Overhead - Your Yearly Costs by China Brooks (photo by dividedsky46)

Sometimes people ask me questions about getting started in the entertainment industry…

Overhead: Your Yearly Acting Costs

There Are Two Sides To Acting

Many actors only think of the creative side of acting. They focus only on developing their talents, which is all sorts of wrong. There are two sides to acting, the creative side and the business side. These two must be balanced or you will never make it long term. Look at many famous people you admire. Let’s choose JLo and Madonna. Notice how both are always coming out with different products to sell? Neither just do one thing. Both act and sing and have perfumes and all that. Madonna just opened gyms across the country. Why? Because it’s business. If you can’t handle the business aspect of acting, please, do us all a favor and do something else. This shit isn’t for the faint of heart.

Keep It Fresh and Keep In Touch

Not only do you need to have confidence and courage in yourself and your acting skills, but you must know how to market. You will have to practice the skill of client retention, networking, and nourishing your relationships. In a sea of millions of hungry, desperate actors, people will forget you. That is, unless you keep in touch and keep it fresh. What do you think I was doing setting up a blog at www.ChinaBrooks.com? Yes, to expand my business, but also to keep it fresh and interesting. It’s like dating someone. After years of dating, you get tired of the same sexual positions over and over again, of eating at the same damn restaurants. You need variety. Surprise, this is no different. Get ready to shine and be brilliant. Otherwise, we just won’t care about you.

Your Yearly Costs

My acting career can easily cost me $6000 or more per year. Those who have hit big, trust that their overhead is exponentially larger than mine. They have to pay their PR (public relations) firm, their managers, agents, team of handlers. Keanu Reeves gets weekly facials. The bigger you get, the more your costs go up and you need to plan accordingly. This is part of the reason why big name actors get so much money. It’s because they have so many expenses. You must take your expenses into consideration or you will never really make any money.

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