In this Women’s History Month submission, AGMA Member Tanya Roberts charts her journey from the opera world to cruise ship life, where the gender dynamics she once knew were flipped. Through her experience as a performer and leader at sea, she examines the barriers women face in male-dominated spaces and the importance of mentorship and mutual support in creating change.
Beyond the Opera House: Finding My Voice as a Woman at Sea
By Tanya Roberts, Chorister
Coming from opera, sopranos make up the largest percentage of applicants, even though the repertoire itself frequently favors male roles. But when I stepped onto a cruise ship for the first time, the ratio flipped immediately. Globally, less than 2% of accredited seafarers are women.
When I began my training as a classical singer, I imagined a traditional path. Like many young artists, I pictured opera houses, orchestras, and the long lineage of singers who had built careers on the world’s great stages. What I didn’t imagine was that one day I would be performing opera on cruise ships.
In 2018, ten years into my performing career, I joined what was then an unusual experiment in cruise ship entertainment. I was cast as the sole soprano in the inaugural Opera on the High Seas cast aboard Azamara. The idea was bold: instead of relying on pop revue shows, the ship would feature a small opera cast as its primary entertainment. While the experiment lasted only nine months before the company returned to a more traditional model, the experience reshaped my understanding of gender roles, leadership, and opportunity.
Coming from opera, I was accustomed to an industry where women outnumber men. At many auditions, sopranos make up the largest percentage of applicants, even though the repertoire itself frequently favors male roles. But when I stepped onto a cruise ship for the first time, the ratio flipped immediately.
Globally, less than 2% of accredited seafarers are women. On passenger vessels, the overall crew ratio often hovers around seven men for every woman. For someone coming from a field overflowing with female singers, the shift was striking.
Ship life is also shaped by an international workforce. Many crew members come from cultures where traditional expectations around family and gender roles remain strong. A typical contract involves six months onboard, followed by two months of vacation. Crew must frequently choose to leave their families for half a year to provide financial support that may not be possible on land. These realities shape who enters the industry and who eventually rises within it.
Cruise ships promote heavily from within. When fewer women enter the workforce at entry-level positions, fewer women are positioned to move into leadership roles later. As a performer, the highest step on the entertainment ladder is to lead the department as a Cruise Director or Entertainment Manager. On my first contract, only one of the six Cruise Directors across the fleet’s four ships was a woman.
Nonetheless, I fell in love with life at sea. When the opera cast experiment ended, the cruise line and I found a way for me to stay, and I transitioned into the role of Assistant Cruise Director. Yet further advancement felt elusive. Cruise Directors, I worked under shared a similar profile: cis white men, usually from North America or Britain.
Beyond the traditional command structure, another subtle factor influenced my career trajectory: guest surveys. At the end of each voyage, guests complete evaluations that the company translates into numerical performance ratings. Scores carry enormous weight. They influence promotions and evaluations and determine continued employment.
Within the industry, there is a troubling perception that female Cruise Directors are rated more harshly than their male counterparts, a concern used as an example of how bias can shape professional outcomes. That these surveys are most often completed by female guests adds a troubling and frustrating dynamic. Whether or not the perception of bias in evaluations is accurate, it reflects a larger question: how can women support one another in leadership spaces where we remain underrepresented?
For me, the answer has been to consciously work in the opposite direction. In a leadership position as Cruise Director, I try to help interested performers – particularly those who would not traditionally be in leadership positions – develop their own shows and career paths, whether toward guest entertainer careers or positions within cruise administration.
But the reality is that the arts – and the maritime industry – are stronger when women lift each other up. In the eight years since I first stepped onboard, I’ve also witnessed encouraging change. On my most recent ship aboard Windstar, women made up roughly 20% of the crew, the highest proportion I’ve ever seen. Even more exciting was seeing women working in departments historically dominated by men, particularly engineering and deck operations.
I began my career expecting to work in an industry where women outnumbered men. Instead, I found myself in one where the opposite is true. The setting may be different, but the dynamics are familiar: in industries where women remain underrepresented in leadership, the same patterns tend to repeat. The way forward is equally familiar: when we support other women and mentor them into leadership, we aren’t competing for the same narrow path – we’re widening the horizon for everyone.