Interview with Nikki Vigneault

Interview with Hope McIntyre and Nikki Vigneault

Hope Perfect. Yeah. So thank you again for doing this and I am excited to hear about how long have you worked in your current role?

Nikki So I’ve been working with Theatre New Brunswick as the production manager and technical director since September of 2019. So I went in, this is the first time I’ve ever done a job like this, and get halfway through the season and then COVID happens. And yeah, so we did two years in COVID where I wasn’t really doing my job. And this is my first like full season, knock on wood, that I’ll get to do every show and everything that we’re supposed to be doing.

Hope Absolutely. Wow, what an odd time to kind of start into a new role.

Nikki  Yeah. Yeah, it was. It was definitely hard to go back after the first year and be like, well, I’m doing it, but I’m not really doing it and like, what’s my purpose? And should I be doing something else? Like, it was a lot.

Hope  Yeah, well, I think a lot of people were asking those questions for sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And what was your trajectory to there? So pre-COVID, what was your training path? How did you end up in the position?

Nikki  So I went to York University and initially I went for acting as a lot of people do. But your first year you have a general year where you have to act, you have to do production, you have to do devised work, and at the end of that year, you do interviews and auditions to hopefully get accepted to one of those streams. And I kind of decided midway through the year that I’m not guaranteed any jobs if I act here and I can get more jobs if I do practical skills like work in production. So, I decided to go that route. And I’m so happy I did. I did four years at York and then I just started hounding people for jobs. I was volunteering everywhere I could, just to get my name in. And so people knew my face and I eventually landed a stage management job at Theatre New Brunswick, and through kind of extenuating circumstances, ended up kind of ATDing a few of the tours with the current or the previous TD, I guess. And yeah, and when the position came up, he messaged me. He goes, I think that you’d be really good at this. And so, I just threw in my name.

Hope  That’s amazing. How long had you been out of York before you got this role?

Nikki  I graduated from York in 2017, so I really only had a year of, like… and during that time I was acting with a theatre company here and doing like smaller contract work, and it kind of just worked out.

Hope  That’s amazing. And are you from that region originally? So, you went to York (University) for studies, but then you went back to your own home region?

Nikki  Yeah. Yeah. And I thought that was like, I was going to have to live in Toronto forever. There was no way I was going to get a job in theatre in Fredericton, but it was really hard to get a job in Toronto. And there, the market is so saturated with people and there’s kind of like right place, right time. I was what they were looking for and my interests matched up pretty exact to get in with my first job at Theatre New Brunswick. And yeah, just kind of went from there.

Hope  It’s great. I know you mentioned right place, right time and just the alignment, is there anything else that you would attribute to your success and being able to get work, steady work in this industry?

Nikki  Yeah, I think for myself and honestly, for anybody that’s young coming in and that doesn’t have experience, you really have to be just willing to do whatever they’re going to give you. And that’s, that’s anywhere. There are still aspects of my job that I do and I’m like, I don’t love this, but there’s a lot of other things about my job that I do love. That’s going to be with you through your whole life. So, just learning that earlier is better. If they’re going to hire you to, like, mop the floor or light walk for hours and it’s going to suck, but maybe next time they’ll call you to do something a little bit better. And that’s just how the cookie crumbles.

Hope  Yeah. No, that’s amazing. I think sometimes students feel like they’re going to leave and get the prime job right away. So yeah.

Nikki  I mean, for a lot of my friends working in Toronto, they’re still doing like gig work all the time. They’re working the general tech stuff, which is great. But there’s no stability in that and it takes a very strong, like special person to work in that kind of job market for a long time and still feel good about doing that.

Hope  Absolutely. And it sounds like from the beginning you were very much thinking about – where am I going to be able to get work. Right? And choosing to go to the production stream. Yeah, that’s a big thing.

Nikki  I love my job, but I also love having a life. And if you are working freelance, you kind of get into this position where, yes, you do have the ability to say, I want to work now, or no, I don’t want to work. Which sounds great in theory, but everybody I know who works freelance is working all of the time, multiple jobs all the time, because you don’t know when it’s going to stop, when theatres are going to be like, we don’t have the budget for that, so we’re not going to hire somebody for this. So, there’s something very nice about being like, I’m an employee and I get a paycheck and I don’t have to worry that next month I don’t know where I’m going.

Hope  Yeah, absolutely. And is there anything, like thinking back, you wish you had known when you first graduated that you’ve learned in the last few years?

