top three theater schools- Page 2

[JC14]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 9:25am

PJ, I think I've lurked long enough to have read about 15 of these threads...

[PJ]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 11:44am

Congratulations, Lurker. You do realize that every topic has been discussed atleast twice on this board, right? Yeah.

[USActorSinger]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 1:23pm

What about Webster University?

[StrStruckDreamr9]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 3:11pm

Many well-know actors are graduates of the University of Michigan's theater program, and I was just wondering, is this the one at Ann Arbor? If I am not mistaken, there are several.

Also, JC, if you're going to complain about repeated threads, here's an idea...DON'T READ THEM. If you've read "15" of them before, why are you still responding on the SECOND page of this one?

[JC14]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 4:04pm

My point was the value of using the search feature. Deep breath now, there's no need to jump down my throat.

[kitkatgirl54]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 5:47pm

ragtime322: wasn't emerson college rated #1 by princeton review as "great college theater," in which the question was "how popular are theater groups?" .. being rated number 1 in that may not exactly read as "#1 theater school in the country." but don't get me wrong, i think emerson is great - it was my first choice up until the last minute.

dory the nun: a current student at your school told me that "UArts is only third behind NYU and Juilliard" a few weeks ago ... i wonder where he/she is getting this if your school doesn't believe in top three. my school does the same thing, i think .. see that's exactly what i'm wondering by posting this topic... thank you for posting.

kyle: yeah except i hate cosi now that i work there ... counting down to my last day!!

feinstein9: NYU has a great graduate musical theater writing program with awesome teachers like Michael John LaChuisa and William Finn. soo.. something to think about :)

JC14: you've read 15 threads of someone asking why all the schools are lying to their students and telling them they are the mythical "top three"? i have reiterated this twice now, but i had not intended this post to be about which schools are good for theater. i know which schools are good for theater and i'm sure we all have our own personal top three. what i want to know is why schools are dismissing this as fact that at least 25 schools in the country are all saying they are top three for theater? Updated On: 8/11/04 at 05:47 PM

[PJ]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 7:59pm

There's no need to jump down your throat JC14 as long as you don't reply in this particular post anymore. :)

[LilMiZBroADwaY23]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 8:45pm

IU Bloomington is supposed to be one of the best for Musical Theatre. It's usually number one, I believe.

Another is Western Michigan University, it's Musical Theatre Program only let's in I believe 10 or 20 students per year. They say if you get in, you are really going somewhere.

Michigan State also has a good program. I don't think it would be as good as IU, but it's supposed to be good.

I plan on going to IU, Columbia (in Chicago) or NYU.

[shesings]

Posted: 8/11/04 at 9:24pm

AMDA info. Ok it IS a 2 year program, and you get a certificate, much like a trade school. However those credits transfer to The New School University where you will have completed over half of the required hours to get your BFA. So yes, it is infact a school. And they do have some impressive alumni. Tyne Daly, Paul Sorvino, Marissa Jaret Winokur, Christopher Sieber just to name a few. So whle a lot of people don't like it don't say its not a school. Infact while most of my friends at college were taking 12-15 credit hours a semester we were taking 25. Everyday 8-5. Much more intensive than some "real schools"

[Mr. Tuttle]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 12:15am

kitkat says:

"i'm not asking about the top schools. i know what i think the top schools are, and i don't care what you think the top schools are."

Hey honey..APPRECIATE what answers you get. Be THANKFUL people have provided you with an answer to your question (believe it or not, they have!). And the answer...duhh...everyone thinks the school they attend is the best or one of the best. So no wonder you're getting all kinds of top school answers.

And, ignoring your question, here's my suggestions for Musical Theater top 5:

U of Michigan
NYU (but not CAP, go Steinhardt)
Oklahoma City University
CCM (if you like attitude)
Carnige Mellon

[BalletGirl85]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 12:28am

My thoughts on AMDA and my story...

When I applied for schools my senior year of high school, my mom wanted me to go to a degree program and she wouldn't pay if I majored in theater. So I applied to good theater schools as well as regular academicy schools to please her and I figured if I really wanted to go for theater, I'd get loans.

I got into a LOT of good schools, theater-wise, including Boston Conservatory, UMich, Emerson and a few others. The only one I didn't get into was Carnegie Mellon. But I ended up going to a "regular" university...where I spent NO time going to classes and all of my time contracted at a big regional theater where I did four mainstage and six children theater shows in eight months. We had lots of student matinees (where students form schools in the areas would come on field trips to watch our shows) and so I ended up missing a LOT of class...and basically my parents were paying $23,000 a year for me to be getting paid a little bit of money to do regional stuff.

