right now — all the hardship, all the tension, all the barely-holding-it-together moments — they will shape your work later.

But more than that — they’ll shape your character. The kind you don’t audition for. The kind that can’t be faked.

I’m still in it. No clean bow here.
Still waiting. Still hustling. Still tired. Still dreaming.
Because some part of me still believes there’s something on the other side of all this that’s worth the weight.

But I’ve learned that surviving the in-between isn’t just part of the journey — it is the journey.

And if you can stay grounded here — if you can hold yourself steady in the silence —
then when the next role finally comes?

You’ll be more than ready.

You’ll be undeniable.