Nikki  I think when I graduated and even all the way into coming into this position and working with different theatres, I feel like this might be like kind of common knowledge, but when you’re a young person working with people who are a lot more experienced than you and they’re looking at you for answers, it’s okay to just say, I don’t know, I’ll come back to you later and let you know what the answer to that question is. I find being the production manager and the technical director, I run all of the scheduling for the company, for the shows, and I also am a whole tech department by myself. So, people are coming to me all the time. Is this enough time for this? Can I have more time? What are we doing in this situation? What are our options? And there are times when I just have to say it’s okay that I don’t know or that I can’t process this information right now. And I can say I’ll email you later. But it took a few years to get to that point where I wasn’t constantly questioning myself and how like, how do I know that that’s right. And I think it just all comes down to like experience and obviously the people you work with play a big part in that.

Hope  Absolutely. I don’t know if you work with a lot of new folks coming out, but I’m interested in talking about any gaps that you’ve noticed in the knowledge of emerging theatre technicians or artists.

Nikki  I don’t get a chance to work with a lot of people out of school. We are a small company, so we do a lot of like traditional kind of theatre practices and are really just starting to get into things like projection. We don’t do a lot of like super high-tech stuff here in terms of what we have in our facilities. And also, we travel to rural locations in New Brunswick. So, in terms of what we can bring to those locations, we don’t have a lot in terms of tech. But I do find even for myself coming out of university, and even now, the universities don’t seem to have like the budget or they’re not like kind of coming up to speed fast enough on all of the emerging technology that’s coming out for theatre. When I was in theatre, we weren’t learning about green screen work on stage or like superimposing people on the stage that are in a different room. And those are things that are rapidly becoming present now that we’ve had the pandemic and we’ve had to do theatre in such a creative way. So, I think that just those things in larger theatres will be more helpful for emerging artists.

Hope  Absolutely. And it is especially, as you mentioned, the pandemic. We all had to learn how to live stream and we’ve all had to learn how to do a lot of different things. Is there anything else that you feel universities could better prepare theatre workers for as part of their training?

Nikki  I think that, like on a personal level, we, at least everybody that I went to school with, we kind of left with this mentality of like, the more work you’re doing, the better, and the more tired you are, the better you’re doing your job and things like that. And I’m only 27 and I’m at the point where I feel like I’m going to be burnt out by the time I’m 35 if I work like that. And, I think that it would be really great for theatres, universities, like any kind of like teaching establishment to really work into the students that it’s okay to just take a break. And on one hand, I feel like a hypocrite because I’ll say take all of the opportunities you can get when you’re young because you want like… networking is so important and you want people to know who you are, but not at the detriment of your personal well-being. So, I think that’s the main thing is just what is a good balance for people.

Hope  Yeah. That word balance has been coming up a lot, which is great. Yeah. I think it’s a real change from even like, you know, a few years ago.

Nikki I think that the pandemic really taught people that when you’re sick, you should stop. And even if you’re sick with something that’s not COVID, maybe you shouldn’t be coming into work and infecting other people with that. And you should take a couple days to recharge and get your body back up to where it should be. I think it hasn’t changed enough. And even though there was talk during the pandemic of we’ll make tech periods longer so that we don’t have to pull these crazy like 12-hour days, 16-hour days to get things done. But, there’s not enough money in theatre to make that a reality yet, if ever. And so, we’re right back to where we were before, cramming everything into as few days as possible with everybody leaving, feeling like they need to sleep for five days to recover.

Hope  Yeah. Just going back to the notion of how to get work in your area. Right? So whether as a stage manager, production manager, tech director… those coming out wanting to work in the field – Any advice on the process of getting employment.

Nikki  I, I feel I’m not the best person to answer that because I did go into a position that I could call my career at a very young age for somebody in theatre. I started when I was 23. I wasn’t even old enough to rent the tour vehicles on my own. I had to ask our general manager to go with me to like rent, like the U-Haul and stuff that we were going to be taking. But, a lot of my success was just volunteering. And you really just have to become that like pest that keeps showing up at the theatre and going I’m here, what do you need from me? And sending in an email isn’t enough. Sending an email with your resume, I get them all the time. I click on them, I open them and then they like, get dusty down at the bottom of the inbox. Nobody is reading those, unless it’s their job to read those. I want somebody who’s going to come in and say, hey, I’m really interested in this. I’m going to school for this. Where we are in terms of like geographical location, there are not a lot of people who are trained to do theatre technical work. So, when a student comes in and they say, I’m really interested in this, I grab them and I’m like, great, I will teach you how to do the stuff. I think it’s very important to have people that will hopefully stay in places like New Brunswick to continue doing that, but also, there’s… you just have to be nice to work with. And you have to have really good listening skills, because nobody wants to repeat themselves three times and you have to just ask questions. Everything else is learned. But if you come in with those three things, you can do almost any job in theatre. And like in the tech and production side, you can work your way up from those three skills.

