I have the Power!

The power to retrieve large amounts of alcohol from behind locked doors and take them to where the public may consume them, the power to take your tickets and answer your questions, the power to remove trash at will and (if the manager says so) throw your ass out...in other words I am officially working for the iO theater in Chicago - booyah. I'm going to be a theater intern (cough... people's bitch...cough) And I just had the mandatory meeting for all new interns the other night - and it was a great start to the whole shebang.

I walked into the theater to find around ten other people sitting downstairs in the cabaret theatre (there ended up being 14 new interns this session – a record for the theater). The manager of the Theater – Mike, came in a little after everyone got there (to the theme from the exorcist mind you – played from the sound booth by Jason Chin a teacher/director/performer at the theater). He gave us the lowdown of the different type of positions – some interns would work the offices upstairs (back behind the Del Close theater) during the day – taking calls, dealing with paperwork, getting coffee – the usual office type intern stuff, some interns would be in charge of the box office – in the evenings – a couple hours before shows and during shows – ticket sales, merchandise, phone calls/reservations, etc – and then some would be working in the actual theaters – taking the tickets and seating customers, bar backing and occasionally helping the bar staff any way necessary (if they need help making drinks bam, stocking, bam, getting glasses, etc), set up & clean up for shows, dealing with customers the most directly often times (hecklers, overly drunk, or just questions and of course seating them), and opening and closing the theater. Of course during the entire briefing Jason Chin was in the light booth punctuating the speech with musical cues and lighting effects – much to the amusement to everyone.

(Note most new interns are theater interns – though very few are level one students/just beginning level two – it’s the earliest you can get into the program and most of them were level 3 or up – so I’m low, low man on the totem pole).
We got a tour of the whole theater – stock rooms, offices, theaters, etc – and then we finally got to see our schedules. I’m the closing shift of Friday nights and a theater intern. The good news is I get to see (no matter which theater I’m in – and often you run back and forth) one of the best shows/teams at the iO and am around to watch the open jam. Also from what I’ve heard this is the shift most likely to let you go early as rarely to people outside of performers stay too long after the final show lets out – and once it’s just performers you can relax. The bad news is it’s one of the theaters busiest nights usually (Saturday closing is the worst form what I’ve heard – as you’ll often stay an hour longer than Friday) – though at least I’ll stay busy – and the official hours are 9pm-2am (so potentially walking home very late in very cold weather – thank god I’m close), and my Friday nights are kind of shot. Still my level one teacher told me she started out in the exact same shift and loved it – so it should be interesting (it does mean I’m half the team responsible for closing the theater – trash duty woohoo, yet I also get the most potential chill time during my shift.

Anyway it goes it should be interesting – and after this session I can trade up to a different shift since I’ll no longer be a newbie.