<p>“OTOH, it should also be made clear that a truly talented kid can go just about anywhere and do well with some additional post-graduate coaching as long as the training isn’t really bad and destructive.”</p>
<p>This is the truth. </p>
<p>It doesn’t matter if it’s an acting program or a MT program.
Amy Adams, Catherine Zeta Jones, Anne Hathaway, Kristen Bell, and I’m sure many others, all started as MTers. But they became famous as actors in movies.</p>
<p>Bisouu, There you go: Alice Ripley “She got a BFA in Musical Theatre from Kent State University.” from IMDb.</p>
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<p>Yes if you’re trying gauge how “actory” a MT program is those would be good things to ferret out in advance. I confess we didn’t do that upfront. In fact, I doubt we (certainly not me anyway) did even 1/8th of the research that many other parents seem to be doing now, we just went on faith with what we were told and I suppose, got lucky. </p>
<p>At NSB in Tisch which is the only studio that has a MT track and also has a straight acting track the MTs and Actors take their core acting classes together. None of the scene work in acting class involves MT styles. Last year it was a variety of scenes from various playwrights some of whom are mentioned above and this year it’s all Shakespeare. I did text my daughter before I wrote this to double check my facts and asked if that changes in advanced studio training and if they ever do scene work in MT styles and this was the response: “Next semester we have a class called ‘scene into the song’ which is all about scenes from musicals and how you get into the song”. Me: does that replace your acting class? Response: “God No. Shakespeare this whole year. They can’t replace regular acting it’s way too important”.</p>
<p>Anyway, there’s a data point about MT at Tisch in case anyone is curious.</p>
<p>ps: I’m seeing Alice Ripley next month in “Carrie” and believe me, she is the only reason I’m going to see that musical. I hope I find her vocally healthy but even if she isn’t and sings her entire part “in frog”, I’ll still be honored to watch her work.</p>
<p>I hope she is vocally rested and ok…and I too would listen to her sound like a frog…</p>
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Yeah. Brecht was way off in his own universe even as to acting style. To put it simplistically, playing it is like putting all your Stanislavski gears in reverse. But wanna see something cool? Log into Facebook when you have the time and check this out … <a href=“Redirecting...”>Redirecting...;
<p>I think most actors like me who are from out in the boonies started in musicals since that’s all there is to do in a lot of places. My first two shows were in choruses of very Guffmanesque community theatre productions of “South Pacific” and “Oklahoma.” 
I was lucky that the resident guest artist at my hometown Fine Arts Center was a Yale MFA who was able to teach me enough to get me into a good arts high school a few towns over. The person who took me to him - or more like dragged me by the hair - was a local dance teacher who has a BFA in MT from Catawba College from back when Aubrey Berg taught there and it was one of the few MT programs around, btw.</p>
<p>That’s wonderful…big long speech, too, which could easily become unnatural. I wish they used a broader shot, because it looks like the other actor is doing some really beautiful listening/reacting/being in the scene type work.</p>
<p>Has Meryl done any Chekhov?</p>
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My guess is that many young actors be it from the boonies or the big cities likely started out in musicals and it’s not a phenomenon unique to the boonies. I saw both straight youth plays (zzzzzz until high school) and musicals throughout the early years of my daughter’s budding interest and we live in a big-ish city. Musicals were a better bet because if all else fails and the acting is dreadful, perhaps at least the orchestra and some clever scenery painted by doting parents or a dedicated community volunteer group were enough to make you feel like there was production value worthy of ticket sales. And maybe there would be kids in the show that couldn’t act nor sing but had been in dance class since they were 3 - and they all had parents and relatives willing to come to watch the dance numbers.</p>
<p>Straight plays offer less aircover in that respect and for them to work, either the audience must be entirely made up of doting relatives who be happy to say it was “great” even if it wasn’t, or the acting and direction really needs to be good and the casting selective. Let’s face it. Not so much of that happens early on no matter where you live but sometimes there are acting breakthroughs that begin in high school that are quite remarkable and worth seeing.</p>
