By Samuel Levine, founder of Levine Partners / Levine IP
We are all creative. We all strive to be creative in our own way. And there are some of us who use our creativity to support ourselves and our families.
When you look at the numbers of people entering creative industries, endeavoring to survive, much less thrive, it is easy to see why “starving artist” is a cliche. Anyone can be an artist, make what they want without regard for industry dynamics or audiences that control the cash flow.
However, those who want to earn a living from their craft must endeavor to transcend simply being an artist. They must also be a creative professional.
To be clear, I am a creative professional, I am not an artist, meaning I want to get paid and build a successful career being creative. This is a critical distinction that is not emphasized by many educators, panelists and creative support systems.
Being a good creative is simply the entry point to your career. You get to participate in the industry on the level of the creative you can create, identify, acquire, etc., which makes the industry accessible to literally anyone.
Welcome to the party.
Once inside, the challenge is to discover how to get the creative made and ultimately get yourself and everyone else paid.
I started off as a writer, then an actor, but always producing. The goal for me has always been to make intellectual property (aka IP, a fancy name for ideas) and produce positive financial results wherever I can: film, television, digital, creator/influencer, branded content, gaming and technology, too.
Even when I am financing a deal, there are creative considerations necessary to close contracts and wire money so we can all go “be creative.” I have never been beholden to or constricted by where or how the IP gets expressed, only that it gets expressed and hopefully delivers a financial return so we all get to keep doing it again and again.
Remember, all good IP deserves to be expressed somewhere, but great IP deserves to be expressed everywhere. It’s up to you as the steward and strategist to determine where it starts.
Most young professionals fail because they are committed to serving their ego and not their idea. Do not blind yourself to the opportunities at hand because they do not look the way you thought they would. Do you think Mr. Beast really cares about getting a deal with Disney any more than Christopher Nolan is hellbent on writing the next great American novel?
You have to serve the IP and your opportunity, so instead of focusing on where it is not working, focus on where it does work.
When you pick a lane, learn the economics of how that world works. Although there are a lot of similarities between industries and content verticals, they are all unique beasts with different essential elements and masters that must be served or satiated. The quicker you understand how the models work, the clearer your creative and strategic decisions are, the sooner you’ll enjoy opportunities to succeed.
Said plainly, in most cases, your creative has to align with the industry standards until you have earned the essential elements that allow you to play a bigger game than the industry itself.
I got into this industry because I love films, but my first success was in broadcasting. Then, experimental theater, commercials, concerts, fashion events, branded content, creator/digital content, gaming, animation, podcasts and web3. Over time, I learned how to figure out that it’s more important to bring something into reality than grind without a result.
By focusing on actually making, actually creating, the wins got easier and more predictable. Although I strived to work in film throughout my saga, that vertical took the longest to figure out and activate a semi-repeatable model that actually gets movies made profitably.
Be attached to producing the result, not how the result is produced, and you will be successful. Success creates more success, so lean into wherever and however you and your ideas can be realized.
Plenty of IP has been pitched to me over the years, usually for film or TV, that found faster realization and success in podcasts (“Scumbags of History”), digital series (“Petrolicious”) or web3 (“Vivid Limited”). There is nothing wrong with failing at film or TV, but crushing it in digital.
Do not get stuck with a failed manuscript if you can launch an amazing podcast; just ride the horse in the direction it’s going!
It’s too easy to fail, being locked into your mind’s eye of the desired result. Your IP does not care; it just needs an audience.
Yes, external elements can impact your decisions, and they are not irrelevant, but this is not a linear business; it is a lifestyle, so understand that you are entering a never-ending game and be prepared to commit everything to be successful, regardless of how long it takes.
I’ve been at this for almost 30 years, had some wins, twice as many failures, yet I’m just getting started. My career is constantly a work in progress, and I am relentlessly learning, consuming, trying and adapting so that I am empowered creatively and successful financially.
There are always industry challenges, be it a strike or a pandemic, but there are always new stories to tell, new places to tell them, and more people to share them with. You have to be committed to the long game and committed to the journey of creativity that pays for your family’s life, not art for art’s sake.
My challenge to us all is to be committed to seeing ideas come to life by any means necessary, and wherever they can, as soon as they can. Find an audience, deliver value, and then double down. String together enough wins and you will manifest whatever goals you set for yourself, and my guess is that they will surprise you in the most fantastic ways.
About Samuel Levine: Entrepreneurial and out of the box by nature, Sam pushes technological capabilities while balancing innovative marketing and media strategies with unique creative content.
This article appeared in the 2025 edition of the Creative Economy Journal. See more from the Journal here.
