<p>And what about the kids who are very talented in musical theatre but decided to focus on acting in college or maybe even a different major but still study their art. I think a lot of people leave college programs due to the cost or because they are getting professional work. After one year of college, Anne Hathaway dropped out of NYU, Reese Witherspoon from Stanford, Sutton Foster from Carnegie Melon, and I’m sure there are many more. A lot of people feel like they have to strike while they are young.</p>
<p>So far our anecdotal evidence makes the quote from @Megpmoms S’s agent – that Broadway can absorb at most 20 kids from each years’ graduating MT classes – seem quite plausible.</p>
<p>It sounds like for each of the first few years out of college only ~5 graduating MTs are apt to find Broadway work (though of course that varies a lot depending on which shows are opening – cheers to “Mean Girls” and other 2015 teen-girl openings!!). Plus landing one Broadway contract in no way ensures a steady stream of them. </p>
<p>If there are over 1000 trained MTs graduating each year now, not to mention all the talented MT/dance kids with other majors or who never finish college, those are staggering odds. </p>
<p>On the other hand, it probably only takes our smart kids a couple huge cattle calls to understand the world in which they hope to work. </p>
<p>We have surely raised some courageous and optimistic kids, no? :)</p>
<p>I have one kid who is a total realist. She knows that she doesn’t have a shot at doing MT exclusively (lack of talent and desire). Not only has she found other areas of theater that she loves (and she’s very good at) she is also double majoring in another of her passions - history. She thinks her future lies in teaching but she’s going to work a couple years before heading back to grad school. She’s my “always lands on her feet” kid. </p>
<p>My other child is a ****-eyed optimist. And, for good or bad, life has always worked out extremely well for him. He spent his childhood having his pick of offers and being fawned over by strangers so I think he has a rude awakening ahead of him in college. Everything has always come so easily to him. But I just hope he develops the perseverance and tenacity necessary to head down this road, whether he stays in classical voice (his new passion) or goes back to MT. It’s not an easy life!</p>
<p>Edit: oops didn’t know that was a forbidden word - then what on earth do you do to a gun before you fire it??</p>
<p>Haha – we’ll have to add “****-eyed optimist” to “Vitamin No” in a list of CC-MTism. </p>
<p>I guess the thing most great artists say loudest and longest is not to listen to the no’s, and I suppose there would be very little art (great or otherwise) if there weren’t folks out there who are able to do just that. </p>
<p>Now I suppose our job is to learn to be the parents of artists without worrying ourselves to distraction. I’ve noticed that wine comes up in theatre-parent conversations frequently but I’m open to other suggestions. ;)</p>
<p>What I’ve found interesting during the audition trips is that I’ve met at least 4 or 5 kids that started as BFA MT majors but then switched to either a BA theater degree, or something else entirely. I keep telling my daughter that college is about preparing for career, true, but also about finding what fuels her passion. So I’ve said to her that she might take a history course, fall in love with history, and decide she wants to switch. Which would be fine by me. Or maybe she’ll find out she wants to write or direct. Or perform plus write, or whatever. The point is I don’t want her to limit her possibilities in the performing arts.</p>
<p>I find interesting parallels between what she is doing now and what I was doing at her age. Back then I was a competitive golfer, it was my passion, and I gave serious consideration to getting my teaching pro’s card, skip college, etc, etc. Which my parents negated. And because they did I wound up getting very interested in science, pursued a graduate degree, and the rest was history. I still play a lot of golf, but for fun and not for a living.</p>
<p>If I had to guess, my D will perform the rest of her life. The only question right now is whether she’ll do it for fun or for a living.</p>
<p>Yeah, but does it really matter the odds of landing on Broadway? I mean my kid (as well as I am sure many of yours) didn’t go to college and major in MT with the goal of landing on Broadway. She performs regularly in both NYC and elsewhere (including tonight) and is working in her field 7 days/week. Broadway is always a nice dream to keep in one’s pocket but I say if they can earn their living working in performing arts, that is quite a success. So far, my kid is doing that. Sure, being on Broadway would be so cool; how could it not be for a theater kid? My kid is not really focused on that and doesn’t even audition that often. She had a callback recently for the lead in a hit Broadway musical and that was cool to think about but the odds are so long that it is not nearly her focus. She performs a LOT, as well as is involved in several aspects of theater and music. For now, she was just cast Off Broadway in a part and even that is hard to attain. She is 24. </p>
