My name’s Hannah Norbury and I’m a 17-year-old student from Manchester. I have just finished a week of work experience with Box of Tricks, which has been a great experience. I’m not really sure what career path I want to follow, but I wanted to know a bit about what goes on behind the scenes of a theatrical production, and this week has been very enlightening.

I’ve done a mixture of things this week. I started off by doing some research on life in the navy during the Second World War for the production Narvik and editing some of the blogs on the website. I then assisted in sorting through and reorganising the office, which I can assure you has a sufficient stock of furry trousers. I spent the remaining three days reading through scripts and writing reports on them, looking for the next big thing. We also went on a company trip to watch Square Peg’s production of Roseacre at the Sale Waterside Arts Centre which is an intriguing play about the web of lies unearthed following a murder at a demonstration.

This week has taught me a lot about the day-to-day running of a theatre company, mainly that perfect scripts don’t just fall off trees; you have to wait for one to reach you and it’s vital to maintain a good relationship with playwrights. Furthermore, you don’t just read a script, rehearse a bit and perform it, you have to research it, know what you’re on about and make it believable. It’s not as easy as you’d think, but it definitely is fun and I’m very grateful that I got the chance to work here.

I’m now starting to think about universities and am hoping to study philosophy and religion. I’m confident the things I’ve learnt here will be useful. But for now, I’m looking forward to relaxing over the summer!

– Hannah Norbury