You see it all depends on how one defines making a living.  If we are talking being able to buy a mansion, drive a Miata, and have a slew of staff, then maybe that makes sense.  I think we can all think of about 50 to 60 actors who are known who have that kind of life.  I am talking about guys like Adam Sandler who run their own production companies with staff of 150 or more. There are a few women with that kind of status as well, such as Drew Barrymore.  But how do you define making a living?  And if you don’t know- I worked on 200 different productions from 2003 to 2008 as background (though there were background casting people who called me an actor and knew I was trained), have studied acting, digital media, editing, pre-production, script analysis and well I don’t know every thing about the industry, but enough to make my own observations.

If you think about it, have you noticed the one hit wonders.  There are series leads that do one series and they don’t seem to work anymore at acting, but that does not mean they don’t make a living.  For example, Patrick Dempsey makes $250,000 a week.  Most Americans could live for years off that.  If he did not have a huge staff, someone like him could work a series for 6 years and then retire for the rest of his life, if he financed his money right. 

Here is the thing  I am tired to the statistics being used as an excuse for WOMEN not to be allowed to fight to make a living along side men as actors.  You see to make a living for me would mean making 20,000 to 40,000 a year at acting.  Guess what, do you know that guest stars can make around $4000 a day.  It all depends on what YOU WANT FROM LIFE.  I just want to pay my bills.  I meditate, hike and make my own art, so extra money I don’t need.   I have education debt, but I chose a community college to get the skills without adding to my debt and if I made $40,000 a year, I can make the debt payments just find. So if you get a guest spot and it takes two or three days to shoot, you would be making about $8-12,000 a spot.  If you get 4 of those types of spots a year, and well you have an agent and manager to also feed, you would still be making “a living.”  So a professional actor can make a living by getting 4 guest spots a year and well a few movies and commercials.  Granted there is the issue of competition and also going to all the auditions to try to get that one, but still I think it is a lie to deter people with talent from pursuing the goal, and an excuse to cut some out of the industry all together.   It is also how professional actors can afford to do theater and other art forms.  It is also why actors are encouraged to have entourages, they make to much money not to afford perhaps to share it, if they get to the status of the actors who seem to need that form of attention.

Basically that actor you see appear four or five times a year on different TV shows as a Guest, is doing just fine, despite the fact that they are not working 40 hours a week, 360 days a year.  I loved being on sets all the time.  My plan was to find production work so I could be creative and work in the industry between acting gigs I may get.  I saw men do it all the time.  Well known actors would work along side crew on one set, and then be acting in another.  And just because I am not a man, it does not mean I don’t have the right to provide for my own family, even if that family is just me for now.  I want to pay for my half of dinner and my own roof over my head, not rely on some guy.  And I certainly don’t want to be dating an actor, which by the way is what I want, not to be so and so’s girlfriend, but because I grew up being told I had to be a lawyer and could not do anything in acting, even though I was also told I should considering getting a job with the government so I could use my acting.  I don’t want a man in my life who would threaten what I love and would degrade my emotional well being with that kind of mental abuse.  If I date someone who loves the things I love, there will not be fights, or arguments and more PEACE and mental stability all around.   I mean I had a mastectomy and then the government tried to push me to work for them as an actress to train their troops.  It was not anti-American to say NO.  I had just had major surgery and was in NO SHAPE to go out into the desert and help anyone.  That kind of pressure on me was unethical in my opinion from the military and MY FAMILY.

