How Nollywood actors can earn beyond movie fees — Etim-Effiong

Talent manager and media entrepreneur, Toyosi Etim-Effiong, has said Nollywood actors can earn additional income through film profit-sharing deals negotiated by their managers.

Etim-Effiong said such arrangements could allow actors to receive additional payments when films perform well commercially, beyond the fees they initially receive for their roles.

She spoke in an interview with PUNCH Online after a session on the Creative Economy Stage at Moonshot 2026 by TechCabal in Lagos on Thursday.

The session was titled ‘Africa’s creative economy: The numbers and the next bet’.

The founder and Chief Executive Officer of That Good Media said some people in the film industry were already negotiating such deals, but the practice was not yet widespread.

“It is a proper and a solid manager that will negotiate back-end deals for films, such that, okay, if a film makes over a billion naira in the market, I get X amount extra on top of what I’ve been paid.

“We don’t quite have all those things. We don’t have those things rampant now. A few people are doing it, but it’s something that we now want to make regular and commonplace for the film industry,” she said.

She compared the situation with the Nigerian music industry, where royalty arrangements have created opportunities for musicians to earn money from their work under agreed terms.

According to her, the music industry did not always have the structures that enable artists to earn royalties, but some people took steps to develop more standardised systems.

“The music industry wasn’t always like this. It was people who took it upon themselves to make a proper global standardised industry from this music industry that now got singers to start getting royalties,” she said.

Etim-Effiong said the film industry was still developing greater awareness of the opportunities available to actors to earn beyond their initial fees.

She argued that professional talent management was necessary to help creatives negotiate better deals and build sustainable careers.

“We have so many talents, we’ve paid so much attention in training the actors and the singers and the videographers and cinematographers, but nobody is training the professionals who will convert what they are doing to actual money,” she said.

She said talent managers had the skills to develop creatives’ careers, negotiate opportunities and help them turn their work into sustainable businesses.

Etim-Effiong, who is also the founder and director of TGM Academy, an institution that trains talent managers, said the industry needed more professionals to represent actors, musicians and other creatives.

“We want actors, singers, creators, creatives all across Nigeria to have people who represent them and people who are able to create sustainable careers from their creativity,” she said.

She added that one manager could represent both an actor and a musician, but advised managers to handle no more than three talents at a time, depending on their workload and the demands of each career.

“When you take up a talent as a manager, it’s like you are working with a start-up. It’s like a business,” she said.

Moonshot 2026, organised by TechCabal, brought together stakeholders across Africa’s technology and creative industries to discuss innovation, investment and business opportunities.

Samuel Omotere is an experienced journalist covering human interest stories, pop culture, and digital trends. He combines his background as a language graduate with a focus on sustainable digital storytelling.

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