Experiences seeing campus productions

College Majors Theater/Drama Majors
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<p>I thought I'd start a thread on this because it's come up in another and I bet we can get a good discussion going. It's a topic that deserves attention for people visiting and considering schools.</p>

<p>PLEASE let us not use this thread to evaluate the quality of specific schools, only to discuss experiences with this aspect of visiting.</p>

<p>The questions are: how important is it to see productions at schools you are considering, and what has been your experience both in seeing productions at perspective schools and/or then experiencing productions when attending?</p>

<p>My D wasn't able to see productions at very many schools. We live far awayfrom pretty much everywhere she applied, and we had to go when we could. But she had some very interesting experiences visiting schools, and now is starting her second year in a BFA, where she has seen many productions, and participated in several.</p>

<p>At one school we visited, we saw a BA project play that was outstanding - one of the most unusual and affecting pieces of theatre we've ever experienced. We also saw a BFA Senior Showcase play that we both (independently) felt was very weak and poorly cast. Her other experience was seeing a rehearsal while on an audition visit; she was pleased with it but not blown away. We got to see the set, too, which was quite stunning.</p>

<p>We both were reluctant to judge any of these schools on the basis of a single performance, high or low. From these experiences, we realized how variable and unpredictable that one moment in time is, compared to 4 years of learning.</p>

<p>Now that she has spent one year as a student, I think she would say she feels this even more strongly. Her department did many main stage productions, and there were also student-run plays and scenes. These shows varied widely, and people who saw one versus another could have polar opposite opinions about the program. In addition, while we'd like to think of these productions as "quality" focused, I think their real purpose at the school is education. They aren't going to cast every part with the most "talented" students, nor are they going to avoid risks in the material they choose (I hope). </p>

<p>Believe me, she CARES strongly about being involved in a quality show in a quality program, and overall, she feels very positive about the education she is getting AND the productions they put on. I guess I would just say that deciding about a school is a complex process that includes lots and lots of factors, and personally I think seeing a show is way less important than checking out the curriculum, students, profs, facilities, etc.</p>

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<p>Emmybet wrote:</p>

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<p>I agree with this. In some college productions, students might be cast according to what they need to work on rather than according to their greatest strengths.</p>

<p>We never attended any productions during campus visits, though I think it’s a nice idea if you can manage it.</p>

<p>I think the best ways to learn about a program are to 1.) Study the curriculum very closely, 2.) During a visit, sit it in on a class or two if at all possible, and/or maybe attend a rehearsal, 3.) Communicate with current students in the program, 4.) Talk to faculty during your visit, if at all possible.</p>

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<p>Since this thread was probably started at least partly in response to my own recent post about viewing productions, I’ll “bite” and present my son’s and my experience. </p>

<p>First–backstory–my daughter was a theater major at a liberal-arts college, and we saw two or three mainstage and student-directed shows there each year. I was also lucky enough to be able to talk about them with faculty (both theater and other departments). Add to that my 25+ years as an arts teacher, and I definitely “get it” that quality varies according to student talent and educational intent. That’s a given. Anyone who goes to a college level production expecting Broadway is probably in for a disappointment.</p>

<p>BUT. I am deeply convinced that you can tell a lot about the department’s philosophy, its imagination, its priorities, its willingness to let the students take risks, its attention to detail, and more, from seeing a mainstage show. What’s going on in front of you–the energy, the give-and-take, that sense of life–all of that is 100 times more authentic than a list of courses or a marketing-department-designed brochure or website, which is how most of us gain our first impressions of a program. Curriculum descriptions are words on paper–words that, for many 17-year-olds, really don’t convey a lot of meaning, and that may not really have much to do with what actually happens in the studio. But a shabby theater can be transformed by a vibrant production in which the students are clearly not just skilled but in love with what they are doing and learning, while a beautiful new facility can seem sterile and flat with a predictable, paint-by-numbers production on its stage. It’s not about perfection–it’s about truth in performance and a sense that the students are developing not just skills but a strong artistic direction.</p>

