<p>What is the recommended attire for BFA auditions? My S has his first audition in a week and a half. Thanks.</p>
<p>Casual. You don’t want to look preppy. You might want to base it on his audition materials.</p>
<p>I’d say just…neat. A jacket and tie would definitely be overdoing it. A dress shirt sans tie might be overdoing it too. </p>
<p>At my son’s first audition, he overdid it a little with dress pants and a button-down shirt sans tie. </p>
<p>At that audition, he saw a kid wearing a white button-down shirt with rolled sleeves and top button unbuttoned, a vest, and respectable looking jeans. My son liked the vest look so much that he wore the exact same outfit for the rest of his auditions. His shoes were a casual lace-up type, but they were leather, and new-looking.</p>
<p>Interestingly, we ran into that same kid at a later audition. The kid was auditioning for the other college’s MT program that day, and he was much more dressed up, as is the norm for MT auditions. Perhaps he was too preoccupied to notice that my son had so closely emulated his “acting program audition” mode of dress!</p>
<p>Another look might be a light pullover sweater over a shirt with a collar. Might be a little too bulky and warm though.</p>
<p>My son wore khaki dress slacks (not khakis, too casual in my opinion, khaki colored dress slacks) with a coordinating button-down shirt and caramel colored leather loafers. He usually had the shirt sleeves rolled up, as he was most comfortable that way, which is important. Your son needs to wear something he’ll feel good in while still making a positive impression. </p>
<p>I would have to amend CCasey’s “casual” to “dressy casual”. What would he wear to a nice family brunch in a hotel or to accept a scholarship award at school? Think along those lines.</p>
<p>I hope that this year’s group of auditioners do outfit themselves in “dressy casual” attire, because when my D was auditioning (she is a college sophomore now), at least 75% of the kids we saw who were auditioning for acting (not musical theater … acting) were dressed way, way down, and it seemed inappropriate to me. Many, many of them wore worn out jeans (some were even ripped) and wrinkled graphic tee shirts. The worst-dressed bunch were auditioning for Boston University in New York City during Unifieds. The best dressed group we saw (doing straight acting) were people auditioning for Minnesota-Guthrie in New York.</p>
<p>Interesting about the difference between the kids auditioning with your daughter for Minnesota-Guthrie and Boston University, NMR.</p>
<p>My son didn’t audition for Minnesota-Guthrie, but he did audition for BU in New York last spring and the kids at that audition were not dressed sloppily. They looked like the kids at every other audition we went to. </p>
<p>Conceivably many of the kids at your daughter’s BU audition session were connected in some way…they could have been kids from a NYC arts school who scheduled their auditions en masse (perhaps with the help of a faculty member) at exactly the same time, for example. Far fetched, perhaps, lol…but not impossible I guess.</p>
<p>I had read here on CC about the ripped jeans/inappropriate t-shirt phenomenon for acting applicants, but to be honest I did not see that at any of my son’s auditions. He auditioned for SUNY Purchase, NYU, BU, CMU, Rutgers and Montclair.</p>
<p>All – thanks. This gives me a better idea of the look he should be striving for – need to make sure he’s got comfortable shoes…</p>
<p>I wore a black and grey striped sweater with black slacks and dress shoes.</p>
<p>NJTheatreMom, nope, the kids were not connected far as I could see; my D talked to a number of them and they came from all over the place. (As a funny aside, several of them were talking to my D about how much they loathed “those musical theater types who get so dressed up,” and one commented on musical theater girls and their “made up eyelashes.” My D, who spent a lot of time with her own eye makeup, sort of slunk down in her seat. As she told me later “I felt a bit like Elle Woods in Legally Blonde where she arrives at Harvard dressed in pink and everyone else is in jeans or wearing black.”)</p>
<p>My daughter, who is a jr in a BFA MT program, tells me that “business casual” seems to be the standard for guys, both for the acting and MT programs. She has taken classes on auditioning both at school and with the casting director at a major professional theatre in our city and, again, business casual is the recommended standard for guys.</p>
<p>Thanks Michael – business casual is a pretty well understood description (and fortunately is something already in the wardrobe)…</p>
<p>I’m auditioning for BFA MT programs at Unifieds, and I consider myself more of a dancer than an actor. I’m confused, because business casual isn’t something I can dance in. I feel like I should be more dressed up than what I’d wear to a dance audition for the songs & monologue portion, but I still want to be able to really dance. I would just bring two separate outfits, one ‘business casual’ and one dance attire, but then will I be given the opportunity to change? I’m so confused. Does anyone have any advice?</p>
<p>At most MT auditions, there is time to change. Therefore, for your songs and monologues, you’d have a dressier outfit (but not super dressy) and then for dance, you’d dance in your dance attire.</p>
<p>For a Design interview, what would be suggested for a male to wear?</p>
<p>Business casual.</p>
<p>Alright. Thanks!</p>
<p>Update – at my son’s first audition a few weeks ago it was very casual. Kids wore what they were comfortable in – corduroys, sneakers, etc. They did a warm up exercise with existing BFA Acting students and then did individual auditions in a room with three auditors (i.e. director/professors in the program). I think it’s a good idea to check with each school to see what the norm is. Some schools post it on their audition-related websites. I think a phone call is always best – but that’s just me…</p>