A Day in the Life of a Circus Stage Manager | brokeGIRLrich
As if I weren’t ill adjusted to normal life enough from my days at sea, once I left ships, I joined the circus. The days honestly all started to blur into one of two types over the following weeks and months I was out with them. Except travel days. We lived on a train and train runs were glorious. The views were spectacular and there was never such a good reason to be lazy, stay in your PJs all day and watch TV. I miss them like you wouldn’t believe! So here’s a glimpse at my average day with the circus.
Start of Each Week
9:00 AM – Wake up. Depending on the number of times I hit the snooze button, I am in a varied state of put togetherness. When you’re around the exact same people 24/7, you really don’t always care what you look like.
10:00 AM – Arrive at work. Double check all the dressing rooms have the correct number of tables and chairs. Fix them if they do not. This usually set my tone for the entire day and was a good measurement of how helpful each arena would turn out to be.
11:30 AM – Make sure the weekly preshow schedule is correct. Print copies for people who need it. Make sure the animal walk volunteer schedule is set. Post both schedules on the callboard. Check emails and paperwork.
1:00 PM – Attend weekly cast and crew meeting.
2:00 PM – Get ready for rehearsal.
Hanging out with my favorite animal in the show backstage!
3:00 PM – Rehearsal – for me, this meant trying to make sure no one got run over by a horse backstage. Despite the fact that we’d been doing the exact same thing for 10 months. 10 months, people! Sometimes I’d play a little Candy Crush then too, but only during the tiger act, which wasn’t very interesting to me and always made me congested. Who else out there knows if they’re allergic to tigers?
5:30 PM – Dinner. We actually had a food truck onsite that traveled with us every week called the pie car. Here’s a brief video about how the pie car worked. The filming of this was considered a PR event, so overseeing that was part of my job too (fortunately not at dinner time on opening day ;o).
6:00 PM – Start prepping for preshow.
6:30 PM – Preshow starts – an exciting event where lots of performers who don’t speak any English and don’t particularly like children are forced to interact in close proximity with them.
7:30 PM – Show starts. This is actually the easiest part of the day.
10:00 PM – Pack up and head back to the train. If there’s nothing happening early tomorrow morning and the weather’s good – hang out, barbeque and drink a lot.
Heavy Public Relations (PR) Day
3:00 AM – Yes, that says AM. Get picked up at train to go to the arena for early morning PR.
3:30 AM – Unlock all the costume storage, turn on the music in the arena and make sure the floor is set with all the scenic pieces for all of the TV shots that are about to occur.
Early Morning PR – clowning around at 4:00 AM. Seriously, who is awake and watching the morning shows at this hour? Whoever you are, I always hated you.
4:00 AM – TV crews start to arrive. Start trying to keep performers from eating while they’re in costume, while feeling really guilty, because it is 4 frickin’ AM, am I really not going to let you drink that coffee?
9:00 AM – Wrap up filming. Get all the performers involved sent back to the train.
9:30 AM – Conference call with whatever city is 3 weeks ahead of the current one to discuss all their PR plans.
10:30 AM – Get picked up from the arena, go to the train, pick up a few performers and go to a radio or TV station for a live, on-air PR.
12:00 PM – Go to a local construction site to team up with Habitat for Humanity and help build a house. Clowns will juggle. Dancers will dance. Children of all ages will be delighted. All of the performers and I will try not to collapse from exhaustion.
2:00 PM – Return to arena for everyone to get out of their costumes.
2:15 PM – Head back to train.
2:30 PM – Collapse into unconsciousness.
You can kind of see my tiny sliver of bed through the door. That was my happy unconscious place.
5:30 PM – Drive back to the arena.
6:00 PM – Start prepping for preshow.
6:30 PM – Preshow starts.
At preshow, you can jump rope with your favorite performers! Except you don’t really know they’re your favorite yet because you haven’t seen the show.
7:30 PM – Show starts.
10:00 PM – Pack up and head back to the train. If there’s nothing happening early tomorrow morning and the weather’s good – hang out, barbeque and drink a lot.
Travel Days – Best Day of the Week
12:00 AM – 12:00 AM – You are trapped on a moving train. No one can bother you. It’s the best sleep ever.
Sigh. Train runs. I MISS YOU!!
On the plus side, I was just the PR supervisor, so heavy PR days were not the norm for me – maybe twice a month. The poor Event Coordinator had it worse because my Heavy PR day was pretty much her normal day.
Also, fun fact, the job titles in the circus are all different than in the theatrical world. So while my job duties were that of a stage manager, the person who was actually called a stage manager was the technical director – the person in charge of overseeing all technical aspects of the show. Our stage management team were called production managers. The person who performed the duties of a typical production manager was called the operations manager…. and so on and so forth to no end of confusion to someone entering the world for the first time.
