Most people understand the necessity of working two jobs when the budget calls for it. Sometimes it takes more than one paycheck to pay off bills, put kids through college or deal with emergencies. But does anyone take on a dual workload for enjoyment?
Yes, if you have two strong passions and want to pursue them both, affirmed Patrick Cuccaro. At this very busy time in his life, he can't imagine doing anything else.
By day, Cuccaro is the general manager of Affairs to Remember Caterers, a leading Southeast caterer and winner of the 2005 Consumers' Choice Award for Business Excellence as Best Caterer in Atlanta. He oversees the company's catering consultants, research, human resources and public relations.
"I'm the luckiest person in the food industry. I work 50 hours a week with no nights or weekends," he said.
Planning parties may seem trivial to some, but not when you look at the bigger picture, Cuccaro said. "As a caterer, I'm helping people share some of the most important moments of their lives with their family and friends."
An avid cook, Cuccaro has had a passion for food for as long as he can remember. Since his first stage performance at 12, he's had an equally strong passion for the theater, which is why he spends his nights and weekends writing plays. In 2005, he was named playwright-in-residence at Theatre Decatur (formerly Neighborhood Playhouse) and will produce six plays - two of them musicals - in the next two years.
Cuccaro started his professional acting career at 19 but soon felt drawn to directing and writing. He feels fortunate to have owned Showcase Cabaret in Ansley Mall in the late '70s and early '80s.
"Those were exciting times in Atlanta theater, and a lot was happening in the cabarets," he said.
Owning a venue honed Cuccaro's skills as theatrical producer, director and choreographer and earned him an Atlanta Circle of Drama Critics Best Production award for "Something for Everyone" in 1978.
He attributes his playwright-in-residence position to the critiques and invaluable marketing advice he got through his affiliation with Working Title Playwrights, an Atlanta play-development organization. His first script, "An Imperfect Order," a comedy about the changing relationship between an aging father and his son, opens in June.
So how does he manage both careers?
"I'm a pretty focused individual," Cuccaro said. "I gave up TV and write at night and one day on the weekend. I cook and eat high-quality foods, and I exercise five times a week.
"When you have a very specific amount of time to accomplish something, you approach it differently, and you place a higher value on everything you do."
He doesn't see either job as work and says they balance each other. For example, creativity is as necessary in successful catering as it is in playwriting.
"To keep Affairs to Remember on the cutting edge, I'm constantly reinventing and innovating. I know what it's like to stage 40 actors, so I bring a sense of theatrical flair to my catering work," he said.
Conversely, working in the business world keeps him from "cocooning in the artistic community and losing all contact with the real world," he added. "It causes my characters to be authentic."
Russ Starrett has found a similar satisfying balance from his careers in nursing and music. A cardiac rehabilitation nurse at Piedmont Hospital four days a week and a popular jazz pianist on many weekends, Starrett said, "If a person has a talent for expression, then I would hope it would come out in both professions.
"Listening is critical in both jobs. A musician has to take a song, listen to what others are doing and synthesize his part to the whole. In nursing, you listen, observe and analyze the needs of your patients. The better listener you are, the more attuned you are to what affects them."
Starrett grew up playing the piano in his minister father's church before serving as a medic in the Army (1975-80), getting married and having children.
While going to college to earn his nursing degree, he also was playing in a salsa band and studying jazz with Ted Howe, a graduate of the renowned Berklee College of Music in Boston.
"I was driven to music and started most mornings in the practice room at Georgia State, playing scales and exercises to improve my technique while reading nursing books," he said. "The playing would lock me in and help my concentration."
The plan was to become a musician and have nursing as a fall-back career, but a grueling stint as a restaurant pianist convinced him otherwise.
The hours were long, the income was "chancy" and the schedule took him away from his first priority, his family.
"Choosing nursing as a career wasn't tough, because it was something I wanted to do, and I knew I'd keep studying [music] and performing. It was never an either/or situation," Starrett said. "I consider it a duty to use your God-given talents."
He plays for his church and a nursing home every Sunday, as well as jazz gigs whenever he can.
Twenty years of nursing and playing have convinced him that his two careers "inform one another." With each you make a commitment and start with science, Starrett said.
"You learn the theory and you practice. You keep adding to your knowledge ... and once the intuition side emerges and you're living it, the science evolves into art."
For Elizabeth Wells Berkes, a practical and flexible job is the perfect balance for an artistic career. Her job as box office supervisor at the Woodruff Arts Center supports her first love: acting.
"When I was a kid, if you sat still long enough, I would sing, dance or puppet-show something at you," she said, laughing. "And I loved those little tape recorders from RadioShack. I'd tape my parents' soundtracks and create entire radio plays over them." Berkes took every theater course at Wheaton College, graduated and came to Atlanta in 1992 to participate in a two-year acting internship at the Alliance Theatre. She was lucky to land an entry-level customer-service job at the box office.
"I kept it for 11 years because it offered me so much flexibility. The manager knew acting was my focus and would let me off for auditions or for six weeks if I was doing a show in North Carolina or Florida," Berkes said.
Two years ago, a new manager offered her a 40-hour-per-week, salaried position as box office supervisor.
"I told him I still planned to act and that when I was in a play, it would be my first priority and claim my creative energies," Berkes said. "I asked him, 'If I can get the work done, does it matter if I work the 40 hours into a really weird schedule?' He said 'no.' It's been really good of him to be so flexible."
It's hardest during rehearsals for a new play, when her hours are most erratic, but works fine when she's performing. She's currently playing a "sweet young thing" in "Charley's Aunt" at Theatre in the Square.
"I sell tickets during the day, then drive up to Marietta, put on a corset and bustle, and become a 'veddy' silly British girl," Berkes said.
She considers playing the lead in Tennessee Williams' "Summer and Smoke" at Theatrical Outfit last year a high-water mark in her career. She will appear in "The Underpants," a Steve Martin play coming to the Alliance Theatre in May.
"Doing live theater is the most rewarding acting. To have people in the same room with you, to hear them breathe quicker, sit up straighter in their seats, cry - it's a communion," she said.
Working 70 to 80 hours a week can be tiring, but Berkes doesn't have to worry about benefits or a paycheck between acting jobs.
"My husband [actor Brik Berkes] and I just bought a house, and I doubt we would have qualified without my work history at the box office," she said.
Stamina is one of the greatest challenges of working two jobs.
"As long as I can get enough sleep at night and caffeine during the day, I can manage," Berkes said. "Besides, when you're doing something you love, it's easier to dig down and bring up those mysterious reserves that we all have."
Cuccaro advises those contemplating dual jobs or careers to consider whether, in 10 years, they would regret doing it - or regret not doing it.
"My advice: Don't live with regrets," he said.