<p>I have no problem with seeing flawed performances. Neither does my son. But it’s one thing to hear current students tell you how great their program is, and quite another to see them up on stage, acting from the heart. And if the plays are designed and directed by their professors, then the departmental vision and the strength of student-faculty collaboration will be apparent. Acting is live, it’s risky, it takes place in real-time, and there’s no faking those shows–what you see is what they really can do. I think many kids are able to gauge the maturity and “talent” (however you define that) when they are watching a production, by the way. My son’s and my most interesting conversations about schools have taken place when discussing a show we saw, not when dissecting a course list or talking about the spiel we got from a faculty member (some are awful, some are great, in our experience). </p>

<p>If we could choose the absolute BEST way to assess a school, I’d definitely vote for attending a summer program, by the way! Too many schools, not enough $$$…</p>

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<p>Times3 - nicely put!</p>

<p>My S and I went to performances at the schools that are closest to us. We plan to do a few others at the beginning of the year. Would I travel to a college far away just to see a show? No. But if the opportunity arises, it is yet another way to see a college program “at work”. </p>

<p>Our intention in going to a show was not to gauge the caliber of the program from the production. As others have said, you just can’t do that. What we were trying to do was to get the feel of the students’ level of participation, risk-taking, excitement, and - way important to us - sheer enjoyment of being up on that stage! We loved to look at the audience - who was coming to the production? Obligatory parents, lots of supportive people from the college community, lots of locals? Was the cast all students or does the college have professionals on the stage that work side-by-side with the students (we saw this at Emerson). </p>

<p>I think it is still important to look at the things that EmmyBet referred to. I do look at the curriculum and course lists, but have found that colleges differ in their descriptions. Some list specific courses (Adler method, or physical acting, or whatever) and some colleges just say “Acting II”. Well, maybe they cover those same topics in good ol’ Acting II - who knows? So you do have to ask questions of the faculty, students, or alumni.</p>

<p>Show are just fun, dag-nab-it! We were thrilled to be able to see a musical at BU, since we were told that they typically don’t do musicals. Guess what? The students were awesome! After S did RENT at our high school, we went to a local college to see their production - and really enjoyed their very wacky Angel character. Nothing like what our high school did. Great to see a more mature interpretation, and how the college handled it.</p>

<p>Although not mandatory, I’d say seeing productions at your college choices surely gives you more of the “big picture”.</p>

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<p>Times3, I agree with you enthusiastically about how shows can demonstrate the “feeling” of a place. I guess I would say from our experience that a great production - not trying to be “Broadway” level, but with the heart and dedication you describe - can affirm that a program would be satisfying, but that a “poor” production needs to be taken with a grain of salt. Ideally if you see a show, whether you liked it or not, it would be best to talk to students/profs about it. There are so many facets - maybe what they were aiming for was a bit too ambitious, but still an exciting learning experience. Maybe someone was sick, even. The show that we didn’t like was at an extremely highly regarded and coveted BFA. We thought the main characters were dull and wooden, yet all of the small parts were vibrant and had great flair. We decided that they probably were trying to get the first kids to stretch, with mixed results, and we forgave them that they were putting learning above production value. Honestly I don’t believe that a well-regarded BFA would have consistently poor productions. I do think that the focus or style of the program as evidenced by the productions could be wrong for an individual student, just like any other aspect of the program.</p>

<p>My D is as happy as any of the other kids on this forum when she is in a show. But she is realizing that being on stage is not her primary work as she trains. That suits her; she is getting an enormous amount of acting and theatre learning nonetheless. Another thread was comparing the number of productions per year at different schools. I don’t think that more is necessarily better - it’s kind of like saying that a marathon runner will build their strength and speed only by running as many marathons as possible. Smaller, focused training opportunities are also extremely important.</p>

<p>I’m not knocking anyone’s opinion here - everyone is different. I’m just saying what we’ve found, to help people starting this process know what they need to be thinking and asking about.</p>

