Wake up. Go to class, 21 credits’ worth. Design a set, costumes, visual projections, a poster and sound cues. Spend time in the wood shop, costume shop and lighting booth. Go home and coordinate with people 1,200 miles away. Plan another show. Do the payroll and other administrative tasks. Go to bed, thank your lucky stars, and do it all over again. This is a day in the life of Jake McCoy.

McCoy, an Arts & Sciences senior, works for Broadway Dreams, a national non-profit organization in New York City, NY. Their mission is to bring aspiring performers closer to their dreams of professional theater or dance performance. Broadway Dreams holds master classes in various cities throughout the United States where the high school and college-age students can learn from and interact with actual Broadway stars.

The envious Broadway Dreams job wasn’t acquired through luck or connections, but hard work. Last year, the group came to Omaha for a session. The group needed a stage manager and asked around in the technical theatre circles in Omaha. McCoy’s name came up, and Broadway Dreams hired him as their stage manager for the week. The company was so impressed with his work that they asked him to come with them to the next city. When that production was done, the director approached McCoy with the opportunity to work for Broadway Dreams full-time as a production manager and administrator.

A job offer like that doesn’t get turned down. McCoy accepted the position and began working with the foundation.

“It’s rare,” McCoy said. “I lucked out.”

McCoy isn’t just a stage manager for Broadway Dreams. He is also a designer and full-time student who is working on his Bachelor of Fine Arts thesis.  Juggling all of these tasks is certainly a daunting job for anybody, let alone a person who has a full time job and is graduating a semester early.

“It’s stressful. [Broadway Dreams,] 21 credits and a thesis,” McCoy said. “It’s all about time management … I divide my time so I know when I can sit down and work.”

Through Skype meetings and weekend flights to far-flung cities, McCoy can work for a foundation based on the East Coast, with its employees dispersed all around the country. His job is twofold.

“[I am] in charge of all production [and I’m the] administrator, in charge of things like registration, payroll, contracts for faculty members, bank account and budgets,” McCoy said. “I do two things — production and making sure when we do have an event that it is staffed, we have the right people … I make sure we know it will happen. It’s crazy.”

McCoy, a technical theatre major, manages to stay calm among the chaos the theater world brings.  His disposition is one that thrives on multitasking, problem solving and creativity.

Technical theatre professionals are expected to have an advanced knowledge of most of the steps in the production process. As a result, the students at Creighton must take a wide variety of classes, including acting, stagecraft, make up design, theater history, costume construction, drafting and scenic design. Unlike acting or performing, technical theater people work behind the scenes without any of the fame or recognition those on the stage receive.

It certainly wasn’t the lifestyle he had envisioned.  In high school, McCoy played three different sports. He auditioned for his first play because a friend told him to. It was a “what the heck?” kind of moment.

Thus began his short-lived acting career, which included the coveted role of Mercutio in Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet.” At the end of that year, he kept being pestered by his drama teacher to stage manage. After all, she said, he was extremely organized. McCoy decided to give it a try, and slowly yet surely began to realize his natural talent in the field. However, he wasn’t ready to base his future on those skills.

When McCoy left for college, he intended on majoring in graphic design and getting a minor in theatre.  After attending his first theater departmental meeting, he changed his mind. McCoy really clicked with the professors, building a wonderful rapport with them. He said he appreciates the department and its flexibility with his job.

“I couldn’t have asked for a better situation here,” McCoy said. “Everybody is very understanding … The department is awesome.”

McCoy’s journey into the theater world was aided by an unlikely source. His grandfather, the most influential person in his life, had been preparing him for this role in an odd way. He taught his grandson the basics of stagecraft.  A cop by profession, McCoy’s grandfather had a passion for carpentry and was a master woodworker in his spare time. McCoy would spend hours with his grandfather, making items like screen doors.  This gave him an incredible leg up on his studies.

“I had a pretty advanced knowledge of wood-working,” McCoy said. “I never had to learn to do the complete basics [of design,] so I could focus on learning a lot of new things.”

The most important thing his grandfather taught him, and the key to his success as a theatrical designer, is how to envision something. Through carpentry and love, McCoy’s grandfather inspired him to be able to look at a piece of wood or a design and see something else. In the design world an empty room has to be transformed into a setting for a work of art. Through imagination and determination, and perhaps some natural talent, a designer takes a script and comes up with the biggest elements in a performance: the set, costumes, props, sound effects and lighting.

“Tech grabbed my interest because I liked the physical art side of things – models, painting, working on lights,” McCoy said. “It is important for theater, to be able to look at an empty room and think ‘What would this look like with a set in here?’ and ‘What would that look like?’ which is really hard. By reading a script, you have to come up with the biggest element in a room: the set.”

When McCoy began his journey in the department, he was one of two students studying technical theatre.  That number has now risen to 11. Explaining this tremendous growth is easy when looking at a person like McCoy.

“Last year, the department had a lot of success,” McCoy said. “I think it did motivate a bunch of people to say, ‘Hey, look, you can actually make money doing this,’ doing what you love.”

McCoy’s sense of professionalism impresses more than audiences. He also continually surprises his peers.  Mary Kate Gliedt, an Arts & Sciences senior and B.F.A. theatre major, has worked closely with McCoy on many levels, both in class and on outside projects.

“McCoy brings a lot of expertise to the department, as well as a complete willingness to learn more to make his own theatrical education stronger and our department better,” Gliedt said. “Jake also brings a strong sense of professionalism and [has] utter control of everything around him.”

The control he exercises in his life includes control over his fears.  Being a techie is a career that does not allow for common phobias many people have. They must use heavy duty power tools, climb up scaffolding to change lights and run the show. During a performance, the director is no longer in charge. Rather, it is the dutiful stage manager who steps into the leadership role of the production and makes sure it actually happens.

“Yeah, it is scary,” McCoy said with a shrug that is typical of behind-the-scenes workers.  “A lot of it is the way theatre works. You have to be comfortable with what you are doing because you are a person somebody goes to all the time. You have to know the answer or figure it out. I overcome the idea of the fact that I’m 21 but I have a full time job working for a New York based theatre company.”

Despite the fear that some may have doing this line of work, Gleidt knows that it is no problem for McCoy.

“He has absolutely everything under control,” Gleidt said. “He’s beautiful.”

It may seem impossible to imitate McCoy’s “beautiful” personality and craftsmanship. However, the secret of his success is actually quite simple.

“You need to trust yourself … it’s all just problem solving, and in the end, we’re just doing theater,” McCoy said. “We’re not doing brain surgery. Keep that clear mind … do not feed into the negative side of things, because nothing will get accomplished.”

Upon his graduation in December, McCoy will move to New York City and continue working for Broadway Dreams. Having a job prior to graduation is almost unheard of in the theatre world, especially in the current economic climate. When asked how he felt about having accomplished such a huge feat and personal goal, McCoy shrugged and answered in typical stage manager style.

“I’m not a big deal,” McCoy said, “but they [Broadway Dreams] are.”