Artists put their talents to work in myriad ways to pay their rent and put food on the table without resorting to day jobs.

As an actor, Charlotte Anne Dore has appeared on theater stages, at corporate events, at murder-mystery dinners. She records audiobooks and hosts storytelling events and leads ghost tours of Boston. She also gets in front of the cameras as an extra and a stand-in for movies and television. She plucked chickens in a Pilgrim costume for a public TV documentary. She operated the feet of an animatronic gorilla for a scene in the Kevin James movie “Zookeeper.”