Hope  Excellent. And so, based on that, when we talk about a portfolio or what they need to have to show on their resumes… I’m hearing you say it’s more about the coming in and doing. But any other thoughts on how they kind of show off what they have done?

Nikki  Right. Well, I mean, the more shows you’ve done, obviously, if your résumé looks a little thicker, I mean, it shows that you’re getting jobs consistently. I think that that’s obviously good to see. References are, I think, the most important thing. A lot of theatre, as with other career paths, is all about like nepotism unfortunately and who you know and what they think about you. So, yeah, like milk those things. You worked with the artistic director, I don’t know, at a big company in your area or you worked for a theatre company, who works closely with the company you want to be a part of. Call them. Say, I had a really great time working with you, and I have an opportunity. Please, would you give me a reference? I think it’s really as easy as that. And I don’t know, I’m not above asking for those things. I don’t think anybody should be. But, I think that that’s honestly like, you can work a lot, but if your references say they were really hard to work with or they had a really bad attitude, a lot of the time, unless someone’s really desperate, they’re not going to bite on that.  

Hope  Absolutely. And then in terms of when you’re hiring. If you’re bringing in someone, I know you’ve mentioned already, those three main things that you feel are crucial. Anything else that you look for in someone that you might be bringing on board?

Nikki  Well, I think the ability to work by yourself is really important. So, it’s great, I have had people who do have experience and that’s always so nice because I’m managing a team. But when it comes to show time, if I have to be in the theatre doing like practical work, like putting lights up or something, if I can have somebody that I can just put in there and say, just like, come get me if you have a question. That is game changing in a small company where all of our departments are one person. So, when I can have somebody come in and they can work on their own and they have a basic understanding of what the paperwork means and everything like that, it’s so simple. It’s like so beginner. You learn those things in your first year of working or doing production classes. That’s it. That, it can be as simple as that. It’s not groundbreaking stuff.

Hope  Excellent. Yeah. Yeah. And are there any resources that you would recommend to students or emerging theatre workers as they’re coming out?

Nikki  I find, like, the Work in Culture Job Board is a really great place. I still look at that all the time and see what’s going on around Canada. You can, if you’re in Toronto, I feel like it’s probably the best. It’s like the best location to use it. But if you’re really open to moving around the country, using that is a really great resource. Also signing up on like, if you stage manage, signing up on the Equity boards for apprentice positions or if you’re already in the union, you would already know to look at that. I used to have a list of theatres that I wanted to work with, and I would just check their websites all the time. Which is like, I don’t know, maybe those are like archaic ways of doing things. You just have to sleuth around.

Hope  Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Any other advice that you’d have for those leaving training and starting out?

Nikki  Just know that you don’t have to know everything. I think though, learning on your own is huge. Don’t wait for people to tell you things, be looking for answers and looking for solutions on your own, all the time. I left university with a focus in lighting design, but I didn’t have a lot of practical knowledge of lighting. It was mostly the design aspect. And so, when I left, I spent a lot of time reading about like why things work the way they do in lighting and the practical, like hanging, channels, dimmers, how to work different lighting boards. I did that on my own time so that when I got into a position and they said, do you know how to work this kind of ETC board, I could say, yes, I do. Or I know enough that I can enhance my skill, but I’m not starting from zero.

Hope  Yeah. That’s great. And as you look towards the future, is there anything that you feel students should be aware of in terms of trends or things that are happening in the industry or things you hope are going to happen in the industry? Like what do you see as we move forward?

Nikki  When I read this question, I was like, I don’t really know. I think that COVID proved that we can’t really tell what’s going to happen because we all thought these big changes were coming down the pipeline and then they didn’t. So I think like, be prepared for it to be this way for a long time. I think theatre is not a very accessible career path, which is really unfortunate. But I think that maybe accessibility is coming around. There’ll be more work for people who… and then more theatre for people who aren’t just like regular able bodied, everything in the norm kind of people. Hopefully that is happening – everywhere. But, in terms of like how theatre is set up currently, I don’t see there being a change any time soon.