<p>^ It’s different for a lot of kids in LA and I’m sure in New York as well. Maybe my view is colored by now living in a fairly affluent area of the Valley. There are still no shortage of opportunities for MT kids, but there’s a lot less frustration for the non-singers. Like some of the kids in my neighborhood are apparently spending their Saturdays studying in the youth classes at places like [Warner</a> Loughlin’s](<a href=“http://www.warnerloughlin.com/warnerkids.htm]Warner”>http://www.warnerloughlin.com/warnerkids.htm), [Carter</a> Thor Studio](<a href=“http://carterthorstudio.com/teen/teen.html]Carter”>http://carterthorstudio.com/teen/teen.html), [The</a> Beverly Hills Playhouse](<a href=“http://www.bhplayhouse.com/acting-classes/acting-schools-for-kids]The”>http://www.bhplayhouse.com/acting-classes/acting-schools-for-kids), or [any</a> number of other studios around town](<a href=“http://www.backstage.com/advice-for-actors/resources/los-angeles-acting-schools-and-coaches_6/]any”>http://www.backstage.com/advice-for-actors/resources/los-angeles-acting-schools-and-coaches_6/) that have a kids’ classes. It seems like there are a good number of performing arts high schools around, too, that may or may not emphasize MT. There are just so many more options for both training and performance all the way around compared to the backwater I grew up if one’s parents can afford them.</p>
<p>^No doubt there are excellent and enviable youth training opportunities in both LA and NYC. Kids are kids no matter where they live. Readiness to make use of the training is a function of where they are on the developmental curve. Fish, what this looks like from the perspective of the parent who facilitating the training and performance opportunities I suspect is quite different from what the student experiences.</p>
<p>There are a ton of educational programs for youth attached to excellent theatres in my city too including with our Shakespeare Company, Book It, Children’s Theatre, Improv companies etc. There are no lack of classes and straight plays for an acting student to attach themselves to vs. the musical genre. My daughter took Saturday and some evening classes at some of these theatres starting from when she was very little. In the beginning that meant flopping around while being encouraged to use your imagination. The visual from my adult eyes pretty much amounted to seeing a large portion of the kids hanging from the ceiling so to speak while perhaps one or two (girls usually) tried to actually do what they were told. Some time and I think it was around 4th grade, the classes started to expect more and got way more interesting which if you were one of those kids that was desperate and ready to do more (or a parent who was sick of paying for flopping around time), was a welcome transition.</p>
<p>On the production end of things, with few exceptions, the straight play productions were painful to sit through at least until the kids got old enough to understand the material well enough to do it justice. There might be one or two students who caught on early and showed signs of real promise if you were lucky, but usually this was not enough to carry the show. Things really didn’t start to improve until sometime into the high school years. At the same time though, the musicals were comparatively more palatable for an adult to watch, More kids were drawn to them at an early age (by a factor of 10 probably) which meant it was more likely to find at least a handful of talented kids out of that mob to anchor the show while the rest of the minions flopped around in the background. By high school and especially by the upper grades of high school, the straight plays caught up and sometimes surpassed the musicals in terms of quality and complexity.</p>
<p>I guess I cemented my daughter’s interest in musicals early on because I was a terrible mother who just didn’t want to sit through straight plays that were awful. But I also failed her because that same selfishness carried over to my not being willing to sit through ballet recitals either. I’ve condemned her to a life of not ever really knowing if she is an MT actor or just a regular one. Oh well. Good thing she was smart enough to get herself to a school where she can explore both. :)</p>
<p>^ Oh, you’re not so bad. LOL My mom worked second shift and never went to a single one of my performances until my grandma finally guilted her into going with her to see me in summer rep after my second year of college. Funny about all the different backgrounds on here. I didn’t even start acting until Spring of 9th grade and split time with cheerleading until 11th.</p>
<p>I heard from my DD who is a Mason Gross student (not theater) that they are planning to start a MT program in the next year or two. Sorry, I don’t have any details.</p>