One of my friends now works as security for all the big concerts and sporting events around Auckland. I wouldn't do that as I'd probably be beaten up and flattened, but I did have a similar job once in my 20s at the University when showed people to their seats at the theatre, where I wasn't paid but got to see a free show. It was usually a play put on by the Auckland Theatre Company.
I had no real aspirations to be an actress and being in the limelight but dressing all in black and being invisible was something I could do. My boss at the time thought I was terrible as I was supposed to sell programmes for $8 a pop and I never sold any, as I thought people should get their money's worth of tickets that were already expensive as it is and didn't need to shell out for the program to go with it. Most people who I asked if they would like a program declined. We were all poor students!
I don't recall many of the plays, except for No 2. in which Madeleine Sami did an Robin Williams/Aladdin virtuoso performance of as many different Indian accents as she could, and one play (was it The Graduate? or A Streetcar Named Desire) where Elizabeth Hawthorne streaked naked across the stage. It was theatre, anything goes.
After the play was over and everyone ushered out, my boss who had his eye on me said he was watching me all the time and I was a bit unnerved by this. He was probably bored watching the same play over and over every night and thought I was much better entertainment. I was doing my English papers at the time and studying drama so I thought I should at least see one play.
The only time I got up the courage to act was when we acted out a scene from Top Girls by Caryl Churchill in the drama studio. I played the waitress so and didn't actually have to say any lines. Which was alright but I ruined the scene because I made believed I was a clumsy waitress who dropped all the food.
After my stint as an usher was over I had two big black bin bags full of black clothing enough for several funerals so ended up donating them to the Salvation Army. I preferred the big broadway musical type shows to the serious political and fringe ones anyway but that kind of theatre never got a look-in at the University. My boss was dismayed that I would sometimes fall asleep on the back row though actually I slept anywhere and sometimes in lectures if they were too boring as well.
Unlike in Shakespearean times, the patrons of this theatre were not riff-raff groundlings who snacked and drank mugs of mead while watching the show. They did not have rotten tomatoes tucked up their sleeves or a hook to drag anyone off the stage. This crowd was very polite and clapped at the end, because it was usually the sons and daughters of the wealthy scions of Auckland (doctors, lawyers, engineers) having a night out at the theatre and acting for fun if they couldn't be full-time on Shortland Street.
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