The Back Stage Guide to Stage Management: Traditional and New Methods for Running a Show from First Rehearsal to Last Performance, 2nd Edition

This widely used manual for stage managers has been revised to include new methods that employ computers and spread-sheet software, automation in the theater, and contemporary event managing. Whether you work in the amateur, educational, or professional theater, you'll find all the nuts and bolts of the craft clearly laid out in this engaging, friendly book.

Author Thomas Kelly combines how-to information with personal experiences of his own and of other top-level stage managers to explain the entire theatrical process, including:

• Preproduction planning

• Organizing of all rehearsals and performances

• Maintaining of the technical aspects of the show

• Supervision of the technical aspects of the show

• Dealing with performers and crew members on all levels


And there's good advice on finding employment, too. The text, supported by many sample documents, diagrams, and charts, straddles traditional approaches and the use of computers. It shows how the communication skills of the stage manager can be applied with success to event managing—a field that offers increasing opportunities for work—and it explores the benefits and disadvantages of the latest stage machinery.

Thomas Kelly has been a professional stage manager for more than thirty years, calling shows on Broadway and at Lincoln Center, at the Lyric Opera in Chicago and at the Houston Grand Opera, at the New York City and Milwaukee ballets, and at major media and cultural events around the country. He is the General/Production Manager for Center Line Studios, a production services company, and teaches stage management at Rutgers University. He lives in Croton-on-Hudson, New York.