I chose a regular school over a theater school because of my parents but that was a bad idea. I HATED academics, even in high school, and I hated the environment at that "regular" school of mine. So I dropped out, worked professionally in theater for a year, and then decided I needed more training and applied to AMDA on a whim, since my friend just started going there and I heard great things from her. I found out about my acceptance within, like, two weeks and I got a REALLY great scholarship.

My whole thing is that I KNOW I will learn stuff there. I've worked professionally in theater since I was ten. I did a tour when I was a kid and lived the theatrical life as well as did the regular school life. But I've never really had the training, since my aunt took me to that tour audition and we didn't really expect anything from it...so I've just been working and I've never had a voice lesson, etc. So I know when I am at AMDA, I will be getting voice lessons from people who are qualified to teach it (rather than musical directors who tell you that you MUST belt every note EVER or you will suck haha, meanwhile, your voice is raw pretty much all the time)... and I've never had any kind of acting training, besides a scene study workshop I took for, like, two days, and a master class I took with Betty Buckley when I sang back up in one of her concerts when I was 15. I am excited for AMDA and I think if I put my time into the program, I will get a lot out of it.

I'm not gonna lie, I only applied because it was mid-June and I really needed a school to be in by September, and no one else was accepting applications at this point. But the more I heard about it - especially the fact that there were NO academics - the more excited I got.

However, I AM going to be doing the program with the New School once I leave AMDA. AMDA has lots of talented graduates, although they do have a selection of people who really shouldn't be in theater as well. I just don't think it's fair of any of you to judge anyone who goes to AMDA as being untalented or whatever. Because they accept so many people, you will find some people there that make you think "what the hell?" but it's not true of anyone, and those people who don't really belong shouldn't be the standard in which all AMDA students are judged. I don't think I'm the most talented person alive - especially because I've never had lessons - but I don't think I'm a loser, especially considering the other musical theater programs I was accepted to.

It's just someone's choice whether they want to do the whole academic thing or if they want to do just theater. That was my choice. Ideally, I wanted to be at Boston Conservatory, since I'm from the Boston area, but it was too late for me to apply again and I really really needed somewhere to be this fall.

Just my two cents...

[feinstein9]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 12:31am

miss kit kat- thank you very much! i was actually looking at nyu since it's like my family's alma mater... but with finn AND lachuisa?? double whammy!

[marincrazy11]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 12:32am

To answer the U of M question, it's mostly out of Ann Arbor. And I saw Into The Woods at Michigan State last year nad was not terribly impressed. It wasn't a bad show, a beautifully stunning one at that, but I left uninspired. But they are doing great shows this year and I think I heard that they have gotten a new musical theatre person there.

[Mr. Tuttle]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 1:01am

Last word on AMDA:

AMDA is not called SCAMDA for no reason.

Go to a real school. Get real training. Get outside of the theater world and inside a history book. Directors want to hire real, well rounded people.

[WayWicked]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 1:02am

Bravo Mr. Tuttle. Can't say it better!

[BalletGirl85]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 1:31am

I am more real and well-rounded than most people I went to school with at a regular school. I graduated from high school. I went to a regular university for a year and hated it. I was wasting time by being there. I read a lot and know more than most people do at "regular" schools. I graduated high school a year early. I also went on tour at a young age and know more about life than I would have if I didn't tour.

AMDA is called SCAMDA because of its ridiculously high tuition and no degree program. But take 20 weeks (or however many weeks AMDA has) of classes for $19,000 (if you're not living on campus)...you are doing 25 hours a week. 25 hours a week of classes times 20 weeks of classes is 500 hours. If you calculated 500 hours of voice sessions (my NYC voice coach who I went to once before an audition charged $90 for 45 minutes), acting classes (not sure the price), and dance classes ($15 per hour and a half), it comes out to WAY MORE than $19,000.

For a little bit of fun with math...

If you took 500 hours of private coaching sessions from this coach I went to, that's $60,000 at his price. If you are taking an hour of voice a week at AMDA, at 20 weeks in the semester, you have 20 hours of private voice. If you take the 20 hours of voice training from the 500 hours of total training, and do a little cross multiplying, it comes out to about $760 for 20 hours of private voice lessons, which comes out to about $38 an hour. For 20 hours of voice training at this NY coach's price, it comes out to $2400, or $120 an hour (he actually charges $90 per 45 minutes, or a rate of $2 a minute, which would equal $120 an hour). I've studied with this coach once and he really didn't help me. I've met one of the AMDA coaches and she taught me more in the five (free) minutes I spent chatting than this "infamous NY coach to the stars" taught me in 45 minutes ($90 of my hard earned dollars down the tubes).

My friend decided to do 20 hours of training a week with coaches and dance schools in NY and is paying a CRAP LOAD more than I am paying for classes at AMDA...and a lot of the time, her voice teacher spends his time photocopying music...and her dance classes are often taught by substitutes. So who is getting the better deal here?

