Anyone else going to Tisch regardless of how much you'll owe?

College Majors Theater/Drama Majors
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<p>Sadly, it is true that not everyone in the world is nice and my S and I have encountered the stereotypical stage parent on more than one occasion. That said, I NEVER met anyone who deliberately tried to sabotage another kid auditioning and to the contrary, most of the parents were quite nice. The best thing to do at any audition is to just focus on the material and on preparing yourself and ignore the rest.</p>

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<p>I seriously doubt that anyone posting to this forum is knowingly giving bad advice, ajrover. I see no reason to believe that those on this thread were trying to steer Billy! away from Tisch to keep him from succeeding. You may not agree with us but, like you, we are just trying to help.</p>

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<p>I have to say that while I was prepared to meet horrific stage parents during the audition process, I mostly met a lot of nice caring parents who seemed to be going through the same thing I was. It was fairly easy to spot the helicopter stage parents and I armored myself with lots of books and an ipod to tune them out. I have also found this forum on cc to be incredibly helpful and supportive and I don’t think people would take the time to give kids wrong advice to enhance their own kid’s position. I am glad my D will be studying with Billy at the Meisner studio in the fall!! We are looking forward to a great experience.</p>

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<p>ajrover, how do you know which kids from your audition group (or day) got accepted? The day my D auditioned for NYU, the room was packed. She didn’t have time (and I didn’t bother!) finding out every single auditioner’s name so that she could track who she saw again when she went to the first day of class.</p>

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<p>Don’t let these stage moms bully you! Believe in yourself and you can do anything. My boyfriend went to Tisch and studied at Playwrights and he had to get huge loans and he’s still paying them off but he is a working actor and had the most fulfilling time at Tisch and that kind of training made him the actor he is today! He doesn’t regret a second of it and I don’t think you will either! Most people never have an opportunity to fulfill their dream and you have beaten the odds to get into a trully incredible conservatory program. I believe that if you really want it in your heart than you should do it! it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity and no a BA doesn’t cut it for most professional actors! Every actor has a different path but many of the actors that I audition against have BFA’s from Tisch and that really gives them a leg up! Be the best artist you can be…there are enough obstacles against an actor coming out fresh from school but you might as well enter the professional world from an acting school that people in the industry actually know and respect.</p>

<p>Good luck.
-words from a professional actress who wishes she had YOUR opportunity :)</p>

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<p>Hmm, tell that “that a BA won’t cut it in the professional world” to those extremely talented young men and women graduating from Northwestern and Fordham.</p>

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<p>Darla, you posted elsewhere that you work professionally as an actress and you have NO college degree. </p>

<p>Believe me, I love Tisch, as my kid is a recent graduate.</p>

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<p>“Hmm, tell that “that a BA won’t cut it in the professional world” to those extremely talented young men and women graduating from Northwestern and Fordham.”</p>

<p>agreed… as well as the countless other BA programs around the country… considering we all know BA program alums who have graduated who are currently working as performers in TV/film, national tours, regional theatre, on and off Broadway (many who graduated within the past few years and are working successfully “right out of the gate…”)</p>

<p>many paths to a professional career… conservatory, BFA, BA, no degree… very successful actors whose degrees are in completely different fields than theatre who have trained during college and/or post college. :)</p>

<p>The posters who suggested on this site that students think through the amount of debt that they themselves take on to attend a “dream school” were trying to be helpful. It is important that everyone weigh the possible consequences personal debt could have on the ability to pursue professional opportunities post graduation. That way when decisions are made at age 17 or 18 they are made with eyes open. We all hope for the best possible circumstances… but there are always ups and downs of which to be aware.</p>

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<p>My D said that Matt Doyle got into a number of the most prestigious BFA programs in the US, elected instead to study for a year in London, and look how well he’s done! Jonathan Groff decided not to attend CMU and seems to be doing quite well, too, without a college education!</p>

<p>Granted, these are the superstar exceptions, but just goes to show you that there’s no one path.</p>

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<p>soozievt, I do work as an actress professionally and I did take half the courses needed to acquire a BFA and I actually REGRET that I couldn’t finish the remaining two years that it would have taken me to get my own BFA. That is why I have applied as a transfer student to NYU Tisch for this autumn! </p>

<p>Education in acting is super important and I’m sure I’ve lost roles to other actors who DID finish their BFA’s so even though I am a member of all three acting unions and am now a little older at 23 - I’m still going to try to go back to school and am really hoping I’ll be accepted. I’m so glad Billy IS going to Tisch after all. Congrats to him!</p>