Hope  Yeah. Again, the talk versus putting it into action. Yeah. Yeah. And I know, like you said, that you weren’t doing the freelance thing for very long before you attained your job. But, in terms of that self-employed mentality and I know you mentioned some of your friends are still working that gig economy, what are some of those challenges of having to manage your own career and yourself as a business?

Nikki  I think that almost everything in it is a challenge. I didn’t do a lot of work like that, but things like, making sure you keep money back for your taxes – that’s a very practical thing that like nobody really talks to you about. You’re getting paid exactly what they’re telling you. They’re not taking anything off. So, making sure that you’re keeping track of your schedule well enough that you know what’s happening when all the time. I think when you work gig work in terms of like doing lighting hangs and stuff, it’s a little bit easier because you’re going in for a few days. But when you work as a designer, you can be working on four shows kind of simultaneously for different times. You need to make sure you have very good organizational skills or you put a lot of alarms on your phone. Like, that’s just the practicality of what that’s like, but also the mental load of that and having to switch back and forth between different jobs also like different moods. It’s hard to work on a show that’s really happy and then be like, well, I have prelims due for this other show that’s really depressing and then switch into that mindset. There’s a lot of back and forth in every aspect of your life when you do work like that.

Hope  Absolutely. And in your experience or from what you know from others, any advice on when you should just say no to a gig? Are there flags or are there things to be cautious of?

Nikki  I think you definitely learn the right questions to ask when you get a contract for a job that is a certain amount of money. You have to know how much work you’re doing for that amount of money. So how much, it sounds bad, like if you’re only getting paid $1,000, you can’t put all of your cares into this job. It is not worth being upset or stressed all the time over. You are getting paid for your talent. And when you are getting paid little, then you need to adjust accordingly. I think that that’s something that you just learn with time, what’s worth it and what’s not worth it to do. Sometimes you can be getting paid not very much, but the company you’re working for is doing something really good. There are so many factors. Like, are you doing this for charity or are you doing this for friends? Are you doing this so that you can move up to another company? But in the end, it has to be about like, how you feel – because you can’t get more work done if you feel crappy.

Hope  Absolutely. And I don’t know if there’s anything that you feel you can contribute around the question of self-producing. Right? Because I know a lot of emerging artists and even stage managers will join collectives to of self-produce just to get experience and visibility.

Nikki  Right. I, not with this company, but I executive directed a company a few years ago where we produced a very large scale musical and a local playwright’s show. And – it was tough. It is a lot to go through. These are all of the things that I need to worry about, and these are all the subcategories of all the things that I need to worry about. I didn’t quite realize, like the chunk I was biting off with that. And I think, though, on one hand, it’s kind of annoying to see people make these companies for like one season and then never do anything again. It is valuable if you’re going to continue to work in theatre, because then you understand all of the facets of what’s going on. It’s not just about – I found a nice place to do a show. It’s what can we do there? Can we have liquor? How many people can it seat? What are the fire codes? Where is everybody going to get dressed? There are so many things that you need to think about. And when you work in, just in one aspect of theatre, you never get that scope.

Hope Yeah. No, that’s incredible. And then on the other side, in terms of the being employed by a theatre, what are some of the things you think a theatre student should know about how theatres operate? Because I think, as you were just saying about not understanding all facets, often students trained in one area, don’t know how a company operates.

Nikki  I think the main thing to think about is all of them operate differently. So, just because you did something one way doesn’t mean it’s the only way and it doesn’t mean it’s the best way. And sometimes you have to do things in ways that you think are not the best way and you just have to get over it and do it anyway. I think in terms of this is how theatres are, you have to come in prepared to problem solve. All theatres have problems, and you have to be ready to be a part of that process. You can’t let other people do it for you. You always have to be actively present with what’s going on.

Hope  Yeah, that’s incredible and kind of segues to the challenges of keeping a theatre company running. So now that you’re kind of working in a management position, I’m sure you’re well aware of what those challenges are.

Nikki  Yeah, I find, like I said before, we’re, all of our departments are one person. So, when I think about like leading our team, for me, that just means helping them, like physically helping them with things. I wouldn’t be good at managing a team if I left at four and everybody else stayed until ten, painting a set or sewing or whatever. And I was just like, that’s not my job. Bye. Like, I’m in there with them because then we can all leave at eight instead of them staying all night or whatever. But, and I feel like I’ve kind of said this, but you just have to be confident about your decisions and stand up for yourself. When, like I said, I was very young when I started, and I mean, I’m still pretty young to be in a position like this. And it’s really hard to go into a leadership role like this and say, this is what we’re doing. And when people question, you stand firm on that and not waver. And when you’re in a position like this, even if sometimes you get it wrong, I find that people respect you more if you can just stand by what your decision is and they’ll learn to trust you. And then that creates a really solid team to move forward with.

Hope  Absolutely. And I know you’ve mentioned funding a few times, in terms of the money limitation, would you say that’s one of the challenges of keeping a theatre company running?

Nikki  Oh, yeah. We’re, we’re a not-for-profit theatre company. And it’s always, it’s grants all the time. I don’t personally have a role in grant writing, but it’s always about the grants. We have our own building. We’re not a theatre company that just rents other spaces. We have a fully functioning theatre, theatre school. We have a carp shop and a wardrobe and all of our offices, so that adds another layer. We’re not just trying to fund our art, we’re trying to raise money so that we can have a place to work. And we’re not all working from our offices at home on like Google Chat all day with each other.

Hope Yeah. And do you have any kind of relationship around the board of directors as a not for profit? Obviously, you know, that governance model is how most companies work in Canada.

Nikki  Yeah. We, we have a board. I don’t have a lot of contact with them. From my understanding, they do a lot of fundraising for us. They’re always around at our events. They’re very lovely. They help our artistic director kind of manage what the seasons are going to look like and what our mandates should be and how to uphold those. But for me personally, I don’t ever get to do that. Like, our artistic director is also the executive director. So, she’s the only person that really gets to meet with the board. And I think that’s pretty typical in any theatre company. The board is kept quite separate.

Hope  Yeah. I think you’ve kind of already dealt with some of this, but any more to add in terms of what an emerging theatre worker should consider if they’re deciding between that independent freelance artist way of working versus a full time gig at a theatre company.

Nikki  I think, honestly, they just have to do both. And in theatre, I think there are very few ways to get around doing both. You start off doing that gig work. If you like it, you continue. And if you don’t like it, you really hunt for a job that you can go back to seasonally or that’s a full year contract. There’s very few people that I know that left school and never had gig work. So, I think that’s kind of just like an unavoidable lesson people learn.

Hope Absolutely. I like that idea of once you’ve had it, because you have to do it, then you figure out if it’s something you want to keep doing, right? Yeah. And then just moving into kind of more discipline specific, which again, whatever applies for you – coming at it like a stage manager, like you said, you also trained as a lighting designer, production personnel. Are there key things you need to do, to assure the director will request to work with you again? What kinds of things make you the one they ask back?

Nikki Right. I know in terms of stage management, you really have to be very moldable in terms of your personality or your temperament to fit what the director wants or maybe not what they actively want, but you have to kind of suss out what their personality is and fit that. Because stage managing is not glamorous. It’s a lot of, people saying jump and you saying “you don’t even have to tell me how high, because I’m reading your mind and I’m just, I’m going to do it and that it’s going to be great”. You are really functioning in the background, and if you’re noticed too much, it means you’re not really doing your job in the most efficient way. So yeah, it’s really about like matching personalities. And if a director feels like they can come and talk to you about things and they don’t have to ask you too many times for things, or if they do feel like you’re kind of reading their mind, then you will get asked back because they want somebody that’s easy to work with. They’re doing so much and their job is so stressful that having somebody that knows how they operate is going to take a huge load off of their shoulders. And that’s, it’s learned. You just have to go in and at the beginning, just say, I’m new, just tell me what you want. And then after a few weeks, you get into a groove and it’s good, but I guess it’s kind of like that in every career in theatre and in the real world, you have to just kind of adapt. But with stage management, maybe more so.

Hope  Absolutely. Yeah. I love that. And then in terms of relationship with the theatre that engages you. Anything you want to add in terms of what those coming into this should understand about the relationship to the engagement.

Nikki  I think that you have to be really clear about what your parameters are with things. Some, like I work with a lot of people who do, I work in an office where a lot of people are doing office work. I’m not necessarily doing office work and I pull hours that are a lot different than those people. When you come into a position like this saying, am I expected to be here this whole time because everybody else is here, or can I work my hours because later I’m going to be making up that time when I’m on tour and working 80 hours that week. I think that there are things like that, that can cause so much stress for somebody. And just being honest and upfront and saying, well, I’ll come in and out and I’ll be here when you need me or whatever. And everybody’s saying, great, that’s awesome. That can take off so much stress that wasn’t needed. And, that might be different when you work in a place that’s a lot bigger than this – but I don’t know.

