We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Caitlin Belcik. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Caitlin below.
Caitlin , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?
Yes and no! I think it depends where you draw the line on “creative work.” This past year has been the first time I’ve come close to and dare I say actually earned a full-time living from my creative work. But it wasn’t for the faint of heart. Since Summer 2024 I have directed 3 shows, choreographed 4, been the associate director on 4 projects, and the associate choreographer on another 2 projects. In addition to those productions, I also consider teaching to be creative work. I am a dance teacher and am constantly choreographing dance prescreens for high school students auditioning for musical theatre programs, as well as teaching for musical theatre programs at the collegiate level. Without those teaching jobs, I’m not sure I would have made a full-time living, even with having worked on 13 projects this past year!
I know I have been fortunate, because my experience over this last year is NOT what we artists typically experience. I moved to NYC when I was 22 years old and started out doing 1 or maybe 2 creative projects a year if I was lucky. I continued to show up, say yes, do my best work, and believe that one day the ball would start rolling. I kept surrounding myself with people I believed in and who also believed in my work – whether it was on the stage or behind the table. I am very grateful to those that took a chance on me at such a young age!
Over the years, I have also found that having some sort of steady job I love outside of the theatre is really beneficial to me. Over the pandemic, I got my masters in Non-profit Leadership and am now the accounting manager over 17 Boys and Girls Club sites at BGCOKC. It’s a remote, part-time job that allows me to turn off my creative brain for a few hours every week which has proved very helpful when I’m feeling burnt out! And while this part-time job might have been “bonus” income for me this past year, it has allowed me to invest in my future and in my retirement!
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
Hi! I’m Caitlin Belcik and as of the past few years, I am a director, choreographer, actor, teacher, and part-time accounting manager based in NYC. Performing and being a part of the theatre industry has been a part of me since I came out of the womb. I always knew it’s what I wanted to do. And although I grew up in Edmond, OK, I ended up making my Broadway debut at the ripe old age of 10 and have been performing professionally ever since.
I ended up getting my BFA in Musical Theatre from Penn State University along with a Business Certificate from the Smeal College of Business. And because that wasn’t enough, I also went back to school during the pandemic to get my Masters in Non-Profit Leadership from Oklahoma City University. I have always loved learning and I think that’s why I’m constantly hungry to do more and to take on new roles.
At my core, I am an actor, turned choreographer, turned director. When I first moved to NYC in Fall 2018, it was to audition and book as many performing gigs as possible. And while that’s an awesome dream, the first big gig I booked was choreographing an Off-Broadway musical called Seesaw. I was shocked and overwhelmed. I had just said yes to something I didn’t even know if I was “supposed” to be doing. I have always LOVED choreography, but this was NOT a part of my 15 year plan. The first 5-10 years I would work on Broadway, and then I would move on to become somebody’s associate choreographer, and then by time I’m in my late 30s/early 40s I’d start choreographing on my own while building a house somewhere in Connecticut. But here I was at 23 years old, choreographing an Off-Broadway musical just a couple blocks away from the theatre I made my Broadway debut in.
And how did I get this gig you may ask? Because someone I worked with in college believed in me and threw my name into the mix without me knowing. So much of my story is like this. Yes, I have worked extremely hard to be where I am today, but I have also somehow been blessed with an incredible community of family, teachers, mentors, etc who have decided to believe in me and say my name in rooms I’m not in.
So, after the Off-Broadway show Seesaw, the pandemic hit… Just when I was starting to get the ball rolling everything came to a screeching halt. (Instert Master’s degree here.) But yet again, a teacher from college thought I would be great for a choreography gig in Cape Cod the summer of 2021, so off I went. Well it just so happens that someone who has now become one of my biggest mentors and collaborators was directing a show at this theatre the summer of 2021. I have since gone on to work with this director 7 more times. And the director from Seesaw? 8 more times. Essentially from this point on, I caught the choreography bug, and that turned into me becoming an Associate Director, which then turned into directing a few projects on my own. And I did finally reach my goal of becoming somebody’s Associate Choreographer which has been so rewarding and always reminds me I have so much to learn.
