For a non-artistic, non-sporty and non-musical child!
My son has just finished Year 8 at a state grammar school and will be choosing his GCSE options next year.
One of the options blocks is a perfomance subject. They have to choose between PE, Music, Art or Drama. I think the only one that he could realistically do is Drama. He's weak at team sports and hates Games, though he's a reasonable swimmer and runs long distances by himself (slowly). He doesn't play an instrument and doesn't enjoy music, nor is he artistic, and from what I've read GCSE Art is quite hard going even if you like Art.
I'm not sure about Drama. I think he would be OK with the analysing texts side of things as he is good at English. However, he hasn't shown any inclination to get involved with school productions or plays. He has ASD and I think he might find the teamwork aspect quite challenging. On the other hand, perhaps it would help him with things like public speaking and having to do presentations. He did an online debating course and enjoyed that.
I would be interested to hear other people's experiences of GCSE Drama (AQA), particularly if your teenager was not particularly interested in Drama or performing to start with.
Looking at last year's data, there were 6 students who didn't do a performance subject, so perhaps there is some leeway to get out of this.