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<p>Darla…I realize you think education is important and so do I! My point was that your statement that a BA won’t cut it in the professional world (totally disagree with you) would be like saying someone without a college degree won’t cut it and well, you are working professionally and do not have a college degree. Therefore such blanket statements just are not true. Many people who have BAs have gone onto huge success in this profession. My D only wanted and applied to BFA programs but I fully recognize the desire and worth of those who choose the BA path. It’s different but can also lead to professional work in theater.</p>

<p>Best of luck with your transfer application to Tisch!</p>

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<p>I should rephrase my words. I don’t mean to say that no actors with BA’s get acting work because that’s simply not true like you said- all I mean is that when you are fresh out of school as an actor its SUPER hard to get agent representation as it is but you definitely get a leg up if you can include in a coverletter or mention in your interview that you graduated with a BFA in acting. It shows how serious you are about acting as a profession/that you have no backup plan which people seem to like because it shows confidence! Also you might be rather green and without professional acting credits yet- but at least with a BFA on your resume they would know that you have lots of hands on acting experience in a conservatory style program- not just studying the history and approaches to acting in a classroom lecture style atmosphere.</p>

<p>There is no one single path to an acting career like you said- I was just trying to suggest that a BFA from a super well known school like Tisch or Juilliard looks superior on an acting resume than just a BA from a less well known state school in Middle America (not that I am knocking that!) I’ve just found this sort of snobbery from many of the casting directors and managers I’ve worked with and I just want every kid to have the best shot they can!</p>

<p>And thanks so much! I found out I was accepted to Tisch this morning and I’m thrilled ! eek :)</p>

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<p>Congrats on your Tisch acceptance, Darla!! Awesome! I hope you love it as much as my daughter has. </p>

<p>Still, I believe some very talented students are coming out of strong BA programs in theater. A former student whom I advised, as just one of many examples I could list, is about to graduate from Brown and has booked The MUNY this summer and just booked a national tour for next year. Actually another friend of my girls who graduated Brown has played a lead on a national tour (cast while he was still a student there). </p>

<p>Do I think that BFA training is excellent? Indeed I do. My own kid took that path, after all. But I know some kids who got into BFA programs but chose BA theater programs at schools like Yale, Brown, and Northwestern, and have an excellent shot at making it and these degrees will also look good on their resumes. Also, they did not just study history of theater and so on, but also had courses in performance areas like acting, movement, speech, singing, etc. and were in excellent productions at these universities. My D was just in a staged reading this week in NYC of a new musical with some actors with Broadway credits and such and one actor in the reading has a BA from Brown in theater. Just saying.</p>

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<p>Wow. I come down on different places in all parts of this discussion! I don’t have a lot of time for a major back and forth right now and some of what I‘m about to say tends to lead to those, but … where to start? LOL </p>

<p>First, I think it’s more than slightly over-the-top to suggest that stage moms on this forum are trying to advance the position of their own kids by discouraging someone from taking on mountains of debt to go to Tisch or anywhere else. I mean, come on … It would make just as much sense to accuse someone of encouraging a kid to take on all that debt because it can seriously cripple a young actor (i.e. “the competition”) right out the gate. I’ve seen it happen and I think gc03 who is also a working actor has said he’s seen the same. I’ll bet Sooz’s D has seen it as well. </p>

<p>As for the advantages of a BFA vs. a BA vs. a MFA vs. no degree at all, I think the only immutable truth in all that is that every actor is different and has different goals. I also think we tend to get things mixed up on this forum between the people with straight theatre, musical theatre and TV/Film mindsets and aspirations which are all completely different animals. Then there’s the added confusion as to the different levels at which each is done. Hell, I made my “Regional Theatre” debut playing Shakespeare around six weeks after graduating from high school; but, needless to say, it wasn’t at any place like the Guthrie or South Coast Rep … </p>

<p>I would be curious to see the proof of significant numbers of under-30 actors with bare BA degrees working “straight out the gate” in high-end Regional Theatre playing anything approaching the major young roles of the classic stage. I’m not out there doing that scene and don‘t plan on it anytime soon, but my information from people who are is that it’s just not true. There was a time when it was commonplace, but things have changed and, yes, the standards have gone through the roof. Most BAs - or really even some BFAs - don’t offer anywhere near the necessary work in the classic repertoire nor on the voice and body to enable a reasonably talented young actor to be competitive in those venues. Nowadays, a lot of artistic directors at the better Regionals won’t even give you the time of day without an MFA or a BFA from a small handful of conservatory programs. Rightly or wrongly, some don’t even want conservatory BFAs except for juvenile roles. You will see some LORT slaves with BAs, but they’re usually relegated to “second spear carrier” or some such until they go back and get additional training.</p>

<p>I’m not saying any of this to denigrate the BA degree. It‘s a perfectly legitimate way to go, but it does typically imply the need for additional training - usually the immersive kind - if you’re talking about playing the classics in the major repertory companies. That is if you’re not some kind of genius like a Ben Kingsley … </p>

