Please move this topic if it would fit elsewhere better.
Background: D is a high school freshman, bitten by the MT “bug” 3 years ago. Found herself a wonderful MT/classical voice teacher, and worked her way up through the surprisingly competitive (at least to me) local community, children’s, and middle school theater programs. Has blossomed as a performer in several lead roles during the first half of 2014.
Without going into unnecessary detail, her freshman year drama experience at our local public high school has been an abysmal disappointment. It has been literally like a scene from a bad movie: screaming, crying director, nepotism, favoritism, parents buying their kids roles, leads that didn’t know their lines the week of the performance, 20+ hours per week of rehearsals but never actually being on stage, etc. I could go on, but that’s the gist of it. Bottom line, D gleaned no good training from her experiences there.
She has handled the chaos very well, but decided to audition for a very reputable children’s theater program at the only professional theater in our area (it’s an hour away but that’s not bad considering how rural our location is). She’s planning to do this instead of auditioning for the high school musical this spring. The pro theater has an excellent reputation for training youth. And there’s no guarantee D will land a role.
I’ve reviewed A LOT of background info on other CC posts to see what kids’ training looked like in their high school years, but I didn’t see any posts addressing what to do if your local school program was subpar. My question is this: is participation in your high school’s theater program essential to getting into a MT college program? Can a student perform exclusively outside of the public school they attend, or does that “look bad” on applications? We intend to follow the excellent advice on CC regarding summer intensives, audition coaching, etc., but I’m concerned about trying to gauge where D should be getting her performance experience.
My daughter’s high school only had a bad drama program, no choir, no musicals, etc. She trained at the professional theatre in our area which is about 30 minutes away. I don’t think that looked bad on her resume. The location for the training doesn’t matter as long as the training is very good or excellent.
My son also did almost all of his theater outside of school at a very well-regarded youth theater around 30 miles away. He did one musical at his high school, mostly because it was “Rent” and he got cast as Roger, but it was, as you say, kind of a mess and a huge time commitment without as much pay-off as you’d like to see.
D has a good friend who NEVER participated in theatre at her high school but was a Young Arts Finalist and got into CCM. She did lots of youth theatre outside of school. IMHO, its all about training, development, and what potential you show in the audition, not what roles you did or did not get at your local high school.
My S relied on the strong, well-run community theatre for his musicals. When his HS did straight plays he would double up and do those too. But the community theatre was like the “varsity” for sure. The combination helped him get into a very good program.
D did lots of community theatre before high school, but come freshman year, she decided to focus exclusively on high school theatre.
It’s now senior year - and in August she made the decision (after being Drama Club President her junior year) to go back to community theatre exclusively. (We are very blessed to have a tremendous local theatre community - we have TWO live theatres in our town and probably 15 others within a 25 mile radius.)
I had bought in to the woman who runs the high school “program” mantra (and I say “program” loosely because she’s not a teacher and there are no theatre classes) that you only do high school once - and you have the rest of your life to do community theatre.
That’s great and all, but for a kid (mine) who’s looking to do this professionally, I have come to the beliefthat my daughter lost out of 3 years of growth as a performer in exchange for a lot of high school hell, back biting and drama, drama, DRAMA.
So, yeah. My advice would be to dump high school theatre altogether. And no, I don’t think eschewing theatre at the high school level looks bad AT ALL to the people who hold the power of admissions to MT programs.
A lot of that drama goes on in performing arts high schools too. The D did community theatre the first two years of high school, but since seniority counts, she was high school only for junior and senior years. It really doesn’t matter which is done as long as the child is having fun and learning!
From my perspective, my S’s high school drama program isn’t great, but it is the high school experience that I think is necessary. My S has done all his high schools plays and musicals but has also done community theater. I think its all about getting experience and being sure you have a good acting coach and vocal coach. (Dance class, especially ballet, is a good idea too.) Everything the OP said about the high school theater is kind of true every where. We honestly did give some thought to no high school theater his senior year to focus on auditions but in the end, these are his friends and it is that once in a lifetime high school experience. Didn’t want to remove him from that.
Two thoughts, and this is just my personal opinion!
I think theater experience outside school may actually look MORE impressive than a high school show, depending what theater it is. It may come across as more "professional" on a resume to say "XYZ Theater" than "ABC High School." So I wouldn't worry about that at all.
I think that training is equally as important as being in shows, if not more. Being in lots of high school shows but not getting any actual TRAINING is a detriment, IMO. I think it's more important to have acting classes, singing lessons, and/or dance classes than it is to be in every high school show.
Don’t get me wrong - of course, being in shows is great experience! I’m just saying that being in a lot of high school shows but NOT having any actual training isn’t enough.
