Anthology Theatre

Another success story about a source of financial acumen finding its way into the entertainment industry. You'll be spotting a pattern by now.

Covent Garden, London, is the home of production company, Anthology Theatre, its original source of financial know-how, chairman and founder, Bob Benton. After a thirty year career in investment banking, Bob decided to follow his passion into the high risk business of show, having presumably learned quite a bit about risk management by then.

The website's 'About' page shows you the team, with useful outlines. Not surprisingly, ATG is mentioned a couple of times in people's career paths, with others starting elsewhere: production management, the fringe, tourism, performing arts degrees and acting.

Lots of active Linked-In accounts with more detail about career journeys – useful for ideas in plotting your own path. Twitter accounts abound – lots of pre-show marketing as you'd expect, but other interesting posts as mentioned below.

The 'Productions' tab features current shows: the Lehman Trilogy that did so well at the US Tony awards; The Great British Bake Off Musical – yes, things are getting a bit silly about baking now – indeed there's, "Oodles of silliness" in Bleak Expectations – Oh, how we'll laugh, no doubt.

There's a lot of co-producing too, so you can also check out those companies to see what's what e.g. Short Street Productions AKA Mark Rubenstein Ltd (www.mrluk.com) and Eleanor Llyod Productions (www.elproductions.co.uk).

The 'News' tab is where you'll find jobs and opportunities. They were recruiting for a trainee producer and an office manager and PA, but the deadlines have recently passed. That's why it's important to sign up for company newsletters and follow key staff/company Twitter accounts.

For example, Anthology's MD and Executive Producer, Lil Lambley's, Twitter account is primarily for publicity, but with the synergy of social media, tweets from other companies appear e.g. Stage One (@StageOneNewProd), "A charity supporting and training commercial theatre producers", has four trainee producer placements open at this time and their friends, the Rose Theatre are looking for a producer, as is The Crucible, Sheffield – applications still open as of this post.

Social media and websites, interconnecting with opportunities. The key is doing the online research.

It really is all at your finger tips!