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Higher education

Talk to other parents whose children are preparing for university on our Higher Education forum.

Performing arts degrees at universities and Spotlight / Equity membership

42 replies

LynetteScavo · 10/04/2022 12:06

Can anyone please point me in the direction of how I find out exactly which degree courses meet the criteria for their graduates to qualify for Spotlight and Equity membership? (At least 30 hours contact time, no more than 22 in a class etc)

So far, apart form the Drama schools / conservatoires I have Northampton Uni and Chichester Uni.

OP posts:
OnGoldenPond · 27/04/2022 16:43

Comefromaway · 13/04/2022 12:40

These are the places listed on the Spotlight Graduating Schools for 2021 These are only the schools who chose to upload their graduate showreels onto Spotlight

Guildhall School of Music & Drama
London Studio Centre
RADA
RCSSD (Central)
Arden School of Theatre
UCLAN
Cygnet Theatre
Institute for Contemporary Theatre
Momentum
Northampton University
RCS

IN addition the following schools have performance listings on Spotlight

Fourth Monkey
RWCMD
Drama Studio, London
Italia Conti
Mountview
Leeds Conservatoire
GSA
PPA
Bristol Old Vic
Rose Bruford
Manchester Theatre School
LAMDA
LCM
East 15
Performers
RAM
Trinity Laban
LIPA
Liverpool Theatre School
Oxford School of Drama
Arts Ed
Associated Studios
Chichester
Plymouth Conservatoire
St Mary's
Brighton Academy
Hammond

This list seems to be missing CSSD?

mimbleandlittlemy · 28/04/2022 16:52

OnGoldenPond - CSSD isn't missing off the list. It's RCSSD (got the Royal added in 2012) , and it's no. 4 in the list Comefromaway put out.

OnGoldenPond · 28/04/2022 17:40

mimbleandlittlemy · 28/04/2022 16:52

OnGoldenPond - CSSD isn't missing off the list. It's RCSSD (got the Royal added in 2012) , and it's no. 4 in the list Comefromaway put out.

Oh yes, so it is. Need new glasses! Grin

TizerorFizz · 29/04/2022 09:08

My DD went to an independent school recognised for its Drama department. Many DDs boarded and it had a dedicated theatre, fantastic staff, loads of opportunities and amazing A level drama results and plenty wanted to go to Drama school post A level. Some decided not to but a few got prestigious drama school places. The only one who works regularly has famous showbiz parents. That’s the way it works. Mixed race too so that is a benefit. She is talented but so were the others.

My DD used her enjoyment of drama to be a barrister.

mimbleandlittlemy · 29/04/2022 16:15

TizerorFizz · 29/04/2022 09:08

My DD went to an independent school recognised for its Drama department. Many DDs boarded and it had a dedicated theatre, fantastic staff, loads of opportunities and amazing A level drama results and plenty wanted to go to Drama school post A level. Some decided not to but a few got prestigious drama school places. The only one who works regularly has famous showbiz parents. That’s the way it works. Mixed race too so that is a benefit. She is talented but so were the others.

My DD used her enjoyment of drama to be a barrister.

It is mostly not the way it works to be honest because if it was the only way it worked then there would actually be very few people in the business because when it comes down to it there aren't enormous numbers of famous showbiz parents - a very good few but not enough to fill Spotlight by a long chalk. Actors' children become actors just as doctors' children become doctors and teachers' children become teachers - because it's an industry they know. Of course it helps if you know people as it does in all sorts of careers, but I'd say that it is the fact the person you cite is mixed race which has far more to do with it in the current casting climate. Nice posh white girls with lovely glossy Timotei hair and nice teeth who went to nice private schools with lovely drama departments are not just ten a penny but about fifty a penny in a world which currently, rightly, demands we move away from that and reflect on stage and screen the diversity of the audience including Global Majority and working class actors. You are always going to get the Phoebe Dynevors who have industry parents but you will also get a lot of people who have no connection with the industry whatsoever and whose parents are slightly baffled by the cuckoo in their nest. Looking down my client list I have one person who might be described as from an acting dynasty and one with a father who was a very well known actor. If there were such a thing as agents for doctors, dentists, teachers, barristers, solicitors I should think there would be a large number who come from those dynasties too.

The honest truth of the matter is far too many drama schools put out far too many students each year and there is not the work to go around. This week I've continued trying to help kids from ALRA North and South and I've also been talking to someone from LIPA who is on a course that, quite frankly, can only be a money spinning exercise for the school because it hasn't given her, for her three years of fees, the training she needs or deserves. I am genuinely shocked. When I first came into the business there were 12 drama schools in the Conference of Drama Schools and now there are so many drama schools and courses which take people on and inflate their hopes with no realistic chances of success. When I first came into the business at least one drama school had a 'night of the long knives' where they slashed their numbers at the end of Year 1, getting rid of those they thought had no realistic chance in the industry. Then acting courses because BAs and no one could do that and I'm not sure that's kinder.