<p>My feeling is that it is good to dream big but think of success in the arts as working continually in the field and if you can do that, it should bring happiness along with success. Broadway would be really neat but even then, it is not an ongoing gig and some we know who have been on the Great White Way are not now, and so it is important to define success as a performing artist way way more broadly. I am not really concerned with how many graduates make it to Broadway, but more how many attain work as artists.</p>
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<p>I bet there’s not a single parent here who doesn’t heartily agree with this sentiment! Earning a living in any aspect of theatre, let alone performing, is in itself a huge accomplishment.</p>
<p>I figured y’all would agree, but just saying that I am not sure it is even worth focusing on counting how many make it to Broadway their first years out of college. Hearing about the variety of work that MT grads are doing would interest me more.</p>
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<p>I completely agree that focusing on Broadway as a measure of success isn’t of much value, but to clarify I’m guessing the “20 absorbed by Broadway” doesn’t refer to only the first year out of college but forever. I think it could easily be true that fewer than 20 kids from each graduating MT year EVER make it to Broadway.</p>
<p>Minor correction about Anne Hathaway. She was at Vassar, not NYU. Now back to your regularly scheduled intelligent discussion. :)</p>
<p>Anne Hathaway spent some time at CAP21, the musical theater studio that used to be associated with NYU Tisch and is now a freestanding professional musical theater training program (and more) in New York. They claim her as a graduate.</p>
<p>As the parent of a kid who graduated with a BFA last May, I want to agree with my friend soozievt: Broadway is not the only standard of success. Honestly, when most kids get out there, they will very quickly see the odds against that, though some do have that dream come true. Most, however, will go to their first open call and realize they are doing well by even getting callbacks at some of the better small LORT theaters, if they can get into the auditions at all as non AEA people. And one interesting thing I have noted, watching as things unfold: it seems that the kids who were always the stars in their high school and then college programs that have the most difficulty when they get out there and realize that there are hundreds of equally talented, attractive, etc. young people like them (and their same type.) And then there is the extra shock of realizing that talent is not the only factor that gets people cast: many times, looks and type trump talent.</p>
<p>Sutton Foster was allegedly told by a teacher at CMU that she didn’t “it.”</p>
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<p>And don’t underestimate the value of theatre connections, links to sources of production money, and/or pre-existing FAME that producers know will draw audience. 
It is good that you brought up the reality than not only is there a very limited amount of paying work, but the playing field is by no means level.</p>
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<p>Unless I’m mistaken, she was also rejected from UMich in spite of having a brother there. This further confuses an already complex profession, when even the nation’s prime MT educators can’t always recognize those who will ultimately be successful.</p>
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<p>Another thing I’ve wondered about is if some of our kids have gotten a false impression of their odds of seeing Broadway based on growing up in the era of many “young” shows like Spring Awakening, Newsies, Hair, American Idiot, etc.</p>
<p>I couldn’t help cranking some more numbers. Here are some detailed estimates regarding age distribution on Broadway based on the available data:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Start with the estimate of 824 Broadway actors in Post #45. For simplicity let’s say 800.</p></li>
<li><p>Equity stats note that the split between principals and chorus is about 70/30 (72%/28% to be exact for 2011-12).</p></li>
<li><p>Using the 70/30 split, that gives 560 Principals and 240 Chorus members.</p></li>
<li><p>A National Endowment for the Arts survey of artists in the workforce noted that 50% of actors are under the age of 35 and 80% of dancers are under 35. It is probably a decent hypothesis that Broadway Chorus members are similar in age distribution to the dancers surveyed (<a href=“http://www.nea.gov/research/ArtistsInWorkforce.pdf[/url]”>http://www.nea.gov/research/ArtistsInWorkforce.pdf</a>)</p></li>
<li><p>Applying the actor age ratio for principals and the dancer age ratio for chorus members from the government study, you get:</p></li>
</ol>
<p>280 principals</p>
<h2>192 chorus members</h2>
<p>472 TOTAL under the age of 35.</p>
<ol>
<li> Assuming an even distribution across ages 20-35, you get 31+ actors per age from 20-35 (31+ 20-year-olds, 31+ 21-year-olds, 31+ 22-year-olds, etc.). If there are less in one age group, then there MUST be more in another, or the math doesn’t work and Broadway runs out of people - the Law of Conservation of Broadway Mass.</li>
</ol>
