Those are one of lines from Come From Away, which paused it’s Australia and New Zealand tour yesterday.
My partner is a professional musician, and one of the thousands of artists, creatives, technical, and behind-the-scenes people impacted by the pandemic.
The last time he was on a stage was June 2021. And the next time he is scheduled to be on one is March this year.
Yesterday I bought myself a ticket to go and see the final performance of Come From Away before the show is put on hiatus. Whilst we all hope that this is just a period of “being on hold”, we all know plenty of Hollywood shows that were put on hiatus, never to return.
The picture above is of the cast, musicians, creatives, and crew from yesterday’s show. An absolutely awe-inspiring group of passionate, talented, and hard-working professionals who bring to life one of the most emotional stories from recent history with empathy, humour, and compassion 8 times a week.
The reality of their hiatus is simple: The unpredictable and ever-changing rules around theatre performances, audience capacities, availability of RAT tests (they have to do a RAT every single day, and a PCR twice a week), and the almost complete lack of Government support since the end of JobKeeper means they can’t continue.
But who helps these people?
How do they pay rent? Pay for school fees and text books? Uniforms?
They don’t get a redundancy payment. They don’t get outplacement services. And most importantly, they don’t get to do what they love and have trained years for.
That’s where Project Displaced can help. Whilst we can’t offer financial support we do offer confidential human help. Our network of coaches can help with coping mechanisms, dealing with the emotional gravity of the situation and working with our clients to build a strategy that will not only help them “get through” what they’re experiencing now, but thrive in the future.
We believe that nobody in Australia should suffer the distress that losing your job can create. And we know that when people are in that situation, a service like ours can dramatically improve their lives, and get them into a new job up to four times faster than when left to do it on their own.
So why am I telling you all this?
I think it is important to remember that whilst we are thankfully seeing some parts of industry rebound from the pandemic we must not forget that there are many parts like the arts, travel, and retail which are still struggling.
If you know anyone who has lost their job, we can help them. So send them to us. Share this article. Subscribe to our socials and share our posts.
And lastly, if you feel comfortable and safe to do so please go to live theatre! Go to a show, the ballet, a musical, a gig of any kind, visit a museum or a gallery. Go before they all go on “hiatus”.
We are tiny but we make a huge impact and we need your help to reach more people.
___________________________________
Ant Cohen is the Founder of Project Displaced and a finalist for the 2022 Australian of the Year Awards as NSWs Local hero.