Does it make sense at all also if someone is in debt but has a job and is working and is getting good grades to train to do something in a related field, to have that person completely blacklisted from that field.  I am sorry but even when I applied to law school I said I did not want to practice but to use the information to work in the arts and entertainment.  Even some background from Eli Stone said that I could now be a consultant for TV, but a consultant for TV who has been wrongfully told they can never be on studio lots again after working for 5 years on those lots- that is messed up all around.  I refuse to work in just any area of law.  I have no interest in dealing with the politics of environmental law (seriously I don’t have that expertise- I majored in Theater not science, though I am Phi Beta Kappa and can understand a range of subjects).  I add that because I was being harassed at one point by the Sierra club who kept sending me information to attend meetings with the city council and it was causing me to have panic attacks.  I finally hit reply all and they stopped. I actually now wonder if someone from my law school or past put them up to it as a guy I dated from law school used to live out here before moving back to Texas, and frankly he was a jerk who tried to use me because he wanted my elected position (I was the ABA rep for the school).  He later got caught by his friends using someone else the same way and he stalked me one day across campus when I was on the way to church to pray, and dragged me to the student counselor, apparently he was under the impression that any woman who got upset with him after they broke up would want to hurt themselves, when frankly I was upset because he lied to me and betrayed me.  Seriously he told me some woman back in TX got up set the way I did with him, however I never said I wanted to hurt myself, but that he was a jerk and a liar.  He sat in church with me when we were dating but he actually wanted power more than he wanted a relationship with me.  Men who lie and betray are NOT WORTH MY TIME.  THERE are lots of men in the sea, and frankly I don’t want to waste time with the wrong and abusive ones.  

I think the people who took me off sets are NUTS!! I am not interested in working in a field my parents or family are working in or understand.  This Is not the 1800s, and I owe no loyalty or fidelity or my future to my blood family.  LOVE is about letting someone go.  Because my own father has told me he wants me to be institutionalized and make ME PAY FOR IT when I already have debts I know I need to pay and want to find work that I LOVE and can do and not be stressed over.  that is what I think is crazy – go make me work in a coffee shop making minimum wage when I have three degrees and there are jobs in the industry I could do, but feel I am not even allowed to strive fore because I am female- that is wrong.  The first editors in HOLLYWOOD were all WOMEN people.  Look It up.  And stop being so narrow minded that only men can be actors, producers and directors, and that we women are not capable of the work, or of the achievements. Of course what to me is worse are the women who are working who are just as determined to keep the numbers of working women down because I am some threat to their job.   A woman took down BIN LADEN= so for those of you who wanted me off sets-  I think you needed to butt out of my business, stop being upset with me for working more, especially those of you who were UNION since we probably made the same, and get your own lives.  Frankly I am more qualified to play a range of characters in the acting arena than to work in a range of legal fields. BIG DIFFERENCE THERE PEOPLE.

I don’t need friends who put me down, try to make me be like them, or who are not there for me, and I certainly don’t need to be forced to network with people who will not get me into work I will LOVE but work I will hate.  Again this is not Salem in the days before this country became free.  This is the year 2012, and well almost 2013 and 13 has always been a weird but kind of OK number for me.  I lost my virginity on a Friday the 13th.  And if you are mad at me because I currently don’t have an employer or boss, well guess what- I made my own choices and it does not mean I am not scared, stressed, in pain, or not happy.  But I am not interested in living the life you have chosen for yourself.  I am going to feel violated and in prison for the rest of my life and NOT SAFE in the US until I can walk onto a set again without being treated like I am a criminal when I am not.  I am also NOT MENTALLY ILL.  I am anti- NRA and the fact that some MEN can use lists for their own selfish political gain in this country makes me sick.   I don’t do drugs.  I do sometimes drink, but one or two hard ciders or glasses of wine and I want to fall asleep.  I have never been the type to get so drunk I was dangerous or reckless.  I have been known to dance on tables, strip naked if threatened with violence, and stand up and speak my mind.  WE WOMEN HAVE THE RIGHT TO DO THAT.  The fact that my UNION has violated my rights and maybe EVEN THE GOVERNMENT makes me sick.  I want to get a job with a theater WITH A FILM production arm or with a small studio that is making indie films and web series. I want to act in PROFESSIONAL ACTING UNION JOBS.  Seriously there are MEN in this town who are working who have never even trained to act.   I wanted to work in production and ACT and I am sick of how NEGATIVE our SOCIETY is and how restrictive it is on MY SEX.  IF YOU THOUGHT I WANTED TO DO SOMETHING ELSE_ well either my plans changed, circumstances changed, or you got the wrong INFO- hurry up and catch up.  We all know where assuming will get you and what it makes you.  Got it!! And to all those of you who want to make a living doing what YOU LOVE- DON’T GIVE UP!!!

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