Major month-long annual rental arrives on Wednesday. This contract is necessary to keep the theatre afloat.
Major heat wave strikes on previous Thursday, lasting until Monday.
Air conditioning breaks down sometime Friday evening. Due to a statutory holiday, nobody is in the building until Tuesday.
On Tuesday, Technical Director arrives and unlocks the space to discover that the floorboards spent the entire weekend warping themselves beyond recognition. They have now attained roughly the shape and curvature of Pringles potato chips. Tons of cracks, several exposed nails, it's a dangerous and unusable mess.
The entire venue staff (including the janitor, box office staff, the publicist, etc.) puts in an all-nighter replacing and then painting all of the floorboards in the theatre to get it ready for the Wednesday rental.
Wait for it.
Wait for it.
Wait for it.
Wednesday rental cancels.
They're still going to pay us 60% of their bill (hooray for cancellation fees!) which is enough to keep the lights on, but staff morale is currently halfway between "mutinous" and "genocidal".