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<p>There is variation among college programs in the kinds of productions they do. Some programs put on mainstage shows that draw audiences from the surrounding community and are intended partially as local showcases and/or are the source of ticket revenues…but some do not do that. There is no such thing as a “mainstage show,” per se, in my son’s program.</p>

<p>At the BFA program where my son is senior this year, productions that students participate in range from equity productions at local theatres where maybe one or two students from the program perform alongside professional actors - who sometimes include faculty members - (somewhat rare) to small scale productions in studios with very informal “black box” type theatre seating.</p>

<p>If you visit a program during a period when multiple productions are being staged, you might want to ask the students you talk to what productions they recommend you see.</p>

<p>At my son’s school, he was in one production last year that was staged in a smallish studio, where the audience sat on bleachers. That show proved to be such a hit that they squeezed in more seats, had extra performances, and did a staged reading for another school within the university. I was lucky enough to see it, and it was extremely impressive.</p>

<p>The same year, there was one production my son told me about (out of the many done each quarter) that most of the students thought was ill-conceived and rather an embarrassment. I’m not sure if this was the fault of the graduate student director (some of whom are apparently much, much better than others), or what, but that particular show definitely wouldn’t have been the best one for prospectives to attend.</p>

<p>Times3 wrote:</p>

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<p>I very much agree with that. In fact, my son tends to be a little bit suspicious of facilities that very glitzy, wondering whether the occupants have their priorities straight.</p>

<p>Emmybet wrote:</p>

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<p>This is a very good point too. I just recently learned that, at my son’s school, some students opt out of casting for a quarter - or even longer - in order to concentrate on their training instead. Rehearsals take up a lot of time, and sometimes by senior year there are other priorities. I thought that was really interesting.</p>

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<p>I never really thought about the importance of trying to see student productions while visiting a college, but it makes so much sense. It would also be fun–all of our family trips are better when there is theater involved.</p>

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<p>I do believe you can learn a great deal about the program by the production. I would also stress having the student going to a few classes–you’d be surprised what they can learn.</p>

<p>For productions: it goes without saying that productions are primarily for educational purposes–but there are many, MANY things you can learn about the program from viewing its productions. Also, for those who can’t physically go there, there are several BFA programs that post videos of what they regard as representative of their school (eg Rutgers Mason Gross’s cumulative Globe theatre production). </p>

<p><strong>Before I go on, I am NOT interested in discussing specific schools. I believe this is an intensely personal quest. What my D and I found negative, you might find just what you need. The key thing is that it gave my D a great deal of information for her OWN quest.</strong> </p>

<p>Some examples we experienced: I saw a highly touted program’s production of a play–in our opinion, it was full of unbelievable over-the-top overacting, from all the actors. The play had a cast of many characters, and each student would recite his lines as though he were in the spotlight for his own private panel of judges in high school. While the students are still learning, this production was poor enough to make my D not apply to the school–you cannot have that degree of egocentric overacting, with none of the students aware about their characters, interactions between characters, nor the purpose of their play, without there being some sort of issue with the program itself. At least, that was the conclusion we drew.</p>

<p>We have also seen several productions in which students who are extremely good looking get leads but they have no talent (or to be precise, talent on the level of an untrained average high school student). They would sing off pitch MANY times, and have poor vocal techniques. Seriously. Yet they were leads. The leads posed and smiled charmingly, were movie and/or commercial good looking, and obviously aware of their good looks. From the program notes, I saw they had gotten several leads before. My D was not interested in a school that valued looks over talent or even apparently training, and then didn’t seem to train the good looking folks anything much either.</p>

<p>Now for the plus side: We have seen productions that have made my D badly want to go: exceptional acting from everyone, such as a very impressive production we saw at a non ‘top-tier’ BFA program, and/or challenging productions that stressed difficult technique, such as a production we saw that focused on physical theatre and circus skills, as well as the set (made by students). That production was obviously a learning experience in that the cast members were at different levels, but the production overall had vision, great directing,and all the members had to have learned a great deal.</p>

