Tour Summary

To sum up my tour, it was a great experience over all, and I'm glad I did it. I think I would do it again if I needed to get my Equity card right away, but I'd have to do it with TheatreWorks, since ArtsPower no longer uses the Equity union. I was very lucky to work with a group of people that I enjoyed working with, and I feel sorry that Chris didn't have a better experience. It was fun to travel to places I've never been (Milwaukee, Chicago, Winston-Salem, Tampa, Savannah, Vermont, Niagara Falls, Boston, and more) I think that was the best part. There were some long travel days which were not so enjoyable in the van, and there were days when we stayed in our motel the whole day because there was nothing around (except for Walmart, of course). But otherwise, I don't have much to complain about. I have also learned that I am not cut out to be the set crew, hauling heavy set pieces and building. God love them, I just don't want to do it again, I've paid my dues!

The biggest 2 things about having completed this tour are:

1. I have a national tour on my resume

2. I have paid my dues!

For other actors/ stage managers who wish to compare ArtsPower and TheatreWorks for possible future employment, here is our experience:

I have to say that ArtsPower seems more organized. They sent us on the road with a blowup mattress in case someone wanted to combine rooms to save money (we had 5 people total, which meant someone had to share a bed, sleep on the blowup, or get their own room- I ended up sharing a bed with a girl who has become a very close friend). Chris had to bring his own blowup mattress which was destroyed by the end of his tour.

Artspower set up our hotels so that we collected points towards free rooms, and we got 4 or 5 free nights out of it! Chris' cast had to figure that out on their own, and it worked but they didn't get as many free nights.

If there was any issue, as individual actors, we could call or email the production manager and discuss it with her. Chris did not know who to call or email when he was having trouble on tour. Artspower as a company is much more personal and takes better care of their actors.

Even though Artspower is non-union now, they STILL follow the Equity rules, which means you get great benefits!

Artspower appreciates their actors: when we had a bad day at a venue because the school forgot to turn off the loud speakers, the morning announcements went off during a show but we kept going. They heard about it at the office and gave us $100 to spend on dinner. We also had a group Halloween costume contest, competing again the other tours that were on the road. We got 2nd place and $50 to spend (as a cast) on anything we wanted. Theatreworks never did anything like this for Chris' cast.

A friend of ours, Abby Stevens, was in the TheatreWorks' cast of Junie B. Jones and has some great Theatreworks stories also, not quite as bad a Chris' but they both had issues with their directors/ choreographers during the rehearsal process.

In closing, I'm sure everyone's experiences will vary on every tour, so this is definitely NOT the say-all, end-all, but it's interesting to know either way.