| Hi. Great to see you! |
| I'm Jody, and I'll be looking after both of you for the first month you're working here at the Amersham Theatre. |
| I'll tell you something about the theatre now, then take you to meet two of the other staff. |
| It's an old building, and it's been modernised several times. |
| In fact, as you can see, we're carrying out a major refurbishment at the moment. |
| The interior has just been repainted, |
| and we're about to start on the exterior of the building - |
| that'll be a big job. |
| The work's running over budget, |
| so we've had to postpone installing an elevator. |
| I hope you're happy running up and down stairs! |
| When the theatre was built, |
| people were generally slimmer and shorter than now, |
| and the seats were very close together. |
| We've replaced them with larger seats, with more legroom. |
| This means fewer seats in total, |
| but we've taken the opportunity to install seats that can easily be moved, to create different acting spaces. |
| We've also turned a few storerooms over to other purposes like using them for meetings. |
| We try hard to involve members of the public in the theatre. |
| One way is by organising backstage tours |
| so people can be shown round the building and learn how a theatre operates. |
| These are proving very popular. |
| What we're finding is that people want to have lunch or a cup of coffee while they're here, |
| so we're looking into the possibility of opening a café in due course. |
| We have a bookshop, which specialises in books about drama |
| and that attracts plenty of customers. |
| Then there are two large rooms that will be decorated next month, |
| and they'll be available for hire, |
| for conferences and private functions, such as parties. |
| We're also considering hiring out costumes to amateur drama clubs. |
| Now I want to tell you about our workshops. |
| We recently started a programme of workshops that anyone can join. |
| Eventually we intend to run courses in acting, |
| but we're waiting until we've got the right people in place as trainers. |
| That's proving more difficult than we'd expected! |
| There's a big demand to learn about the technical side of putting on a production, |
| and our lighting workshop has already started with great success. |
| We're going to start one on sound next month. |
| A number of people have enquired about workshops on make-up, |
| and that's something we're considering for the future. |
| A surprise success is the workshop on making puppets - |
| we happen to have someone working here who does it as a hobby, |
| and she offered to run a workshop. |
| It was so popular we're now running them every month! |
| Now, a word about the layout of the building. |
| The auditorium, stage and dressing rooms for the actors are all below ground level. |
| Here on the ground floor we have most of the rooms that the public doesn't see. |
| The majority are internal, so they have windows in the roof to light them. |
| Standing here in the foyer, you're probably wondering why the box office isn't here, |
| where the public would expect to find it. |
| Well, you might have noticed it on your way in - |
| although it's part of this building, it's next door with a separate entrance from the road. |
| For the theatre manager's office, you go across the foyer and through the double doors, |
| turn right, and it's the room at the end of the corridor, with the door on the left. |
| The lighting box is where the computerised stage lighting is operated |
| and it's at the back of the building. |
| When you're through the double doors |
| turn left, turn right at the water cooler, and right again at the end. |
| It's the second room along that corridor. |
| The lighting box has a window into the auditorium, |
| which of course is below us. |
| The artistic director's office is through the double doors, |
| turn right and it's the first room you come to on the right-hand side. |
| And finally, for the moment, |
| the room where I'll take you next - the relaxation room. |
| So if you'd like... |