Sorry - this has turned in to a bit of a rant but I think the constant public perception of the whole industry being a nepotistic hotbed where no one from outside can even break in is just not true just as it isn't true for the kids who become doctors, teachers, dentists etc without ever having had one in the family before.

Whippet · 29/04/2022 16:21

@mimbleandlittlemy I hear what you say, but then the news is littered with stories such as the fact that after issuing a global open casting call for a young Prince William for the next season of The Crown, Netflix has decided that the absolute best person they have found is Dominic West's own son, despite the fact that a) he has never performed much before and b) looks nothing like Prince William!
Oh, and let's not forget that Daniel Radcliffe's parents were in the business!

mimbleandlittlemy · 29/04/2022 17:01

Of course. I'm not saying it doesn't happen - it's just that those cases make the news because it's tabloid fodder whereas Joe Bloggs, whose dad was a bus driver and who did 3 years at RADA having got in on their outreach programme, isn't nearly so interesting as a story especially for the Netflix publicity machine - though damned well should be and then some. They were looking for someone young for William - the age specification on Spotlight was 16 - 21 - so the chances were they were going to have someone with very little experience, son of a star or not.

I never forget Daniel Radcliffe's parents were in the business - I knew his mum quite well when she was a rather good casting director. Emma Watson and Rupert Grint's were lawyers and racing memorabilia salesman respectively.

TizerorFizz · 29/04/2022 22:55

@mimbleandlittlemy
you are very rude about girls at private schools. I don’t think you have to be quite so judgemental. However there are lots of DC who want this career snd it’s difficult for all of them. Knowing the industry helps. As it does to be the DC of a vet or medic if you want that work. Others have to be extra special and so many actors have parents in the business. We can all make a very long list……

mimbleandlittlemy · 30/04/2022 00:24

Having been to private school myself and knowing a lot of privately educated kids, I know what it produces. I wasn’t being rude, I was stating a truth. They have lovely glossy long hair (the Timotei comment was a slight joke - sorry) and good teeth and there are lots and lots of them wanting to be in the industry. And there are too many in an industry that isn’t looking for that because that’s a very small pool of lived experience and at the moment, rightly or wrongly - there’s a discussion to be had about the nature of acting v lived experience but not for now - people want lived experience.

I know a lovely privately educated girl with who fits my earlier description who is toying with becoming an actor and thinks her perfectly fine teeth aren’t right so her parents are paying for Invisalign and she’ll have a lovely smile. I talked to a girl the same age recently, in her last year at drama school, whose parents are below the breadline and she can’t even afford to get her teeth cleaned so she can’t smile in her headshots.

There are all sorts of unfair advantages in the world, sadly.

TizerorFizz · 30/04/2022 08:31

Some people get free teeth straightening and others don’t. As for glossy hair??? You are just pedalling a stereotype. Are you saying poor people have filthy short fair and look like urchins? How condescending! You really have no idea. I’ll leave it there.

I was only trying to say that wanting an acting career and getting one are two different things. The OPs DD has done little extra and even when DC have every benefit at school, it’s seldom easy.

Whippet · 30/04/2022 12:12

My sense at the moment is that if you're white you need to be 'quirky' in some way to be getting work at the moment. The days of the classically beautiful or handsome girl/boy seem to be over. Everyone now seems to have lop-sided jaws or memorable eyes or something.

It must be soul-destroying for young actors coming out of drama school seeing Netflix and the like post open calls saying "no previous experience necessary". It does rather make a mockery of the whole thing. Although I think all the young actors in the last season had some acting experience, even if Emma Corrin was passing off her LAMDA Shakespeare Summer course as if she'd been to drama school Grin.

Whippet · 30/04/2022 12:24

You also have the rise of the young actors who have no training but are overnight internet sensations due to their Tiktok videos and the like - I saw one such guy in the new series 'Ten Percent' last night?

To be honest, I wouldn't advise any young relative of mine to go to Drama School these days!

ENoeuf · 30/04/2022 12:28

It’s fascinating reading this, we are a few years behind. As kids, they’ve been able to get work here and there (paid and experience) and attend auditions quite easily. Sounds like the leap to adulthood is really tough.

AccidentalStageMum · 01/05/2022 01:00

Totally agree with absolutely everything mimbleandlittlemy has said.

I would say to the OP, is your DD 100% aware of the realities of the industry and does she have the kind of personality that you need to survive it?

I have a DC who is a reasonably successful child actor now in their early teens. They have good credits and are with an agent whose high enough tier that their name can potentially open doors. It's still incredibly hard to find work. If you land 1 job every 50 auditions, that is probably pretty good odds.

There are huge numbers of people wanting to do this and drama schools churning out thousands of new hopefuls every year into an industry that realistically only has a handful of jobs available.

Does your DD understand the process once you've managed to get your headshots and your showreel and your agent?

