How was your day? (Random off topic chat)

Just been to my doctors for appointment but told nothing for 2 weeks. - Walked out. They have a sign up that they can take on new patients. - Why, when they can't cope with those they already have?

Not sure on your location or how many local theatres there are to you - but depending on your area of interest why not apply to work FOH or as a dresser if you’d prefer BOH? Once you start working in a venue you’ll learn a lot about how it runs and will have the chance to get involved with other departments and then use your experience to apply for other roles. If you don’t have a large professional theatre nearby (or no vacancies) then maybe try volunteering at a local amateur venue? Good luck 😊

I'm in London so plenty of theatres around but can't get a FOH job, applied for many. Badgered theatres large and small about giving me even unpaid work and nothing. I don't know what tips I'm asking for really, maybe someone knows of something or knows somebody I can contact!

Hugs and ditto to the comment above about being made redundant sucks.  Big time!  Especially in Winter when there isn't even the incentive of "oh, it's a nice day, I'll catch some rays".

I saw a post recently on Facebook from someone looking for FOH work, there were some useful comments on there (sorry, don't have access to FB at work).  I do know someone working at the Prince Edward who responded on that - drop your CV into all the theatres, wear a big smile dropping it off, etc.  I'm on a couple of Theatre-type FB pages so you might need to poke around.

Low moods in Winter are commonplace so don't get too down on yourself.  Always here to listen x

My kid worked for The Barbican for a bit, their interview was off the blooming wall ...  take an object and explain to the group (there was a group of them) another use for it.  He picked up a chair, turned it upside down and tried to sell it to them as a piece of art, or something.  Just a demonstration of being able to engage with others, maintain eye contact, keep chatting etc, I guess.  Anyhow, he got the job but didn't like it much, left not long after.   


Gawd, interviews are HARD!  I went for one some years ago where I was told that logging the previous weeks timesheets for colleagues would be my job, and they had to be done before 10am Monday morning.  Well, of course what I should have said was - "how many timesheets are there" and "I would plan to be in the office early every Monday".  Flummuxed, though, I said something like "well that sounds kind of unworkable to me" because I was at that time working with a team of 15 guys working on 8-9 projects each and they'd never have their timesheets done for me for Monday blooming morning ....  Sometimes the interviewers are looking for answers they've already got panned out in their heads.  

I have been on an interviewing team when it was startlingly clear that the (very nice and keen) interviewee just wasn’t suitable for the job. It was a bit of a phew moment that it was so clear because interviewing can be a real crapshoot - people come in and say all the right things and then turn out to be entirely useless when you hire them.

I had a phone interview today which did NOT go well. Not thrilled with myself and fingers crossed that the interviewer didn't see the same flaws I did.

A while back, I went to an interview at a university, that lasted all day and was a bit like the X Factor. All 6 interviewees were gathered together, and we all had to sit at a PC and write a report based on a government white paper. I sat there clacketing away at the keyboard, thinking what an unhinged stream of consciousness I was whacking down. Then we each had to stand in front of a room full of 30 staff and do a presentation and get grilled in a Q&A. Back in the waiting room after my session, the next guy came back in, bright red of face, sweating profusely and shaking, muttering "I hate doing stuff like that."

The lead interviewer came in and asked 3 of the group to go with him. The rest of us looked at each other and said, either they've failed or we have and they're being taken through to some special inner sanctum! As it turned out, they came back in and Apprentice-style gathered their things and said they were being sent home.

The rest of the day was a panel interview in which I went last as I has the shortest journey.

I didn't get it. I was actually quite glad as, massive salary as it had, it would've meant moving to Oxford which I suddenly realised I had no desire to do. In fact, why did I even apply for it?!

A year or so later, I happened into the other person who didn't get it and she said the successful candidate was being absolutely worked into the ground and had no life to speak of beyond the job. Phew.

@theatremonkey, I'm really sorry to hear about your serious telecoms issues this week and am glad to see things are improving. There I was, getting really fed up because my wifi kept dropping, only to find that you and probably thousands of others in the area had been affected by a major and prolonged outage. That would be bad enough at any time but when you need it to run a business and it leaves you with lots to catch up, it's even worse. I hope BT/Openreach offer some compensation idc.

Woke up this morning to a text from my sister to say that I am now officially an uncle! Everyone is well. The little lady is going to get spoilt rotten.