No, AMDA is not a college. But it's not a "crappy" program by any means. If you go in there expecting to learn something, you will come out of it having learned something. If you have a negative attitude about it, obviously you're not going to get anything out of it. I've done the professional thing for more than half of my life. I definitely got "life experience" being on tour and living with a guardian and being tutored. I graduated high school a year early when I was 16, and I'm young for my grade, and I lived in a dorm at a college when I was 16 and 17. I can learn plenty of things and be PLENTY well-rounded without wasting $23,000 a year sitting in a classroom taking the same "general psych" class I took my sophomore year of high school, or the same "elementary French" class I took in fifth grade.

And like I said, I'm going to be transferring to the New School to get a degree. I'd just rather have constant theater training first. I need a break from academia. Some people enjoy sitting in classes for hours on end. I like to read, I like to voice my opinion, but minus the losers I had to be in college with. If being "real and well-rounded" means sitting in a lecture hall with 300 other students who only talk about "how friggin wasted" they were at a frat party the night before, then give me AMDA anyday.

[shesings]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 1:46am

the thing is you can come up for a bad name for any school. Every school is adored by some and hated by others. Believe it or not I didn't really like my AMDA experience, I do think however that people don't give it enough credit. It's called scamda b/c some bitter little sh*t who didn't like it, or probably didn't getin, came up with a name to make fun of it. Not a very clever one at that.
I also think it's impossible to pick the top 3 musical theatre schools b/c its entirely subjective. I for one do not think U of Michigan or Oklahoma City U are top schools. They wouldn't be my first choice. I would look at Carnegie Mellon, Boston Conservatory, CCM, NYU, Julliard. They are pretty much all schools that almost anyone would be impressed by.

[bronxboundexpress]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 2:12am

NYU is the #1 top school because I go there.

[kitkatgirl54]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 8:53am

mr tuttle, you read my post out of context. the "i don't care what the top schools are" comment was directly in response to JC14 who was complaining that this post had been on the board before and that i should use the search option next time. i should have made it more clear that i was speaking to him, but considering it came directly after his post i figured there would be no problem seeing that i was defending myself towards his comment. if i came off hostile/bossy it is because i was mad that rather than actually reading my post i felt like he just skimmed the topic and the responses and then bitched at me.

balletgirl: i am glad you are sticking up for your school and find it is a good deal pricewise for you. i do agree that some talented people go into AMDA because if they take 50%, there have to be some good kids in there. also, there are definitely alumni that have gone to this school and gotten work. having never attended a class at AMDA i can only go off of what people have told me. as long as you stay away from their housing, you personally should be fine and will become a wiser person from this experience, if not a better actor.

however, most of all what bothers me about AMDA is when i run into students from the school at auditions. you can pick them right out because they offer brutally honest (and not always helpful) advice to fellow actors at auditions and, from what i have seen, love to tell their peers at the audition that they sucked. if you can gain self-confidence by going there, great. pass some on to me while you're at it. but what i have run into most is the holier-than-thou attitude that is really just unnecessary.

also, from what i have heard there are plenty of voice teachers at AMDA that love to teach you how to scream so watch that. Updated On: 8/12/04 at 08:53 AM

[showstopper]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 9:34am

balletgirl...I went to amda with a huge scholarship and dropped out after the first semester because most of my class was out all night at the bars and partying. Infact some of the students came to class still wasted. The problem is you get alot of scene study with partners and if the partner that they pair you up with is a big loser then you get nothing done. I wanted a conservatory training. I am now a student at the boston conservatory. It's very serious and excellent training with a degree at the end. The senior showcase at the end is in new york and is attended by alot of the important people in the industry. amda has a showcase and nobody attends. We went to watch it and it was filled up with 1st and 2nd semester students. I think Chris seiber got his degree at another college and went to amda afterwards. Marissa winoker is supposedly suing amda for using her name because she didnt even finish the program, she dropped out at the very beginning. Tyne daly finished there...but how long ago was that? that was when the school had a GOOD name. Good luck with everything, I hope it works for you. Updated On: 8/12/04 at 09:34 AM

[JC14]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 9:43am

KitKat, it was not meant as a direct insult towards you, it was more a general statement. I come from the land of CompulsiveBowlers where they'll eat you alive if you so much as repeat a previously asked question. While that doesn't justify my statement in anyway it was just intended to help move things along as the responses I read seemed to mimic other things I've read on here. Didn't mean to step on your toes...back to the topic...

I don't think anyone can rightfully say "these are the top three theatre schools." Your education is what you make of it and while there are schools that continuously turn out successful broadway actors...CMU, Michigan, