What is a Production Manager?The production manager manages and coordinates all the technical work - the set, lighting, sound, properties, costumes - that contributes to the staging of a production. She has responsibility for the budget and allocates it to the various departments that support the work - wardrobe, sound, lighting, scenery workshop, etc. She then has the extremely tricky task of ensuring that all the creative team can realise their ideas while at the same time staying within their budgets and keeping to the strict timetables required to build the scenery, make the costumes and stage the show in the theatre. If there is a conflict, and inevitably there is, between the artistic vision of a member of the creative team and those attempting to turn that vision into reality, then it is the production manager's job to mediate. How to become a Production ManagerMany people break into theatre by taking a low-paid job in any company they can to get a start. Once you have found your way into a theatre, like Sacha Milroy, you will tend to start on the lower rungs of stage management and work your way up. But how do you get that first break? You may choose to take a diploma at drama school, and now some universities offer it as a degree course. Production management skills could take you into jobs in film, television or the music industry. |  | |