Author Topic: WORK/LIFE BALANCE: Tech or Church?  (Read 16481 times)

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erin

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Re: Tech or Church?
« Reply #30 on: Oct 28, 2007, 09:21 pm »
Tech should not be allowed to be on Sunday mornings to begin with.

Um, not everyone worships on sunday mornings.  Plenty of people (and major religions) have other holy days or other preferred times of worship and it is our responsibility as managers and schedulers to be sensitive to every person's religious needs.

Usually, according to industry standards we take mondays off.   But when i work with an orthodox jewish director, we take saturdays off and finish early on fridays.   When i work with the artistic director of the theatre, we take off sundays not for religious reasons but so that he gets one day a week off with no work at all.

Juggling all those holy days can be a pain in the butt, but so far (*Knock on wood*) i've never had to schedule a show where there were more than two religions devoutly observed.   

I think a more open point is that any person who has strong religious beliefs should be able to practice those without having to give up theatre entirely.   Tech can go on without one designer for a couple of hours if everyone else on the show feels a need to work when that person wants to worship.    Flexibility is essential when working with other human beings who have beliefs and needs.

centaura

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Re: Tech or Church?
« Reply #31 on: Oct 30, 2007, 07:35 am »
Quote
it is our responsibility as managers and schedulers to be sensitive

I think this statement sums up the issue nicely.  It should be the goal of every manager to be able to put their personal feelings about a subject aside and work with the idiosyncrocies of the people they are managing.

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Rhynn

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Re: Tech or Church?
« Reply #32 on: Nov 11, 2007, 08:28 pm »
I have a unique position in that I teach drama at Baptist high school and am required to attend multiple services during the week.  Of course, we don't even think about rehearsing on Sundays or Wednesday nights (the mid-week) service.  For 3 of the 6 services during the week, I am the audio technician, and I occasionally fill in for the other services.

When I work in theatre outside of the high school, I have learned to schedule soundboard replacements for my duties during tech weeks.  It's part of life in the theatre--a compromise between church and theatre that I have had to come to terms with.

Many Baptists would criticize me for putting theatre before God and church.  This is a topic for another thread, but I do wonder if your SD is struggling with this issue himself.

As for just going to another church with an earlier or later service, it doesn't work that way in the Baptist religion.  Just like there are Missouri Synod Lutherans and Evangelical Lutherans, the Baptist has many branches:  American Baptist, Southern Baptist, and Independent.  Each branch has variations in doctrine, and the independents can vary from charismatic to fundamental.  In most areas you won't be able to find more than one church that preaches the same way you believe.

Since the original post is about a college production, I wonder if the SD just has not run into this issue before--having tech's rescheduled in the middle of a church service.  The experienced SM will plan for it, but other technical and artistic crew members may not think that far ahead.  I hope that he will think about this experience before taking another position.
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