Producing, in Practice

Brighton Festival 2026 | Brighton Festival 2026 |

Brighton Festival 2026 | Brighton Festival 2026 |

London Symphony Orchestra with Antonio Pappano

Dark Noon

Akram Khan

Clod Ensemble

Asian Dub Foundation

St John’s Passion, Britten Sinfonia

Fevered Sleep

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Producing Assistant

The Scale:

160,000+ people engaged with the festival's 60th edition, its highest attendance in years.

Over 100 events, 140+ performers, across three weeks.

I worked across 14 productions, alongside 7 different producers and teams as large as 20-30 production staff, including Kohlhaas, the first original work Brighton Festival has ever produced in-house, opening this landmark edition, as well as:

Highlights

Running a day solo

Artist liaison · Stage management · Time management

Midway through the placement, I ran a full logistical set-up day for Clod Ensemble on my own, standing in as producer. That covered artist liaison, stage building and the complete production set-up, coordinated start to finish without another producer on site.

Highlights

Solving under pressure

During a classical production, a stand had mistakenly been given to us from another production. Their team came to reclaim it about a minute before our rehearsal started, and the room froze, no one wanting to interrupt the conductor. I stayed calm, took the brunt of the reaction, and told them a solution was already in motion while I took the stand off stage myself, in front of the orchestra. Rehearsal went ahead with a temporary fix while I spent the afternoon tracking down a second stand, driving across town and checking storage closets, until a colleague located one. I picked it up with minutes to spare before that night's performance.

Crisis management · Decision-making · Resourcefulness

Additional Roles:

Beyond the highlights, my placement spanned every stage of live production delivery:

Front of house & guest-facing - venue and artist liaison, box office, stewarding, private member events and post-show hospitality

Physical production- stage builds, prop sourcing, technical setup, dressing room preparation

Operations- deliveries across the venue, health and safety checks, workshop and live programming support

As a Production Runner, I anticipated artist and production needs in a fast-paced environment, sourcing dressing room requests under tight timelines and acting as the communication link between artists, venue staff, suppliers, and the wider team. The role sharpened my ability to think fast, solve problems under pressure, and keep things running smoothly for artists, audiences, and stakeholders alike.

The takeaway:

This placement became the case study for my MA dissertation on the unseen work that makes an event feel live, and why bringing people together is so important in a digital era.

Working amongst diverse producers and types of productions, and moving between crisis and calm has taught me more about the entertainment industry than I could have learned from the outside, letting me put what I'd learned during my masters programme into practice. My previous career in hospitality and tourism set me up for this more than I realised, as I hadn't expected how much the skills I'd built at Backroads would carry over. I took what I'd learned producing luxury active travel trips globally and applied it to the entertainment industry.

Learn more about my experience with Backroads here.