You say that the local theatre is very reputable AND is known for excellent training - that’s great! So I think that would be a MUCH better bet than a subpar high school drama program. I don’t think colleges care where you get your experience and training, just as long as you get it!
My kid did both (school shows and outside opportunities). But I don’t think it matters, as long as you are training and also doing productions. Go for the experiences you’ll get the most out of and also enjoy the most. There is a lot to be said for school/youth productions but also to be said for participating in adult productions. They are different experiences but both have value. A college MT program is not going to think twice if your kid did shows outside of school instead of in school. It is more important that they participated in theater. Lots of kids go to college programs who never did their school shows.
I think it depends on the experience the student is likely to gain from the high school program. My son has also been on the losing side at school due to favoritism, but he has learned a few things from his involvement in school productions–dancing in a large chorus, forming strong friendships with other chorus castmembers, improving sight reading skills and, also important, dealing with disappointment and being a strong team player. After very disappointing casting in freshman and sophomore years, he looked outside and got some jobs first with community groups then with a couple of professional theatre companies. (It was great to see how blown away “real” directors were with his singing, even while his school director overlooked him). He auditions a fair amount and has gained audition/callback experience, too. At first, his school directors were put out/angry that he went outside to gain experience and, I think, punished him for that in sophomore year. We were very, very careful to have minimal conflicts with the school productions. He is now a junior and has at last been cast, though not as a lead. He has hopes for senior year, but I suspect the director is holding him up as an example to other students to show them what happens if one of her actors tries for roles outside school (no one else in our school’s sizable drama department, does that). I guess my advise is to treat it as a balancing act–get involved in the school program if it has something good to offer, such as dance and singing training, but don’t overlook other opportunities. My son is extremely proud of his work with professional theatres, and I’m sure it will look good when it comes time to audition for college. Our next step is to figure out if we can trust the school directors to give him a recommendation… or if it would look odd not to have a school recommendation on his applications. Good luck and keep your options open!
^I don’t recall any of son’s schools requiring a recommendation from a school theatre director/instructor. Some required an artistic recommendation, but that could come from many different sources. Fortunately for son, his school theatre director is a wonderfully dedicated and caring person who runs a great program.
No HS shows here… in a high school that was considered to have a great department. Nepotism, favoritism and ineffective scheduling with a crazy director kept my son away. His experience came from community and regional theater coupled with competition-team dance (which BTW he believes was the key to his auditioning success). He is at a great program…
D used her voice teacher as her artistic recommendation. We weren’t sure what she’d get from the theatre dept, or if it would even get done! However, almost every application she filled out asked for her school theatre teacher’s name.
Is anyone familiar with the Theatre Education Award, sponsored by CMU? I find it ironic that a small group of ex-students is planning to nominate our high-school director for the award–the very same students who received a huge amount of favoritism from her! These kids were cast in every show all four years of high school (there are four of them and they are now college graduates); that’s a total of 12 shows that featured these same four performers in lead roles, with very few non-chorus opportunities for other students. Some of these were small-cast shows (four to six students) and many were single cast. When the teacher was challenged about single-casting a small show in a school with close to 3000 students, her response was that she thought only one student was able to do justice to the role. In my opinion, large high schools should NEVER produce small-cast shows… and they should not single cast plum roles! How on earth are the majority of students expected to learn or build experience to put on their college applications. Sorry to vent, but back to the Theatre Education Award–I wish there was an opportunity to challenge nominations. Not to be mean, but to provide a voice for the non-favored students.
If you’re wondering about having/not having HS shows on your D’s resume for college auditions…no worries. I know a girl who had only one show on her resume when she applied for colleges. She went to Juilliard, just graduated and landed a plum role. Whether your D gets into a good MT program is MAINLY dependent on the audition…for most schools, it’s about 99% dependent. If they have a kid who blows them away with their audition, they will not give two hoots whether she performed in HS, professional theaters, or anywhere else. Similarly, I know kids on Broadway as kids who didn’t get into any auditioned college program. It really, truly is all about the audition (except for NYU, which is about academics and the audition, 50/50…there are a few other schools that care about academics, but not overwhelmingly.
Resume seems to be of little consequence to college auditors. We’ve had a couple say that they barely look at or consider them. Make the choice that will provide your child the best development of her skills… even if it is a smaller role, chose the thing that will make her a stronger performer. In the end, it seems to be ‘what happens in the audition room’ that matters most.
Again, thank you for the insights. I’m so thankful to hear that as long as the training gets done, that’s what matters. D was so excited to be a part of our hs program that it was certainly worth the try. The complete lack of organization and professionalism on the part of the director has been such a shock. D unfortunately wasted 6 months learning nothing. But it took that bad of an experience to justify the hour long commute to the other theater.