<p>Of course, none of this accounts for celebrities from the TV and Film world who get stunt cast in straight plays on Broadway as a means of putting butts in the seats, either; but, I think we’ve all seen how that usually works out when they didn‘t originally come from a strong theatre background … Crucifixion, anyone? :wink: There are also some very good young straight actors playing contemporary roles on Broadway with BAs, but if you’ll look a little deeper, you’ll find that most came from entertainment families.</p>

<p>As for screen acting, it’s definitely more wide open, but my experience thus far is like Darla’s in that the prestigious training does get you taken more seriously. There are varying schools of thought on that - especially in LA - so here are a couple of links to opinions showing the opposite extremes …</p>

<p>[The</a> Casting Corner: October 25, 2004 Archives](<a href=“http://more.showfax.com/columns/corner/archives/2004_10_25.html]The”>http://more.showfax.com/columns/corner/archives/2004_10_25.html)
[The</a> Berg Studios: Showcase & Press](<a href=“http://www.thebergstudios.com/showcases.html]The”>http://www.thebergstudios.com/showcases.html)</p>

<p>My own case leads my opinion towards the latter. Remember that when you get signed by a good agency, it usually means someone else got dropped. The person I “replaced” at mine was a pretty big name when I was in high school, but she never took the appropriate steps to advance her craft past the teeny bopper stuff and wasn’t booking anymore. As for the “green” part, I expressed some trepidation to a casting director before accepting my second SAG role last summer because it was going to condemn me to unionhood for life when I had very little on-camera experience. There’s no accounting for the “smoke up the skirt” factor, but what she told me was, “They don’t hire the young Harvard lawyer because he knows his way around the building. If that was all they wanted, they’d promote the janitor.” </p>

<p>Just my perspective …</p>

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<p>Fishbowl, you just expressed so well what I’ve literally sat at my computer for hours trying to articulate. Just wanna say: yes, yes and yes to all of that. She speaks the truth! Especially in regard to training and it’s application to different disciplines which, I agree, is often very much glossed over in this forum.</p>

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<p>As fishbowlfreshman points out, he doesn’t want to get into a back and forth. And neither do I. The one thing I absolutely agree with is that every actor, every artist finds their own way in. The best way to train. </p>

<p>No school, no matter the reputation, will get you a job. Training, talent, personal skill, instincts and drive will do that. Well, those things and a bit of good fortune now and again. BA, BFA, MFA don’t mean a damned thing if you didn’t get the training while in the programs. And there is quality training in plenty of places.</p>

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<p>I was fully prepared to have my head bitten off after posting that! LOL At any rate, there was a veteran Regional Theatre actor posting on CC a couple of years ago who went by the name of Tarhunt who from all I’ve seen and heard manifested an almost clichéd example of the mindset of the generation now serving as the gatekeepers to that area of theatre. Agree or disagree, it’s worth looking up some of his old posts for examples of what I was talking about in regard to some of those preferences and prejudices. Here are some quotes …</p>

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<p>He pulled no punches whatsoever when it came to his views on the MT crowd … </p>

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<p>Of course, the question that must be begged is why they contend the American system should take seven years to accomplish what the British “trade courses” typically do better in three … Also, I think the great equalizer in all this is innate ability which varies greatly. I made reference in my last post to geniuses like Ben Kingsley and actors like that certainly exist although I tend to think they’re more or less a handful in a generation kind of thing. For a real treat, get on YouTube and check out Kingsley’s one man show as [Edmund</a> Kean](<a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O-Ib2ep1hc]Edmund”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O-Ib2ep1hc) keeping in mind that he had very little formal training …</p>

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<p>Great post, FBF, good to hear from you again. I too have asked the question, “what is the most important thing for an actor?”. Many times, over 20 years. The answer I’ve gotten most often, from the people I’ve most respected, is, “get a good education.” Still true, after all these years…</p>

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<p>Fishbowl- Amen.</p>

<p>About the UK/US schooling comment, I have a book called Will Power by John Basil about learning how to act Shakespeare. Basil once hated Shakespeare but after going to a lecture given by John Barton, the Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, he did a full 180 and started learning more, and eventually developed a system of learning Shakespeare based on what the speaker outlined as the British technique. Apparently, Barton talked about how the British work on a set acting technique(classical training, I suppose) , and the Americans are all about emotion and method acting(or variations- this was in the 80s), and he said that American actors could be so much better at Shakespeare than the Brits if we could combine a good solid technique with our emotional connection to the material. We tend to get bogged down with technique, but Barton felt its simpler to learn. So I suppose the difference in years for schooling could have something to do with that…</p>