A ‘Creative’ Niche: Providing Tax, Financial Planning to Artists and Actors

That's why the first and most important part of Edoga's nine-step financial education and wellness program is 'mindset,' since getting an artist to buy into the idea that financial planning applies to them is a huge challenge.

"Artists have got to stop pretending that we can't deal with finances," she says. "What I want artists to recognize is that we can be better artists if we pursue our passion from a place of financial stability and strength. Because I'm now financially secure, I think I'm a better artist than I was. I audition with far less desperation than when I was thinking every moment about things like 'if I book the part, then I could maybe pay off my Visa bill,' so I really focus on the mindset and getting people to realize that [art and financial planning] are inextricably connected and I don't think we can separate our 'artist self' and our 'money self.'"

Artists have to realize that what they're doing is a business and the more organized they are about that business, the less worried they'll be and the more they'll be able to perform their best, agrees Todd Thurston, a New York-based actor and founder of a tax preparation practice that caters toward artists in the performing arts ).

Like Edoga, Thurston, too, spent many years juggling auditions and acting roles with bartending and catering to pay the bills. One day while on the subway enroute to a catering gig, Thurston spotted an ad for H&R Block.

"I'd always done my own taxes," he says, "so it wasn't too difficult for me to complete H&R Block's tax class."

Thurston spent a number of years working for that company during tax season before eventually branching out on his own, and today, he serves a mix of actors, directors, dancers and musicians.

"I like to get artists right off the bus, so to speak, people who may have had their first show and start to make money and don't know what to do," he says. "I show them how they can get their finances organized and reduce their taxes."

Besides being finance and numbers-averse, many artists don't also know that there's a host of financial planning resources available to them. Taxation is a particularly tricky area, Thurston says, but the best thing about being an actor or a performer is that "most of your job is looking for work and according to the IRS, looking for work – pictures, resume, transportation to jobs and so on – can all be folded into your job search as a way of improving your skills in your profession, and that's deductible," he says. "A lot of artists, musicians and dancers get freelance income, so it's even more important to get expenses organized and get proper tax planning advice."

But Thurston, like Edoga, believes that the most important aspect of his career as a tax planner has to do with his own lifestyle and the fact that being financially secure helps him be a better performer.

"Although I tell my agent I can't take a job between February and April because I can't be in rehearsal, I have been on tours during tax season, and with the Internet, I can do both my jobs," he says.