With his blue jeans and boxy blue checked shirt, Hytner could have been mistaken for a stagehand until he called the actors onto the floor.

NEWYORKER: Curtain-Raiser

There is the brawling but good-hearted Communist stagehand (Clovis Cornillac) who struggles to keep the beautiful young chansonnier (Nora Arnezeder) from the disgusting embrace of a local landlord and crime boss.

NEWYORKER: Paris 36

Costs from theater rental to advertising to stagehand salaries have all gone up, and to pay for a long run, producers need the bigger seating capacity and ticket prices that come with a Broadway space.

WSJ: 'Wit,' Starring Cynthia Nixon, Took the Long Road to Broadway

That was a stagehand who played the saw.

CNN: Life is (still) a 'Cabaret'

In temperament, Gelb could not be more different from his predecessor as general manager, Joseph Volpe, who started out as a stagehand at the Met and spent forty-two years there before his retirement, last year.

NEWYORKER: Man Behind the Curtain

He did so with a maple bat--once thought too heavy for play--made by a Canadian upstart named Sam Holman , a former stagehand who founded the Original Maple Bat Co. out of his garage near Ottawa.

FORBES: Carry a Big Stick