Season 8 Episode 2, Chris Theobald, Technical manager.

So having spent quite a while in the industry, have you ever come across any issues, any problems, anybody holding you back, anything like that? Because we know it can be a difficult world to be in.

Yeah, I think it's an interesting industry and a load of people that come and work in the industry or are interested in it are looking for what I would describe as an alternative path.

I think it falls out of the traditions of what people are expected to do where obviously now there's formalised education around all sorts of stagecraft.

But I think for a lot of people it was a home to them when they perhaps didn't else have a home in sort of other career paths.

Yeah.

In that respect, because I'd seen it from my parents and I'd seen it from my grandparents, I knew it was a very viable and vibrant industry.

You could have a life, you could have children, and you can have all of that.

I think the thing for me that holds people back is attitudes around certain things.

I think that thankfully the industry is changing for the better.

I think gone are the times when you walk into a fit up and you have no idea what to expect, what personalities to expect.

And I think now there's sort of more of a respect and an understanding, which is great.

But yeah, but I think that for me, that the only thing that's ever held me back is potentially a sort of a type of attitude where you don't feel like you deserve to be in the room.

And the way that I run my theatre is that every single person who's in that room deserves to be there.

yeah yeah going back to what you said here's is very much the land of misfit toys um exactly if you ever feel slightly i mean out of place isn't really a statement you could use these days because it's so it's a lot more liberal than it used to be but there's always a place to be in in the backstage of a theater yeah

and that's what makes it so special and it's why it's very accepting yeah and that's why it's so precious and should be uh treated with so much respect because i feel like if you take that for granted then it doesn't become the safe space that we are so pleased to work in yeah

absolutely uh so um what would you say the pros and cons of working in the industry uh what is a leading question

i mean the cons i think the cons are that You're not going to be able to fit into the social schedule of a lot of your friends who work in offices.

You're going to have to get used to working late nights.

And really, I actually think that's the only negative to working.

I mean, there are other sort of more nuanced ones, but I think the big ones are that the antisocial hours are things that... mortals could only dream of uh of working um but i think i think the positives are as we've already touched on i think it's an incredibly accepting space i think in terms of a place where you can develop your skills i think it is maybe the best place to be because it's so vocational And, you know, there are so many jobs that you go on to your first day and you're taken around and you don't really do any work.

It's sort of like you need to go and meet HR and you need to go and give them a passport.

And then, you know, you might have an orientation around the building.

If you turn up for the first day in the backstage of a theater, you're doing a fit up.

Or you're doing a loadout.

Or you're doing a plot.