Child Labor Laws for Broadway/Equity

[LegitMTLover]

Posted: 7/11/15 at 11:38am

Hey All!

 

So what exactly are the child labor laws for a professional Broadway show? A friend of mine when he was a child was in several shows including: Chip in Beauty and The Beast, Gavroche in Les Miz, One of Annie's brothers in Annie Get Your Gun and a few others. While he did say that every performance day he did have to show up to the theater, because the kids did understudy one other, he only normally went on 4 times a week for a 8 show week or 6 times a week for a 12 show week. The only times when this didn't happen was when he was only in one scene in the first act. So he was permitted to leave after he was done and not stay for the curtain call.

 

I thought maybe this was old procedure due to the fact that it was 15-20 years ago. However I talked to my friend whose daughter was in Matilda and she told be basically the same. 

 

Yet there are shows like Annie and more recently Fun Home where children go on every performance.

 

Does anyone have any incite to Equity Child Labor Law or could direct me to a thread where this was already answered?

 

Thanks!

[Fosse76]

Posted: 7/11/15 at 12:03pm

There are special rules for live stage performers similar to TV and film, but are significantly more permissible, and are age-based. Essentially, they can work no  earlier than 5am and no later than 12:30am (midnight if school is in session). While there are slight variations of how many hours a day the minor can work (based on whether or not it's a tech/rehearsal/preview performance or regular performance, and whether or not school is in session), they can work at least 8 hours in the day, and there doesn't appear to be a limitation on the number of days they can be required to work.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 7/11/15 at 12:16pm

https://labor.ny.gov/formsdocs/wp/LS559.pdf