Talk about your basic can of worms, dilemna, nightmare, etc.
My own rule is to work as much as I need to to get the job done, well. I am opposed to billing overtime for stage management as it gives management the control over when I choose to work in order to do the job. If I want to attend a load in on my day off, I do not want a deputy to say I must be paid, etc. If I want to come in and do work on my book that I would otherwise do at home at the same time the lighting designer is working but not requiring me to be there, then I will; it is just common sense that he might answer questions of placement or timing, and I might answer his about location, position of units, drops or actors. When I am hired as a stage manager, I believe that part of my job is to schedule a successful route from table work to full production on opening night. If I see along the way that I will spend over lets say 60 hours in a week actually performing stage management duties, then I will look to see if in the weeks before or after I might be working, like 30 or 40, and if not, then I know I must address the schedule and make it work better. If I work 7 days a week, 16 hours a day, then I am hurting the production, because I cannot be functioning at my best and forseeing and prioritizing, etc. as effectively as I must to do the job. Soooooo.... another look at the schedule might just reveal more time allotted to some aspect than is needed, or there may be two scheduled events that can happen simultaneously, thus saving elapsed time, the real enemy. I remember the first time I realized how easy it was to schedule half hour when the crew was at dinner when the afternoon could end with the stage set after a work call or rehearsal. That way, the crew would come back, and we would start avoiding the dreaded last half lour of a long day when very little productive work gets done. What about if what thew director wants desperately is some "time with the actors" and you need time to tech without them... let him work in the lobby or rehearsal space, and you can get your stage work done at the same time instead of the morning, etc. I have found not giving in to the martyr complex we all condition ourselves to can resulkt in some very creative scheduling of overlapping use of time, thus, in the end, lessening my hours. I have never thought of overtime as a way to make money, only as a way to convince producers/managers not to waste time. All this changes, of course, in the world og industrials, trade shows, TV, etc where overtime is budgetted and always neede3d, and we would be fools not to get every penny... those jobs also only last days, and the ability to set our own schedule later on is not a mitigating factor to the sometimes brutal hours needed to get things on in a space that only becomes available at midnight or day of, etc....
I think the job of staqge manager is adequately compensated at most levels, factoring in at almost every level of Equity and some AGMA houses higher minimums for us for the very purpose of achieving our jobs. I do not think of attending a load in, walking blocking for lighting, taping floors, updating of book and paperwork, etc as extra work, it is the work!
Enough from dinosaur ville.
Here is a fact though:
Equity used to allow a broadway tryout to work 16 weeks with no day off then another 10 weeks with alternating days off for principals and chorus (hmmmmmmmm.... when did the stage managers get the alternate day?) However, after that 26 weeks, it was 8 hours a week, and if a show still needed to be worked on, well, then we got overtime.
When I first worked as a Bway PSM on a musical, I received $496.50 and was thrilled and felt set for life, and because the co mgr. was a friend, she made it $500.00. On many shows, I was ASM, called the show, understudied two or three roles and was responsible for all creation (editing, splicing, recording, etc.) of the show sound effects tape.
We have come a long way with Equity over the years in applying SENSIBLE work rules and wages; I would hate to see it any more continuously pushed toward "bad unionism" wherre our demands reflect those of other unions in terms of featherbedding, break rules, nickle and diming hourly rates for work that is part of the job.
