Messages

256

Employment / Re: Touring as a Married Couple

« on: Feb 07, 2014, 12:50 pm »

All of my comments below are speaking specifically to the cruise market.

Should we just send resumes so that they get them at the same time and the company will put together that we are married?

Never AssUMe these things.  I'd outline it in your cover letter(s) and state specifically you're looking to work together.

This will be a challenge for myriad reasons. 

Let's assume that you are both qualified and are both offered a position (a huge assumption - I don't mean that in a negative way - but a necessary one for the discussion).  The likelihood of an SM and a sound tech opening at the same time on the same ship is very small, and frankly contracts are specifically scheduled to avoid this situation whenever possible - not good to have several key players of your tech team turn over on the same day.  The likelihood of you both being qualified for that same ship if openings do occur at the same time narrows the possibility further.

But, let's assume all of the above works out and you manage to get on the same ship at the same time.  Most cruise lines have different contract lengths for SMs and technicians.  If you are an SM and hubby is a tech, it will be a serious challenge to line your contracts up so you sign on/off at the same time, from both a contract perspective and from the perspective above about not having several key players of your team leave close together.  There can be some flexibility there, but be prepared to be out of sync by 4-6 weeks.  On the ship it becomes another challenge, with cabins/berthing etc. - but that is usually able to be worked around.

It creates a number of headaches challenges for the cruise line which often times can leave employees feeling neglected, insignificant, frustrated, etc... - and it's not out of malice or apathy, it's just the reality of it.  If it was my decision I'd honestly be wary of going down this road with a married couple.  If one or both of you are absolute rock stars from a talent perspective, then a cruise line is going to be more apt to make it happen - but if you're on par with other candidates who don't come with all of the above strings attached then it wouldn't make sense.

I'm not saying this to discourage you, and a married couple definitely has more clout than folks who are dating or in a relationship, just know that life at sea is definitely more suited to single and unattached people. 

All of this said?  I have seen it happen.

257

Students and Novice Stage Managers / Re: E-mail Management

« on: Feb 05, 2014, 09:28 pm »

I'd argue that any email correspondence on a show you're hired to do belongs to the theatre - though that subject is probably about as clear as mud, especially if the producer is not providing you with a computer and company email address (which they most likely not doing). 

Ultimately the SM is on the front line of middle management and yes, his/her primary responsibility is often seen as getting the show up and maintaining it, but an equally important responsibility in the eyes of those signing your check (even if unseen by others) is limiting risk exposure.  Deleting emails for the entire run of a show doesn't serve that end, unless of course everyone is hiding something - but my comments are assuming that everyone is acting in good faith.

258

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: SMing an Equity Actor for the First Time-Report Tips

« on: Feb 05, 2014, 05:51 pm »

Thanks for the formula!

I've always struggled to figure out If/Then formulas.

No worries...  If/then is pretty simple once you figure out the syntax.  =IF(Logical_Test,Value_If_True,Value_If_False). 

A simple example:  =IF(A1=1,"Yes","No").  This would display the text "Yes" if cell A1 had the value 1 and "No" for any other value.  You can get incredibly complex with these as "yes" and "no" are substituted for any formula in Excel or nested if/then statements.

The specific if/then statement below is really just cosmetic.  IF A1<>"" translated to English is "If A1 does not equal blank".. Basically, the MROUND or CEILING function will only execute if there's a value in cell A1. 

The math would still be fine if you just said =MROUND((B1-A1)*24,0.25), but every cell you had the formula in would show "0" if there's no value in column A, so it would look ugly to have a dozen random zeroes on a report.

259

Students and Novice Stage Managers / Re: E-mail Management

« on: Feb 05, 2014, 02:59 pm »

In this case, you never know when an actor/producer decides to file a lawsuit and your emails may be subpoenaed. Its an extreme example of course, but if anything comes up in conflict and you get an email about it....you should keep it.

It's not as extreme as you might think.  At a previous place of employ I was tapped by corporate legal for emails on a particular subject in effort to clear the company of any wrongdoing.

Injuries, contractual/labor disputes, harassment, discrimination, etc... - it can and does happen.

260

Introductions / Re: Greetings

« on: Feb 05, 2014, 10:49 am »

Welcome, and great first post!

261

Introductions / Re: Long time reader, first time poster

« on: Feb 05, 2014, 10:48 am »

Welcome, and kudos for doing your research prior to posting.

We look forward to your contribution.

262

Students and Novice Stage Managers / Re: E-mail Management

« on: Feb 05, 2014, 10:47 am »

There's no reason to delete substantive emails.  Storage is incredibly cheap and becoming cheaper by the day; I'm fairly certain the amount of storage I have on my personal gmail is outpacing the rate at which I'm using it.