Wow! That seems both stressful and exhausting. For a few days I’m alright, but after that I don’t travel well. Props to you!
-Bryan
Income Surfer recently posted…Weekly Recap- 3/9/14
I’m definitely pretty much a much at traveling. It’s more like – I’m ok without sleep for a few days, but year of it being a chronic thing makes me really not ok. So it was time to get off the road for a while.
I literally saw the title of this and thought “Yes!!! I can’t wait to hear about the circus!” It is really a fascinating lifestyle, and I imagine that it took a while to get “acclimated” to reality after it. What do you think was more comfortable, the bed on the train or the bed on the cruise ship?
Shannon @ Financially Blonde recently posted…Music Mondays – Brown Eyed Girl
Definitely the cruise ship. And I loved being rocked to sleep. My bed on the train was a mess. It was lumpy and probably 20 years old and so small that my boyfriend and I couldn’t even lay comfortably on it next to each other even though it claimed to be full-sized. Definitely not. Although I will say that the movement of the train when it was rolling was almost as awesome as the rocking of the ship to knock you out.
Ok so when I clicked onto your website the last thing I expected was to read about a day and a life at the circus. This is awesome. You are definitely living in color.
Petrish @ Debt Free Martini recently posted…5 Positive Attitudes While Paying Off Debt
Yeah, I’ve had a few unusual jobs. I’ve been pretty lucky.
Wow, thanks for the insight into what a day in your life is like – I like how you describe the actual show as the easiest part of the day!
Brock @cleverdude recently posted…Success is All About Choices
I’m pretty sure that’s true for most stage managers. ;o)
Mel @ brokeGIRLrich recently posted…A Day in the Life of a Circus Stage Manager
You have such. a cool job.
That’s some interesting insight into a world I don’t know much about. It’s pretty amazing how there’s other options out there aside from a typical 9 to 5 desk job. It sounds like you had quite a few adventures with this position.
Mr. Utopia @ Personal Finance Utopia recently posted…Screw LinkedIn! Why Career Networking Sites Can be Unhealthy
Yeah, it was a lucky few years doing several jobs that were way out of the norm.
I thought your post on life on a cruise ship was crazy, but this is even worse! So many late nights sounds horrible.
Understand if you son’t want to answer, but is the pay in the circus any good?
Mr Ikonz @ Project Ikonz recently posted…Save money on Microsoft Office thanks to work
No. N.O. Definitely not. Not at all. If it had actually been about 40 hours a week, it would’ve been fine, but I remember figuring out my hourly wage one week and I was making like $4.15/hr. Actually, I was working there when I started blogging, so my earliest Accountability posts outline it completely.
Ouch!! You should have been working at McDonalds!!
I’ll check out the early posts.
Mr Ikonz @ Project Ikonz recently posted…Niche website update
Wow, that is one jam-packed day! And then over and over again… that is dedication. I would love to be able to say that I ran away with the circus 🙂
Alicia recently posted…A Safety Net On Doing My First Income Tax Return.
I could definitely be a lion tamer. Or the guy that trains the monkeys. All I would have to do is learn how. I would stay away from the tight rope, especially the ones without the net.
No Nonsense Landlord recently posted…Targeting Your Market to Maximize Income (long post)
Actually, I was learning how to walk on the low wire (kind of the high wire in training) when I left. I would never want to be the lion tamer.
All you have to do is make sure the lions do not have claws, or teeth. Maybe instead of a clown suit, have a lion suit. That way, no attacks, or at least less of them.
No Nonsense Landlord recently posted…My Fourth and Fifth property (and first semi-horror story)
And I wasn’t allergic to clowns either. Sounds like a plan to me! Granted, clown attacks were pretty scary.
You sure have lived an interesting life. Ship life, then circus life? Never tried either, but they both seem to have some cool perks. Thanks for linking up with Countdown in Style.
April recently posted…Countdown in Style {15} with Co-Hosts @HBSoulStains and @greeneyecarissa
You’ve had so many jobs. Just when I thought it couldn’t get more interesting with your cruise and your theatrical position, you show us what a day in the life of a circus manager is like. 🙂 Thanks for sharing this with us at Countdown in Style! Don’t forget to stop by Friday to see if you are featured!
Brittnei recently posted…Shop Hopeful Kiss and Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics Review
That sounds so awesome! Tiring, but amazing! It’s hard to imagine having that much energy at 4 in the morning lol. Thanks for sharing a peek into what it was like. I featured this in this week’s What’d You Do This Weekend! Pinning 🙂
Ashley @ PioneerMomma.com recently posted…2014 Weekly Worksheet: Week 12 (printable)
Thanks!! And yeah, I have no idea how the performers would muster up that much energy. I’d always feel like a zombie until at least 7-8 o’clock.
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