<p>Now, in the 31-per-age group-under-35 you probably have lots of non-MT majors, most certainly lots of highly trained dancers in the chorus. These numbers include all plays, so straight actors are included (but there are probably not all that many really young actors in straight plays on Broadway). Depending on the shows in any given season, you may also have opera singers, instrumentalists who can sing, acrobats, pop vocalists, etc., etc. So, it is probably likely that 20 MT kids per age group is not a bad estimate, and it could be less, but probably not a lot less (although I wonder how many successful MT aspirants have degrees).</p>
<p>Remember, these numbers do not include National Tours, where many college MT grads get their start. Also, the starting point of 800 Broadway actors may be low and a larger number would, of course, drive the numbers up.</p>
<p>@EmsDad - As an engineer I love all your number crunching… thanks!</p>
<p>One thing you may have overlooked is that there are actors younger than 20 on Broadway. D knows several kids who were on Broadway as children or young teens.</p>
<p>@momcares - I thought about actors younger than 20 but I figured that those would be not that signficant in total numbers. I just did a quick count and got about 24 obvious children in current shows (I went fast, so I may have missed some). Let’s say that there are 30, that would reduce the numbers by 2 in each age from 20-35.</p>
<p>However, I have an inkling that the 50% over 35 number does not hold for Broadway - the survey was nationwide and I would bet that Broadway tends to be a little younger on average than acting as a whole nationwide. Only a few percentage points of difference in this ratio would easily counteract the impact of young actors. For instance, our local LORT’s tend to have many ex-Broadway actors who are over 35. We recently had a actor move back into town after 10+ years starring on Broadway (a grad of d’s HS, by the way) and she is now doing LORT musicals in town.</p>
<p>The aspect of this industry that bothers me the most is what I perceive to be a fairly large percentage of kids that get cast once or maybe twice and then have a really hard time getting another part, for years (and maybe never).</p>
<p>NotMamaRose-thanks for the further info about Anne Hathaway. I know that she was at Vassar for at least a year as she was in a friend’s a cappella group there. I have a Vassar a cappella CD where she was listed as class of '04. ;)</p>
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<p>@soozievt – I agree! </p>
<p>Here’s how some local MT actors that I know of have put together careers in a mid-sized market.</p>
<p>Several local MTs do the obvious work as voice teachers, acting/audition coaches, business speaking coaches and commercial and voice-over actors. At least one works as a middle-school drama teacher. Two work in casting for the two large MT theatres in town. I would think this could create some conflict of interest as they do cast themselves, but so it goes.</p>
<p>Several local MTs also move between Broadway and our local market on the left coast. Off the top of my head, local talent has recently been to Bdwy for A Christmas Story, Scandalous, Wicked, Memphis, Spring Awakening, A Little Night Music, Next To Normal… I know I’m forgetting others. </p>
<p>It would be great to hear how your kids and/or other actors you know are making MT careers work.</p>
<p>I just had a conversation that reminded me of this discussion.</p>
<p>There is much talk about needing to become a true triple threat to work in MT (and I think that is certainly the ideal), but it seems like realistically most of Broadway’s female leads wouldn’t make it as Broadway dancers in today’s market.</p>
<p>In the past there was certainly room for “Singers Who Moved” like Judy Garland, Ethel Merman, Jennifer Jones, Barbara Cook (not certain these are all great examples?) etc. versus “Dancers Who Sang” like Chita Rivera. I have a sense that may be equally true today, if not even more true now than in the past.</p>
<p>Sutton Foster and maybe Amy Adams come to mind as current examples of true triple threats, but honestly could most working Broadway female leads make it as Broadway dancers? It seems like there are many more Singers Who Move working today. I’m thinking of folks like Lea Michele, Carrie Manolakos, Vicki Noon, Kristin Chenoweth, Celia Keenan-Bolger, Jennifer Hudson, Anne Hathaway, Audra McDonald, Bernadette Peters, Megan Hilty, Alice Ripley and others. I may be wrong – and maybe some of these folks could work as Broadway Dancers – but I’m guessing Broadway is employing LOTS of female Singers who Move today.</p>
<p>Is it really realistic to think females REALLY need to be serious dancers to stand any chance of working on Broadway these days? Should those of us with D’s who haven’t trained as dancers since they were young and/or are physically unsuited to being serious dancers really urge them to pursue a career in real estate rather than MT?</p>
<p>I agree with your observation.
I have also been thinking about the dance issue because more than one person has told my daughter that her “type” doesn’t really need to be a great dancer. I don’t know if it’s completely true, but it has put to rest some of my worry about dance being her weakest skill.</p>