Applying to Drama School – 5 Tips
If you want to be a professional actor, the traditional route is to go to a nationally accredited drama school.
TIP 1: MAKE SURE IT’S A DUCK
They say if it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then it’s a duck.
I’m afraid that’s not the case. There are many course masquerading as professional level training courses, which are really ways of extorting money out of aspirational people. They hope that because the course is unique (and yet lacking the accreditation) it will somehow help them.
Look, it’s simple, if you want to be an actor, local college and university are probably not going to help. Yes, some actors succeed this way, but too few to bank upon.
TIP 2: APPLY EARLY
The early bird catches to worm. (since we were on bird metaphors previously)
There’s an awful lot of people applying for a very few places at the UK’s many drama schools. It makes sense to get your drama school application in early. Once those places are gone, they will create a waiting list. It is a cruel agony to be on a waiting list and then never getting picked. You have to reapply next year – with no guarantee of getting through.
TIP 3: DON’T SWEAT YOUR AUDITION MONOLOGUES TOO MUCH
People put way too much stress into their choice of drama school audition monologues.
Choose two pieces, where the psychological action of the character is different in each. This is the real meaning of contrasting, not just a comic piece and a dramatic piece and hope they are actually contrasting.
They might have heard the same speech from Immaculate a million times before, but it’s about what you do with it that counts. I’ve known auditionees nail a drama school place with a well known, over done pieces.
But equally, I’ve known people choose really contemporary interesting pieces from plays they are passionate about – and not just something they read in A-Level or Higher Drama.
TIP 4: IT’S A NUMBERS GAME
There are a lot of people applying. There are only certain amount of places at a certain number of institutions. But if you apply to many, you give yourself the best chance.
If you apply to ten, you stand a better chance, a much better chance than applying to the closest one and hoping. Then when you don’t get in, you trade it for a local college performing arts course and a nice career in a call centre somewhere.
Apply to as many as you can possibly afford to apply to. I’ve known people get into none, I’ve known people to get into all, and I’ve seen people scoop victory from the jaws of defeat, finally being successful at their last audition.
Oh.. and one more for free. If you’re only going to give it one go and then give up, you may as well save yourself the time and money and go do something else now. The chances are you aren’t getting in the first time, but several of my favourite people took, 2, 3, 4 auditions to get in, and they are exception people.
TIP 5: GET SOME HELP
Of course there are those apparently talented folks who swan in and seem to pluck their place at a drama school out of thin air. But for the rest of us, there’s help…
These days most drama schools charge extortionate fees for ‘audition preparation’ classes, whilst warning they make no promises, which of course they do not. Take care with these courses, they are useful, but they are also created by drama schools needing to create revenue. They sell the dream, but don’t have the responsibility to deliver it.
Get some professional help, in my career I’ve often helped people with good instincts and some ability to surpass those ‘talented’ ones that didn’t do any kind of preparation at all. With proper preparation from a professional drama school audition coach, you can get a real head start on the competition.