Theatre Tips and Tricks: Sleep.
The header is a bit misleading.
So you want to be in live theatre/concert tours/film and tv?
Take your circadian rhythm.
Gather it up in your arms.
Give it one last, tender hug.
Tell it what a good sub-conscious control system it's been.
Or if you're Canadian and don't have a gun, use a rock, I don't know.
Put it out of its misery.
You'll be doing it a favour, I promise.
Because if you don't do this,
It is going to die a long, suffering, trembling death.
And it's going to take you with it.
Okay, joking aside, our 'time off' varies from month to month, week to week, even day to day. It's difficult to work in 'normal life' things such as shopping, banking, raising children, and sleeping. Fortunately, with 24 hour stores, online banking, and internet shopping, some things are easier than others.
Sleep is not one of those things.
One day you might be an afternoon matinee, the next day a morning work call, the afternoon off, and an evening show. Right into another morning call followed immediately by a matinee. Then you're off until the next evening. Then an afternoon and an evening. Finally an afternoon. And then your day off.
That's your week. But the next week is totally different. And the next.
Okay so that's an example of Repertory theatre like the Shaw Festival or Stratford (Ontario).
Back at Aquarius, 'stock' theatre, one show at a time, it wasn't uncommon to have twelve to sixteen hour days during tech weeks, setting up the lights and set, programming, actors onstage. And then it opens and you're just in for evenings and two matinees a week, for three weeks, and then do it all over again.
Or you're on a film shoot, and one day you start at 6am, go for twelve hours, then break. But because of turn-around stipulations, you can't start the next day until 8am. And the next day until 10am. So you begin the week up early and out in time for supper, but you end the week starting in the late afternoon and there until the sun rises.
Or you're a road crew touring the globe. You pull in at 7am, direct the local crew on how to put everything together, make sure everything works, trouble shoot, maybe rehearse a song or two. Catch a nap if you can, then it's concert time, immediately followed by directing the local crew how to take everything apart, shove it back in the truck, grab a shower, and it's 2am, back on the bus and off to the next town to start again in four or five hours.
That's not counting things like commuting to and from your job. Or the getting up and getting dressed, or the unwinding after you get home. Just because you have eight hours between calls doesn't mean you get eight hours sleep.
Sure, there are 'laws' against pushing people like that, or bonus time pay penalties to employers who make their workers keep such hours. But this industry also pushes people hard, and burns them out quickly. There's tons of unscrupulous bosses all too ready to take advantage of an earnest technician. Having the weight of a Union backing you up at times like that can certainly help to keep things legal, but not every venue has one. So then there's the boss saying something like "oh but this has to be done by tomorrow, I thought you cared about the arts..." These people don't care about the arts, and they certainly don't care about you. Look after yourselves.
Driving fatigued kills tons of technicians yearly. It's not "on site" so it doesn't count as a workplace concern. But it should.
The machismo attitude of "yah well, I did all that on only two hours sleep and twenty bottles of jolt!" feeds into this terrible cycle, encouraging people to push themselves harder and longer to get the show up.
And that's why this whole thing is absolutely terrible on our bodies.
Even if you're happy where you work, and love putting in that over time, our bodies need to rest, and our brains need to shut down. It will be incredibly hard to keep any sort of normal sleep cycle with standard working conditions.
As long as you're aware this is going to be part of your life in this industry.
And that there will be health repercussions down the line.
I keep odd hours. I'm usually up noon to 2am. Thick curtains can help keep the room dark to simulate night for dozing during the daytime.
I catch naps whenever I can. Back to back shows? An hour meal break in between. I'll curl up on a couch and close my eyes for fifty minutes. Sometimes I manage to doze off. Generally it's just nice to zone out and unwind. 'But that's your MEAL break!' Trick is... There's usually time preshow, or even during, where I'm sitting around bored. I can eat then. Eating on the clock is okay, sleeping generally isn't. Weird.
I try not to ride fatigued, but it's unavoidable. Leave yourself plenty of time, and plenty of space between other vehicles. Your reaction time is horrible when you're drowsy, so having that extra buffer helps.
Other common sense things include "eat healthy, avoid drugs and alcohol, exercise" and so on, but let's be honest, what we 'should' do and what we 'do' do often don't mesh.
Caffeine and stimulants might keep you awake, but at what cost 'later'. Tired bodies have weaker immune systems, but we don't have time to be sick. Take some pills and push on. -Also unhealthy.
At the end of it all, I have no "life hack" for sleeping and working in the entertainment industry. I don't know that there is one.
I love my job, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. And part of my job is being up at all hours, which means squeezing sleep in as best I can during the off hours. I'm okay with it, but I also don't have a social life.
Someone with a family, or friends, of whom keep 'normal' person timetables, trying to squeeze them in around rehearsals and runs, more power to them. And often times it just doesn't work. Which isn't me saying "you can't have friends or kids". It just takes more... effort? Or there are times you just have to miss important moments because time tables don't mesh?
It can be a tough career, and a tough way to live, but it's also the best jobs in the world.
Just make sure you're going into it eyes open.
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