Category: The Working Actor

Taking Care of Actor Business

Welcome to April!  Can you believe we’re back again at tax time?  As I slogged through my own piles of forms and receipts yesterday, I tried not to get frustrated at the complications of being a working actor during tax season: working several jobs, working in several states, working sporadically, working “under the table.”  All highly confusing when you try to fit your eccentric artistic life into countless small numbered boxes.  But it’s all part of the actor’s business.  Because you are, after all, running your own business (and if you don’t agree, the IRS does soooo…the bad news is you might have to pay taxes on your own actor business, but…it’s worth it!) and you’ve got to organize your life to accomodate that.
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Don’t Wait On Los Angeles

Irony. We’ve saved our pennies working our degrading jobs, packed our lives into our cars and set out on a great adventure to Los Angeles to pursue that dream of working in entertainment. We unload all of our belongings into a friend’s cheap apartment and crash on a couch until we get our feet set and move into a dive of our own. We get a quick lay of the land before applying for as many of those same degrading jobs as we can. We are creatures of habit.

Obviously, few to none of us start out towards the top of the heap. Rent is due and you have to eat- you gotta do what you gotta do. But how quickly we forget why we came out here. How quickly this town can eat you up if you let it. It’s a slow grind of frustration; a poison. Luckily, the antidote is simple: do what you came out here to do. Read More

How To Jumpstart Your Career As A Working Actor

So you’ve done it!  You’ve decided you want to be a professional actor.  Congratulations!  Welcome to one of the most exciting, challenging, creative, and crazy industries in existence!  Now, do you want the good news or the bad news first?  Right, here’s the bad news: it’s not easy to be an actor.  You’ve got to juggle auditions, rent jobs, performance schedules, bills, networking events, classes, headshot sessions, headshot reproductions, headshot mailings bla bla bla etc.  The list goes on.  The good news?  Being an actor can be intensely rewarding and immensely fulfilling.  It’s one of the only jobs steeped in rich traditions, requiring far-off travel, a healthy body and mind, a fresh imagination, some street smarts to boot, AND the opportunity to dress up like a 18th century courtesan in the morning and an ER doctor in the afternoon. 

So…where to begin?  Well, first thing to know is the greatest thing about the entertainment business: you can be an actor pretty much anywhere!  If you’re not already busy in your community theater, get into it!  Find out about your closest regional theater (and don’t say you don’t have one, they’re eeeeeverywhere), research their local hiring policies on their website, or see if you can wrangle yourself an audition for their next show.  Or (as I always recommend) produce your own!  Get your friends together and put on the kind of theater YOU want to see.  Theater not your bag?  Or, are you even more than a Triple Threat, and you want to do film and/or television too?  Are you even more determined to push your career as a professional actor forward?  Keep reading… Read More