I just kind of fell into theatre, and I've been in love with it ever since. I got a little hooked in high school, because it made me feel useful, but I really got dragged in in college, where I ended up working for the theatre department, and by a series of odd coincidences (mostly being at the right place at the same time as other people) I got an assistant stage management position my first semester, and it just kind of spread from there. It took a bit of an odd turn when my supervisor/technical director left, and we only had interim faculty, but I ended up taking on a lot of the responsibility, and I think that actually served me well. It just had the downside of making me a little too busy and stressed out (basically running 3 jobs in addition to schoolwork, and 2 of those jobs were full-time). But I love it to bits, and it has parts that make me work hard, and parts that help me relax, so even if I'm constantly busy, I can trade back and forth between stressful and easy, by choosing which task to work on. I've also been really lucky to mostly work with really agreeable people -- I haven't met too many hardcore divas yet, just awesome people. When you accidentally have 3-hour conversations about your job, or things to do with your job, and you only have to stop because you have to be somewhere else, it's kind of glorious. And everyone knows everyone, and we tend to have time to joke around, and there are so many different worldviews, especially with all the people who travel. I never want to stop. And fortunately, this is the kind of job that you can work on forever, in one capacity or another. There's not really any stopping because you're too old.
I wish I'd had a little more free time in college (working theatre means working evenings) but socializing with the theatre people meant going to some really great parties, and having really smart discussions, and having a family out of the faculty, instead of professors that you refer to by title. And I think if I did it over again, I wouldn't really be able to stop myself from doing it the same way.
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I've also been really lucky to mostly work with really agreeable people -- I haven't met too many hardcore divas yet, just awesome people. When you accidentally have 3-hour conversations about your job, or things to do with your job, and you only have to stop because you have to be somewhere else, it's kind of glorious. And everyone knows everyone, and we tend to have time to joke around, and there are so many different worldviews, especially with all the people who travel. I never want to stop. And fortunately, this is the kind of job that you can work on forever, in one capacity or another. There's not really any stopping because you're too old.
I wish I'd had a little more free time in college (working theatre means working evenings) but socializing with the theatre people meant going to some really great parties, and having really smart discussions, and having a family out of the faculty, instead of professors that you refer to by title. And I think if I did it over again, I wouldn't really be able to stop myself from doing it the same way.