<p>I think you can learn a huge amount by the productions and classes and would urge everyone to go to at least one of each if at all possible. If you can’t go to the college, try looking online for videos.</p>

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<p>This might not go over big but, we saw a rehearsal of a very famous student production when we visited and my daughter thought it so awful it almost turned her off to the school. She’s a senior this year at that same school and it’s been wonderful but she still thinks this yearly production is just slightly better than an embarrassment. Of course you’re not allowed to say that in public!</p>

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<p>One thing to think about, even if the student is a prospective performance major, is to what extent students in the program are involved in the technical design of productions. </p>

<p>This can be be reflected in the shows. At my son’s school, a couple of the shows I’ve seen have been quite brilliant in their technical aspects, and it was students who were chiefly responsible for this.</p>

<p>Ideally, students will work collaboratively on all aspects of a performance…or at the very least, the actors will be involved with tech enough to understand what goes into the creation of all aspects of a production. That is what makes a well-rounded theatre artist.</p>

<p>One other comment I thought of for this thread is that we did want to attend a show at one college my son visited, but we did not realize that for that particular school we should have researched the matter and made arrangements long beforehand. There were productions we might have seen, but no seats were at all available when we visited. The reason may have been that the school is in New York City.</p>

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<p>Amtc, I think it’s a good point to note that there can be awful shows at good programs. That’s one reason I rather hesitantly mentioned the substandard show in my post #6 above. </p>

<p>My son loves his program. He was so fortunate to be admitted. He feels he has received excellent training. Nevertheless, the program is certainly not perfect. No program is.</p>

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<p>I totally agree with NJTheatreMOM and AMTC that there can be awful shows at good programs. And you shouldn’t base your entire decision on one show, or at least you should be careful what conclusions you draw. However, you should still see at least one show if you can, and if all you can see is one show, it is a very valuable piece of information–use it as you want. I realize some people may see this as an attack on this or that school but that’s not my point at all. Only that you shouldn’t use ‘reputation’ or ‘ranking’ as the best way to see if a program is good for you, nor should you look at their own website stating their ‘vision’ as gospel either (words are easy). There are many factors to what makes a school good for you, but a very important one is fit–do you feel you ‘belong’ there? Seeing a production helps enormously with that decision. Finally, student-led productions are very different from faculty-led productions, on nearly all levels, but mostly in that you usually have a professional director & cast director for faculty led productions. If at all possible, I’d see both.</p>

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<p>Just thought I would mention that the Mason Gross/Rutgers BFA actors who just returned from studying at the Globe will be putting on AS YOU LIKE IT in September. This will be the first of many student productions my family will be going to.</p>

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<p>I’d like to add to all these thoughtful posts that one aspect of going to a college production is getting to see some of the students in the theatre program! It’s enlightening to see who got in (at audition schools), what they look like, the variety (or not) of different types, and yes–the level of ability too. These, after all, may be our student’s peers and it can sometimes strike our kid that these look like his/her peeps or not.</p>

<p>That said, it is also easy to dismiss a terrific program for some of these reasons and departments change, students graduate, new directors take over, etc. I like to tell the anecdote of my older S (non-theatre major) who went on a campus tour in the department he was applying to and it was really lame. They didn’t have their act together and they sort of anti-sold the major/department. He still attended and the reality was 180 degrees from that bad tour. So… yeah. It’s hard to put too much stock in any one experience. :)</p>

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<p>I have two conflicting opinions about seeing campus productions.</p>

<p>1) Yes, because shows are a huge part of the department, judge quality and you should want to see a show anyways if you are a theatre major.</p>

<p>2) No. You don’t want to be swayed over by pretty costumes and talented people in picking the “better” school if it’s not a good fit for you.</p>

