“If you ever start to feel inadequate at what you’re doing, don’t let that stop you.”
Whitney McDonald is the Theatre Operator for the Amentum Center of Performing Arts and the Aiken Community Theatre in Aiken, S.C. She acts as a liaison between the city and the theater, runs the box office, and handles communications for the theater.
About
Whitney McDonald formerly worked in retail and banking, acting at the Aiken Community Theatre as a hobby. When the previous theater operator announced her retirement, McDonald decided to apply. “I had been a part of the theater for a long time,” she says. “I always thought to myself, ‘Man, if she ever retired, it would be really great to have her position.’”
McDonald got a job offer two weeks after her interview. “It just worked out,” she says. “I knew everyone in the theater anyway, but I’ve always been a performer. I’ve always been on stage; I’ve done a little bit backstage. But I didn’t ever really realize how much goes on behind the scenes to run a theater.”
McDonald starts her day at 8 a.m., when she checks her email and voicemail and makes sure everything in the theater itself is ready for production. Because she works for both the theatre and the city, she handles communication and manages the box office. “It kind of just depends on what’s going on that week. There’s always something different to do every day.”
McDonald says that every theater’s administration is different from being on stage, and each venue requires something different from its theater operator. “Having a background in some sort of administration would help,” she says. “I didn’t have a whole lot of that.”
She also says students would need to be okay with working by themselves most days and that they should work on their customer service skills. “You are the face of the box office,” she says. “When people call in, they expect to speak to you, and you want to be able to help them as best you can.”
McDonald suggests that people interested in working in theater should start by getting involved in local workshops and attending local auditions. “That’s how I got into it,” she said, crediting a lot of her success to the connections she made while acting. Finally, she advises students to be bold. “If you ever start to feel inadequate at what you’re doing, don’t let that stop you.”
Media
Whitney McDonald Interview
