Should a Stage Manager Be a Production Manager?

So today is my first day at a new job! It’s pretty common knowledge among my regular readers that I was discontent at the last one. I actually had a funny conversation one of the last days at my old job with the Stage Manager for the company doing the show there.

She said she heard I was leaving and asked where I was going next. When I told her I was going back to stage management because production management wasn’t really for me, she started to laugh at me and told me she’d never even wanted to try being a Production Manager. Earlier in the week, I learned that one of our facilities managers had been a Stage Manager for years, tried production management once and hated every second of it. ….apparently I needed to learn this the hard way as well. But hearing that from both of them made me feel a world of better about how the entire last year has gone. For any Stage Managers out there considering a foray into production management, here are some things to think about:

• You had better have top notch technical skills if you want to be happy and not just endlessly stressed doing this job. I spent more time looking at light plots, ground plans and sections this year than I have since college. I also had to figure out things like how to rent ourhealthissues.com/all-products/ motors, what size they needed to be and whether or not they could power Italian equipment.

• You may or may not have to deal with unions. Union agreements are the most convoluted and confusing paperwork I’ve ever read in my life.

• Payroll is a seriously unpleasant beast to wrangle.

• You are no longer in hands on, in the thick of things, which I found to be an unpleasant change.

• Crew guys are just as insane as actors, they just don’t cry as often. You will still get yelled at - often for things that are in no way your fault. At least this is a familiar thing.

Based on conversations with other friends who are Stage Managers, if you need a change for a while, look at something like Company Management or Tour Coordinating. I’m going to keep that in mind next time I’m stupid enough to apply for a job other than stage managing. So what am I doing now? I’m the Stage Manager/Lighting Director for Dinosaur Train Live. And if you have small children, or are just alarmingly into dinosaurs, check out our touring schedule. My work schedule is a little insane, but if I can make the time, I’d love to meet some other personal finance bloggers around America as my tour comes through your area.

I am so going to kick butt in the dinosaur category of Jeopardy by the end of May.

So should a stage manager become a production manager? Definitely not all the time.