The Production Playbook

Every show we book comes with its own Production Playbook. Your board said yes to a show, and now somebody has to build the budget, sell the sponsorships, find the volunteers and fill the seats. That somebody has probably never produced a show. The Playbook was written for that person.

Most of every Playbook is the same from show to show: the budget, sponsorship, tickets, marketing and a job for every volunteer. The rest is written for the show itself. Here is the one for Christmas on the Dial: more than 200 pages that walk a volunteer from the first board conversation to the last thank-you letter, with every form already drawn up. Its full contents are at the bottom of this page.

Budgeting: know your numbers before the vote

Your board will ask two questions: what will this raise, and what will it cost? The Playbook helps you work through your own ticket sales, sponsorship and program advertising expectations, and set a realistic budget from them before anyone signs. Three worked examples, from a 200-seat church to an 800-seat performing arts center, show every line of income and every cost, including the ones first-timers forget. A break-even worksheet runs the same arithmetic on your own room and ticket price. A line-item budget and a month-by-month cash-flow calendar show when money goes out and when it comes in, so you see the gap between the first bills and the ticket money months before you reach it.

Sponsorship and marketing: fill the seats, and the budget

Sponsorship can cover your costs before the first ticket sells, and this show gives sponsors something no other fundraiser in town can offer: a 1950s radio commercial for their business, performed live on stage at every performance. The Playbook sets out four sponsorship levels, the order to ask in, a script for the conversation across the desk, and four commercial formats your team can write from.

Then the seats. The marketing plan counts back from opening night, with a complete free version for an organization with no advertising budget and a paid version for the last three weeks. The press release, the media advisory, an eight-week posting schedule and ready-to-paste posts for your cast are already written. Your cast, their families and your board are the largest audience you have, and the Playbook shows you how to reach them.

Volunteers: a job for everyone who says yes

People say yes far more often to a defined job than to “help with the show.” The Playbook breaks the production into 16 volunteer roles, from the Production Chair and the Treasurer to the ushers and the chaperones, and gives each one a single printed page: what the job is, when it gets busy, roughly how many hours it takes, and what that person does not have to worry about. Hand the page over when you ask, and yes comes easier.

The chapter on your team also covers finding your volunteers: how many people each performance night takes (about fifteen for a 400-seat room), and where to find them beyond your own members, from high school students who need service hours to civic clubs and your sponsors’ staff. A call for volunteers and a show-night schedule come ready to use.

A nine-month countdown puts every task on a calendar with a name against it, so the Production Chair always knows what is due this week and who owns it.

What’s inside

• 7 parts and 23 chapters, from “Is this right for your organization?” to the wrap report
• 59 templates, ready to copy and fill in: the sponsorship sheet, the break-even worksheet, the budget, the audition forms, the volunteer schedule, the playbill, the press release and more
• 16 one-page role descriptions, written to hand to the volunteer who takes the job
• More than 200 printed pages

The full contents

Start with Chapter 1, free

“Is this right for your organization?” is the chapter to read before your board votes: what you need already, what you can do without, and the reasons to wait a year. It is an instant download, seven pages, yours the moment you ask.

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