Summer Employment while in College

mom4bwayboy
Mon, 09 May 2016 23:25:38 +0000

S (rising college junior) will be living at home this summer, working as a server in a chain restaurant. Apparently, his mentors have similar suggestions to @jeffandann D’s and recommend getting some “life experience” outside of the theater world. After one week on the job, he’s already wondering, “how do single parents make it doing this as their main way to make a living?” His feet and back are sore. He’s beginning to understand what it means to “get stiffed” and he’s having “Spooky Server H*ll Dreams”. Fortunately, he only needs to “make it” for 3 1/2 months and plans to sock away money for the NYC - and collect “fodder” for the NEXT musical he plans to write. The upside to not having a theater job this summer is that he has plenty of creative energy for the current musical he’s writing.

After freshman year he was lucky enough to secure an ensemble job in a well-regarded summer theater program for 10 weeks in a very affordable location (mounting 4 shows over two weekends each). After expenses - food and transportation heavily subsidized by M & D - he come home with $1000 (40 % of what he earned). His big learning that summer was, “how do people survive doing this in NYC?” and “how do you keep performing and deal with exhaustion/burn out?” A few of the leads were Equity, but most of the actors/ensemble were from the local community or college students - no EMC points.