Hope  Yeah, but that’s good. Just that laying it out clearly upfront. Yeah.

Nikki  Yeah, exactly. Like, not even just in terms of like your, obviously your duties and your responsibilities, but like, what is the company culture? What is everybody doing? You realize everybody else was focused on their jobs or not focused on your job, even though you feel like everybody’s looking at you and being like they’re not doing X, Y, and Z or whatever.

Hope  Absolutely. Yeah, Yeah. And any thoughts around joining Equity? I know it’s a big question for a lot of our students, stage management students, acting students that come out. They’re like, well, when should I join? Should I join right away?

Nikki  Right. I didn’t join Equity as a stage manager, and I did fine. But there are, I would say, joining sooner than later is probably a good rule to go by. When you come out of school, you have a cushion of about two years where your schooling matters, and then after that, nobody cares where you went to school. It doesn’t matter. It’s all about your work experience. So, if you can jump on those apprenticeships as soon as you get out of school or even in the summers when you’re taking breaks from classes, that is really going to boost you. A lot of apprenticeships say we need somebody who has like four credits already. But where are all of those one credit apprenticeships going? They’re going to university students. That’s usually what’s happening. So, I would say jump on the Equity bandwagon sooner than later. You get a lot of benefits working with Equity. You can be asked a lot if you are working non-union and it takes a toll on you, on your body and on your mental capacity. And having simple rules in place, like knowing if you operate a show, you’re going to get paid a little more. Or, if you have to do laundry, you’re going to get paid a little more. It makes you feel better about all of the extra things you’re doing because you’re being compensated for all of that extra work. You’re not just being told you have to do this and that’s it. You get paid $700 a week and whatever.

Hope  Excellent. Yeah, that’s great. And any thoughts on the whole… I think that’s been an ongoing dilemma, debate about whether stage managers are employees or stage managers are self-employed.

Nikki  Right. I believe that they are technically employees. I know for us in like our situation, that works well for our company. We go on tour, two people load the set in, the stage manager is usually the only person at the show with the actors when all of the patrons are there because the crew needs a break. Then being employed by TNB allows us to let them be there and be ambassadors of our company. And then, we come back and we strike. So for us, that works well. I don’t know situations where it doesn’t work. I would think, having stage managed, I liked that my taxes came off with my pay. I didn’t want to have to worry about filling out, like freelance tax forms and all of that kind of stuff, so I appreciated it.

Hope  Yeah. Yeah. And then from the kind of production manager side  of producing. Are there specific challenges that you find as a production manager, as technical director?

Nikki  Well, the challenges are the time. With this job, because all of my job focuses on a show, it’s a lot of hurry up and wait. I’m at a point right now where I’m waiting. I’m scheduling, I’m doing a lot of emails, but there’s not a lot of lengthy tasks ahead. But there will come a day where I have 20 tasks that I have to do that day, and that will continue for a few weeks. So, I think it’s something that could be lessened with more people, obviously. But, I think that’s the main challenge is just you’re always waiting and thinking about all of the things that you need to do that you can’t do yet. And you’re like pre-problem solving and like, oh, if I do this at this time, then I can do this other thing while I’m waiting for whatever, and I can get the outline done for this so that I only have to fill in information. And so, it’s just a constant battle of how do I prepare myself enough that I can make something take a little less time?

Hope  Absolutely. Yeah, that’s great. That’s great. And I know you brought up leadership a little bit earlier when you talked about physically helping out a team as part of your role. Anything else in terms of how you see the challenges of taking a leadership role and how you see leadership in itself?

Nikki  I think, because of the size of the theatre that I work with, even if I worked with a larger theatre where I would have the ability to have more of like a traditional PM desk job, I think I would have a really hard time with that. With seeing all of these people doing all of this… I think part of it, too, is like the stuff that they’re doing is fun. It’s not like I’m watching people paint houses all day or something where I’m like, oh, I’m glad I’m not doing that. They’re like building these really cool props and set pieces and getting to watch this whole world come to life on flats. And I’m like, I want to be a part of doing that. It’s also nice, I find, it’s really hard to be the person that always has to have the answers and being the person that everybody’s always going to saying, can I have this? Do we have money for this? And it’s nice sometimes to just go and work and paint a set and ask our head of props and paint, hey, what colour do you want me to do this in? Or, what do you want here? And have somebody just tell me what to do for a little while? I find it very refreshing and I think that I would have a very hard time working in a larger company where I didn’t get those opportunities to take a breath and leave my desk. I’m really not like a desk person.