How Do You Manage?

AMERICAN THEATRE: In November 2022, Lisa Smith was weighing whether to continue stage managing or to scale up her part-time job at a gardening center into a full-time gig. She’d been stage managing in the Twin Cities for 20 years, 15 of those as a member of Actors’ Equity Association (AEA), when the forced break of the pandemic reminded her what a full night’s sleep felt like. When theatres opened again and she returned to stage management, she grew wary of some companies’ plans for reopening and their failure to create contingency plans for any personnel but performers. Understudies are great—but what happens if the stage manager gets Covid and there is no backup?