As for performing, I’m still doing that too! I’ve performed Off-Broadway and in many regional productions since being in college. But what I’m most interested in is being in rooms that feel collaborative and fun. I think rehearsal rooms can become so intense and for what? Yes the work we are doing is really important, but it’s also singing and dancing in a room full of other people who are essentially giant kindergarteners that want to play. I have found that some of the work I’m proudest of has stemmed from a rehearsal room with great leadership. I strive to be like my mentors and to lead rooms like them.
Lastly, I have to mention my “side” jobs – teaching and accounting. I absolutely love teaching. I have taught dance at several Universities and worked at a couple of high schools in NYC. I also work with high school students across the country who are auditioning to get into musical theatre college programs. I think working with students and seeing their passion for what they do is so rewarding and it fuels me to keep going. And now let me circle back to that master’s degree. During the pandemic I started working for Boys and Girls Clubs of Oklahoma County and am now the accounting manager over 17 Boys and Girls Club sites. It is a job I have grown to love more and more over the years. It’s an organization that is doing incredible work and I’m happy to be just a very small part of it.
I have been so fortunate that people have taken a chance on me. It has lead to me working at dream theatres with dream people. And I’m getting to do it while working dream “side” jobs. I’m not sure what I did to get so lucky, but I hope I can do for others one day what people have done for me.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
I honestly can’t believe I still like my city or industry after my first year and a half of living in NYC.
After college, my roommate and I moved to NYC to pursue a career in musical theatre. We moved into a 2-bedroom apartment that seemed too good to be true. And it was. Bedbugs. We had bedbugs for seven months and never got rid of them. We finally had to break our lease and leave most of our furniture because the building was infested. Our friend’s very kind mother took us in, and we lived in NJ for a couple months while we waited for our next apartment. This time, a renovated 3 bedroom. Well, a few months later we were woken up by the fire alarms… The fire destroyed the entire back half of the building. Where did we live? Yep, the back half of the building. Time to buy a third couch. Next apartment, a giant 4 bedroom. We signed the lease March 1, 2020. I moved home to OKC March 18, 2020 and paid an entire year of NYC rent while living with my family during the pandemic.
On top of the apartment fiascos for this year and a half, I was working about 7 jobs at any given time. I taught at a dance studio, nannied for 2 families and babysat for another, taught dance for a company called MTCA, worked remotely for Boys and Girls Clubs of OKC, free-lanced for a marketing company, was starting to choreograph dance competition numbers, the list goes on. This was all while trying to go to ECCs (auditions) every week. I was booking nothing… I was booking nothing, I was covered in bedbug bites, and I couldn’t afford to take dance class let alone go out with my friends. But the fire inside me was still going for whatever reason, so I stuck it out…. And I’m so glad I did!!
I am now living in a 1 bedroom on the UWS, I’m working with some of my dream collaborators, and I just ran my own Dance ECC for a production of Frozen I am choreographing in the New Year.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I used to think I always had to know the answer. I still struggle with this. But it’s actually okay to not know every single thing. Lately, I have started stepping into more leadership roles in the theatre industry, and that sometimes makes me nervous because in my mind – I haven’t been doing this long enough to know all of the answers!
But what I’ve come to find out is that nobody does. And people who say they do are just pretending or think they will look weak if they don’t know an answer.
I remember being so nervous to direct my very first show a few years ago, because I was afraid an actor or a production team member would ask me a question that I didn’t have the answer to. I thought the director has to know everything because they are the director. The leader of everyone. But as I said before, it’s actually okay to not have the answer. Some of my favorite directors will say, “hmm that’s a great question. Let me think on it and I’ll get back to you.” The first time I was an associate director and I heard the director say that, I was shocked. It was so simple. And I actually really respected the honesty instead of a made up answer.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.caitlinbelcik.com
- Instagram: @cebelcik
- Facebook: Caitlin Belcik
- Youtube: Caitlin Belcik
Image Credits
Ted Ely
Russ Rowland