I have people ask me if DC's agent sends us scripts to choose from! Nope, you sit and pray the email pings at least once a week (the last 2 years you prayed it pinged once a month), and then you have anything from 12 hours to maybe 3/4 days to learn whatever role has come through, tape it all and send it back. Tape then vanishes into the ether and 99.9% of the time you never hear another thing. You don't even get a 'no thank you' 99% of the time. In 8 years we have had feedback twice from casting.

If you do hear back for a recall, you can then face weeks or months of call backs, chemistry reads, directors zooms/meetings - and then it's a no. You've committed to the role, dreamt about it for weeks and it all vanishes in a second. You can even book the role and have them change their minds after that! And you have to be able to take all those knocks and disappointments and still get up the next day and put the exact same enthusiasm and excitement into the next role.

With some casting brackets (female 25-30 for example), Casting Directors can receive literally thousands of submissions for a single (small) role. In order to be one of the handful who are selected just for a first tape you'll need to tick an awful lot of boxes - have a specific look, or be with a top tier agent, or have a great cv of previous work. But you can't get that great cv without opportunities and you can't get that top tier agent without the great cv or being the stand-out in your year from a big name college, so it's a huge catch-22 for the vast, vast majority.

Alongside that, as an adult you'll also be having to support yourself in the kind of job where you can drop everything for an audition or to go off and film for 6 weeks. You also need to be paying for constant continual training to keep your skill set up to date and ready to go. Plus your headshots, Spotlight, Equity, IMDbPro.

I once sat and compared costs/time with a friend whose kid is into showjumping... she had to deal with more mud, but otherwise it was pretty similar.

Think very carefully if they have the resilience and rhino hide to take the relentless rejection that is the norm. And whether the level of debt they will take on with a degree course is going to be worth it - and in my opinion it is definitely not worth incurring the debt to go somewhere that isn't a college with a really good name. If your child just wants to perform, there are much easier ways and much more fun ways than doing it professionally.

AccidentalStageMum · 01/05/2022 01:06

Whippet · 30/04/2022 12:12

My sense at the moment is that if you're white you need to be 'quirky' in some way to be getting work at the moment. The days of the classically beautiful or handsome girl/boy seem to be over. Everyone now seems to have lop-sided jaws or memorable eyes or something.

It must be soul-destroying for young actors coming out of drama school seeing Netflix and the like post open calls saying "no previous experience necessary". It does rather make a mockery of the whole thing. Although I think all the young actors in the last season had some acting experience, even if Emma Corrin was passing off her LAMDA Shakespeare Summer course as if she'd been to drama school Grin.

Apparently Emma Corrin "studied drama at the University of Bristol, but left to study Education, English, Drama and the Arts at St John's College, Cambridge from 2015 to 2018"

I quite often see stories about 'stars' plucked from obscurity... and generally if you go digging, they've actually got a fair bit of training or experience behind them already.

Drama college is definitely not the only legitimate training route in.

mimbleandlittlemy · 01/05/2022 08:51

TizerorFizz · 30/04/2022 08:31

Some people get free teeth straightening and others don’t. As for glossy hair??? You are just pedalling a stereotype. Are you saying poor people have filthy short fair and look like urchins? How condescending! You really have no idea. I’ll leave it there.

I was only trying to say that wanting an acting career and getting one are two different things. The OPs DD has done little extra and even when DC have every benefit at school, it’s seldom easy.

As you well know, I am not saying that. I am saying that this industry doesn’t need a saturation of a type for whom there is increasingly little work. I thought your comment about the one girl getting work from your dd’’s school having industry connections, oh and being BAME, was pretty unpleasant but that appears to be ok. Truth is, at the moment Global Majority and quirky win the day. I saw a show at the RSC a couple of weeks ago and at one point there was only one white actor on stage out of ten or so and they have recently done a Much Ado with a GM cast. Good. Bring it on. We need to change this industry to reflect a world most people recognise not a bubble - though there were some pretty unpleasant comments from the white, middle aged, middle class audience who are frightened at not seeing themselves reflected. It’s not Shakespeare. Mmmm.

I do find it exhausting looking at breakdowns and unable to suggest a very talented actor because they don’t have sufficient TikTok presence or enough Instagram followers but this too shall pass, I hope. Fads come and go but I think the rebalancing of the industry away from showcasing a small number to reflecting far more of our society is a good thing.

AccidentalStageMum - it’s just bloody hard isn’t it? I can’t tell you how upsetting it is for an agent to bring that bad news to a client after all the tapes, tests, pencilling, hope. The constant bravery of actors doing this day in day out never ceases to astonish me and I love them for it.

AccidentalStageMum · 01/05/2022 18:38

It definitely is and I have so much admiration for DC's agents. They celebrate and commiseration with equal measure for definite! I'm always happy when we book that it means they also get paid given how much time they spend on all the submissions that go nowhere.

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