How (not) to run a theatre company

Step 1: Pick a name. It has to be a really cool name. Something that not only explains who you are but also what you do.

Although this bit seems like the most fun it can actually be pretty tough. It’s difficult to know what your work is going to be before you make it, so picking a name before you start anything else is often a mistake. Do not follow our advice and pick a name like The Skeleton Project. Its three words and people will shorten it to one.

“How is Skeletons going?”

“What are skelproj up to?

“Did you see that awful show by The Projects?”

There is no real rush to set up a company, if you are working in collaboration with someone just work in collaboration with them, this may lead to a permanent thing or it may lead to other work. It may just be a learning experience.

A name is still a tricky one. We recently did some forms & got design students to look at our name and logo. Most of them thought we were a punk band or a medical research company. Which is fine, we wish we were both of those things at once.

Step 2: Do everything you can possibly do. Never say no. Make yourself free and available.

This is a bit of a tricky one, particularly for emerging artists. You definitely what to see what’s out there. Join some mailing lists and apply to everything you think sounds interesting and that may lead to fun, profit or knowledge. These three things are key and as long as you are getting one of them then you have a good start.  Do not make our mistake and commit to make three shows with different people, be on the board for everything you can be, go to every networking event that has ever existed and offer your work for free to anyone who will listen. While I am a firm believer that working for free often leads to other great things constantly giving your work away for free can be quite problematic when you then want to charge.

Do not do so much your nose or ears bleed. In fact that’s a good marker that you should slow down. Trust me. You can live on less than four hours of sleep a night for months. I would not recommend it.

Step 3: Make a new show every week.

Don’t. Make a good show. If that takes a day, a week, a month, seven years then that is okay. Make your best work. If you can make a new show every week that is great, do not advertise that that is what you are doing because one week you won’t have a new show. You will have a nose bleed.  

Step 4: Have a flashy website.

Have a flashy website.

Step 5: Have two twitter accounts, two facebook accounts, a linked-in, a myspace for no reason, write blogs and make sure you’re phone beeps every time you get an e-mail, you do not want to miss an opportunity.

Actually, we have gotten quite a bit of work through social networking and it does pay to reply to e-mails promptly and professionally. Do not do it all the time. (Don’t be me.) If you get an e-mail at 1am it can and will wait until the morning. Your ears will bleed.

Step 6: Apply for things with a show you have not make yet, that saves you the time making it if it doesn’t get accepted to the platform, event or festival.

No. Stop it now. It is fine and a great idea to apply to show new work, unfinished work or to apply to commission to make work. It’s also okay to enter into conversations with people about the type of work you have made and could make for the thing you are applying for. Be honest with people. It is a very bad idea to do some press shots for a load of shows you are thinking about making and then make them once a venue has booked it. Don’t panic if you don’t have suitable work for a certain call out, there will always be others.

There you have it, follow these simple 6 steps and you will have a cool sounding company, with a flashy website shooting out shows faster than anyone else, making shows for events on the bus to the event and getting accepted for festivals with shows you have not even made yet. You are the future.

It’s okay to make mistakes.

Oh, Step 7: pass on advice once you have made mistakes. That’s a useful one.

- best
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