We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Hunter Phoenix a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hunter, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?

For a lot of actors, the dream is fame and fortune, mine started out a little differently. I came up through the theater by way of dance. I really wanted to be a ballerina, I always have, and still love the strength and grace tenacity, the ballerinas show. But when my body didn’t develop like a ballerinas, the dream had to change. I got into doing chorus line work in musical theater. From there I was pushed to study acting into start auditioning for lead roles… I did, I was terrified, and I started booking! 
Eventually, this lead to commercials and on camera work. As soon as someone pointed a camera at me, I was in love! I definitely had stars in my eyes, and the dream of fame and fortune took off!
What made this significantly more practical, was the responsibilities of adult life, and a fierce modeling and commercial agent that was all about the business of the business. I saved up and bought my first home at 24 years old and suddenly had mortgage payments to think about and my focus shifted. Fame, yes, but there was also the goal was financial stability and sustainability.

Hunter, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Long before the milestones, the credits, or the recognition, I became obsessed with a harder question: how do you build a creative life that actually supports you financially — not someday, but now? That question shaped everything.
At the same time, I took a deep dive into acting training on many levels; scene study, character work, audition techniques, on-camera techniques, commercial acting, voice and speaking training. This was back on the East Coast, and in London, where actors are expected to be “serious about their craft”. I was fortunate enough to personally study with Uta Hagen who wrote, “Respect for Acting”…. And that’s exactly what she taught me. I truly developed a love the training, the skills and a passion for the work. 

As artists we are taught to treat financial stability as something separate from creativity, I approached it differently. I saw the creative work not strictly as a creative expression, but as a highly developed skillset, and a profession that deserved structure, strategy, and commitment. I definitely didn’t want creativity to live on the sidelines of my life, but I was also committed to NOT be a starving artist

I’m most proud of the versatility I’ve developed across stage, screen, and voice work, the formal craft training and standout theatrical roles I’ve taken on, and the persistence it’s taken to build an international career over more than two decades. I’ve worked in multiple entertainment markets, moved from child performance into professional acting, and built a resume that includes screen roles, stage performances, and voice work and most recently verticals across a huge variation of projects.
My career stands out for the range of mediums I’ve mastered, from theater and film to television, commercials, and voice-over work. I’ve also trained seriously in the craft, including study with Uta Hagen, and taken on demanding stage roles such as Blanche in Streetcar Named Desire and Karen in Speed the Plow, which reflects both skill and ambition.

I can also be proud of my resilience and adaptability, having worked across Toronto, London, Istanbul, and Los Angeles while continuing to evolve as an artist. In addition to acting, I’ve built credibility as a mentor and creative professional, showing that my career is about more than credits and about lasting impact in the industry.
In the last few years, especially since the strike, there has been a real need to be extremely flexible and adaptable, and that has only strengthened how I approach my work as an actress. These have been three of the hardest years of my life and of my career. I’ve really had to re-commit to the path and dig deep to find new levels of determination and get creative about how to continually book work in fast-changing industry that looks nothing like I did when I started.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

This journey has been incredibly challenging, but also incredibly rewarding – there’s truly nothing else I would rather do. The most rewarding part for me is being able to live my life on my own terms. This is quite literally the mindset that keeps me going. I don’t need to ask anyone’s permission.
That perspective has made me especially focused on longevity. Rather than chasing validation from a single opportunity, I’ve built my career around adaptability and ownership. Acting is still the center of my world, but I understand something many creatives learn too late: the modern artist often has to become multidimensional. Today, audiences don’t just connect to performances—they connect to the person behind them. They’re looking for honesty, voice, point of view, and consistency, and I chose to embrace that instead of resist it. As a result, my career feels increasingly self-directed. The industry is still unpredictable, but I’m no longer waiting for someone else to decide whether I get to create.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

When I first started out, there were almost no resources available for actors outside of acting schools, coaches, and whatever you could find in bookstores. That was really it. Today, everything has changed. With so much information available online, the barrier to entry is dramatically lower, and aspiring actors now have access to an incredible amount of knowledge and opportunity right at their fingertips.
That’s actually one of the reasons I created MyActorGuide.com — to build the kind of resource I wish I’d had when I was starting my own journey. I wanted to create a place where actors could find real guidance, practical tools, and honest insight about navigating the industry.
At the end of the day, this industry is much more than a career to me. It’s what I love, what I’ve dedicated myself to, and what I continue to build my life around every single day. Acting isn’t just something I do — it’s who I am.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://HunterPhoenix.tv
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/hunterphoenix.tv
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/realHunterPhoenix
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hunterphoenix
• Twitter: https://x.com/Hunter_Phoenix
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@HunterPhoenix
• Other: TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@hunterphoenix.tv

Image Credits

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