The reality about working on a cruise ship - expect long, long hours and little time off. Most of the techs I've spoken with work six day with 12 hour shifts. They don't just handle running tech. They do whatever needs to be done. Certainly, they ahve a primary capacity (like say you're the lighting tech - your first job is to check the lights each day, make sure everything is ready and then you are assigned your daily task. it might be running lights, sound, redressing a set (the show rooms are used for lectures, general assemblies, demos, as well as shows, there is is a lot of demand for lighting and sound).
I worked for Holland America, which is a division of Carnival, and some of this I found to be true and some not. I happened to be on a ship where there were only two
theatre techs, me and one other. I was in charge of
theatre ops, from scheduling to running lights and sound, to writing performance reports. The other person was in charge of all things backstage, from getting a crew to move scenery to handing off
props and sweeping and such. While it was a lot of work, I still found that I had plenty of time to visit nearly every port we stopped at.
The pay is very low - these ships are internationally flagged, which means that do have to
play by US standards. Techs get paid a little better than others, but still nothing compared to working on land.
I found this to be completely not true. The ships are internationally flagged, but the companies are US based, so they do have to pay you at least by US standards (though even when I was on the ship it would have been great to get paid in Euros!). I was getting paid enough that I could have lived comfortably in many places. Then consider that you have virtually no expenses while you are on the ship, so unless you rack up a huge bar
tab or you buy lots of stuff in port, you can bank nearly all your wages less taxes. There is no cost of living on a cruise ship, room and board and transportation are provided.
The cabin, which you will share with one to three other people, are tiny, nearly closet size. You get a cubical for your stuff and a bed and that's pretty much it. You don't have to pay for your room and board, so that helps. There's also not many places for you to spend your money on board. Some ship allow crew to
purchase things in the stores, but many don't (I don't believe Cranival does). There is a general store for the crew which offers just about anything you could want and usually pretty cheaply.
On cabins, yup, small. However pretty much the only time I spent in my cabin was sleeping, and in that case, it doesn't really matter. My bathroom was awesome, you could take a shower while on the toilet brushing your teeth in the sink (it was very small). My understanding, at leas on the HAL fleet was that any tech who had a position like lighting or sound as opposed to a general "go push scenery around" tech got their own cabin. I did.
As for the shops, any crew person with officer status (this includes
theatre techs) could shop in the shops on the ship. Also, where passengers were not allowed to buy alcohol and bring it back to their rooms (on account of the ship wants them to buy drinks in the bars!), crew could.
I was e-mailing one of my students, he was sailing through the Panama Canal at the time, and said that life on the ship was okay, but monotonous.
This can be true. Many cruises are week long runs to the same ports each week. These can get boring. Unfortunately you don't get to choose your cruise until you have worked for the company for a while. Once you get out of the Alaska or Caribbean runs, and can get on ships that go to lots of places, it gets more interesting.
There are
ups and downs to cruising, and it certainly isn't for everyone. It can be a great thing to do after college, go see the world and get paid to do it. It can also be tough in that you may loose contact with people who may have other opportunities for you. You will get to work with top end gear, but I would strongly suggest that you have some experience with it first. You NEED to go into the job with good troubleshooting skills. You also need to really be a
jack of all trades, or at least have a good understanding of all aspects of production.
You will get to work with lots of different talent, which is good. You will learn to design shows on the
fly in a 1-2 hour rehearsal the day of the show. You will develop lots of good skills.
I am happy to chat more on cruising, feel free to PM or email me. I have posted in some of the other cruise threads too, so you might check those out as well.