Organize?  Yes.  Delete? No.

263

The Green Room / Re: LINK: The Aggregation of Marginal Gains

« on: Feb 04, 2014, 03:43 pm »

Oh, please please please do not get me started on the Millennial generation.  I'm embarrassed to say I'm part of it - though on the extreme upper end of the age range...  I wish I could secede!

264

The Green Room / LINK: The Aggregation of Marginal Gains

« on: Feb 03, 2014, 10:58 am »

It's amazing how quickly making improvements of 1% can add up.  Particularly interesting is the graph of change over time.

The Value of Marginal Gains

265

Employment / Re: Is it a Tour?

« on: Jan 31, 2014, 03:39 pm »

Conversely, you can just as easily say that since you've been the resident SM for 2+ years at the same company it proves that you're a competent SM and a valuable asset to the team.  I'd consider phrasing it based on the job for which you're applying. 

If you're applying for a tour you'll want to highlight that you have the experience of putting up a production in multiple venues.  The semantics of tour or not is one debate, but you can and should find a way to denote that you're able to look at a show and a new venue and spot challenges, pitfalls, required modifications, etc.

If you're applying for a resident SM job you'll want to highlight that the theatre you're at has kept you on for 2+ years and it's been a mutually beneficial relationship, etc.

It's all about how you spin it.

266

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: SMing an Equity Actor for the First Time-Report Tips

« on: Jan 31, 2014, 07:56 am »

I'm thinking of including an hour-tracking formula that will calculate hours worked.

I agree with Nomie regarding checking the archives.  Speaking specifically to the formula you mention, I use the below formula for weekly time logs. 

=IF(A1<>"",MROUND((B1-A1)*24,0.25),"")

What this does is it will round you to the nearest quarter hour, where cell A1 contains starting time and B1 contains finishing time.  This will round to the nearest quarter hour; e.g. 9:07am is rounded to 9:00 am, while 9:08 will be rounded up to 9:15.  I am not sure how you'd keep time for AEA actors, but it's likely that you'd need to always round up, e.g. if your rehearsal is 9:00-10:00, and you go over into 10:02, you'd need to round up to a 1/4 hour instead of leaving it at 10:00.  For that, you would use the CEILING function with the formula below.

=IF(A1<>"",CEILING((B1-A1)*24,0.25),"")

If I'm totally missing the mark, ignore my post -  but these are some formulas I use to convert time into 1/4 hour increments, so working for 1:15 becomes 1.25 hours.  Once the time is converted it becomes much easier to manipulate into whatever other math you need to do.

267

Tools of the Trade / Re: Android app suggestions

« on: Jan 27, 2014, 09:01 pm »

On this topic, what do you guys think are the necessities on Android? I never leave home without my Galaxy S3, I use it for just about everything from keeping in touch, to killing time, to keeping my schedule/tasks organized.... What apps should I look into?

This is much like asking "how long is a piece of string?"  Is there anything specifically you're looking to do on your phone or any specific categories of apps (e.g. Productivity, organization, entertainment) you're looking for?

268

Introductions / Re: Here to Learn!

« on: Jan 27, 2014, 10:00 am »

Click the "notify" button that's located at the top and bottom of each thread. 

269

Tools of the Trade / Re: Excel for rehearsal scheduling or other program?

« on: Jan 21, 2014, 03:27 pm »

I don't think Excel is the right program for this, though there is software that does "shift planning" that might be better suited to what you're looking to do; though for the finite duration of a single production I'm not sure if it would save you any time.

If you were to implement something like this, the software doesn't know who is in your cast and what their conflicts are.  You'd still have to manually retrieve that information (assuming everyone even knows ahead of time - never a guarantee in community theatre productions), input everyone's conflicts into the software.  You lose even more of the benefit if a person's conflicts are not consistent and you have to manually enter a new conflict every two weeks.  I don't have experience in this type of software, but my hunch is that by the time you get done entering everyone's conflicts you're already going to have a fairly good idea in your head of when you can and can't rehearse specific scenes.

Since you've taken the effort to post here I assume this is becoming problematic; IMHO you'd be better served by reviewing how you're handling/sorting conflicts now and seeing if there is a way to improve your current process rather than spending the time and money to implement a piece of software? 

Also - welcome to SMNetwork.  Why don't you head on over to the Intros board and tell us a bit about yourself!

270

The Green Room / LINK: Miami's Coconut Grove Playhouse takes a step towards revival

« on: Jan 16, 2014, 11:12 am »

Miami Herald Article

A pretty cool and somewhat historic (very historic for South FL) venue; among other things hosted the US Premier of Waiting for Godot