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<p>I agree that seeing shows can be an important part of the process for a prospective theatre major. My D was able to see shows at most of the schools that she seriously considered and for which she was accepted into their program. For her, it was a gut thing as much as anything. Times3 expressed many of our observations in her post above. However, one thing that was not mentioned by other posters that ultimately played a piece in my D’s decision was looking in the program at who was in the production. At 2 of the schools, we were surprised to see that many of the actors were not theatre majors. Although we didn’t think there was anything wrong with non-majors being able to audition for shows, my D interpreted the large number of non-majors in the show to be a symptom of the seriousness of the students in the program…why were the theatre majors not fighting for those spots more successfully? That (along with some other things) helped her narrow down her focus to 2 schools where the shows were primarily done by theatre students.</p>

<p>Ultimately, she did not choose the school that did the most impressive performances, although it was hard to turn down that school (she saw 3 shows there and they were amazing!) Her final choice was based on a combination of factors that included a very good, high energy performance where the actors looked like they were having fun and taking risks. She also sat in on a class at her final choice and was extremely impressed by the level of teaching. For her, seeing a performance and sitting in on a class helped her to visualize whether or not she could see herself as part of that community.</p>

<p>One final note on the question of which production that you see; my D is currently in rehearsals for her first production at her chosen school. It is a new student showcase where all the incoming performance majors have the opportunity to participate and perform. Apparently, the faculty has written a piece that they adjust every year to meet the needs of that incoming class. We are looking forward to seeing her perform later this month. My point is that I would guess that this production will be different than the one we saw there last year which mostly included junior and senior theatre students. Yet, it is on the same stage and will be advertised to the D.C. community just like the other one. However, I would assume that the primary purpose of this production is to get the new students involved and engaged in the process and to get to know their strengths and weaknesses. If I was a visiting prospective student, that distinction would be important to know.</p>

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<p>Seeing productions was essential in making my decision. As a design/tech major I also made sure I set up tours/visits that allowed me to see the booths and backstage areas.</p>

<p>I saw mostly mainstage productions, thought at one school I really liked (but didn’t choose) I also saw a studio theatre show. At one university that I wasn’t able to visit for a performance due to distance, they were actually allowed to send me a couple clips from their most recent show.</p>

<p>I saw a show at a school that only had a general theatre program that seemed very poorly executed overall. I saw good shows at three schools, and also saw good things from the clips I mentioned, and narrowed it down to those 4 choices.</p>

<p>Eventually I chose a large school with a small theatre program. I like the balance between there being available resources but not having large classes and having it be too competitive. A residential college program I was accepted to helped balance out the large/small school difference as well. </p>

<p>I had narrowed it down to that school or a much smaller college where theatre was a major part of campus life. I’ve made a friend at that school and still intend to see some shows. They really rolled out the red carpet for visiting freshmen, and I LOVE their productions and the students I met. But in the end, my overall impression of the other school, as far as the campus, students, location, etc. was much better. And the program here is still awesome.</p>

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<p>What great perspectives! Thanks so much, David - we all wish you the very best at school. Keep us posted!</p>

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<p>Our D never saw a show at her top choice school before being admitted. </p>

<p>We’d all been around enough theatre programs and professional companies to know how risky judging a program by a single show is, and most of the schools she was interested in don’t release video of mainstage productions, so seeing a show during visits wasn’t a huge priority for her. </p>

<p>That said, it was a big relief when our family finally saw our first mainstage show and were all VERY impressed. ;-D </p>

<p>In her first year D has found that of the 60+ shows on campus every year some are amazing and some not-so-much… just as in the professional theatre world. She actually finds this variable quality – and the associated opportunity to learn how to distinguish gifted production teams from less talented teams – to offer one of the most important learning experiences on campus. Also, IMHO, any program that produces consistently excellent work is probably not taking enough risks or allowing students to stretch to their limits. We have seen mediocre student work in many of the top training programs in the country, which is just as it should be.</p>

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<p>^You make a very good point, MomCares.</p>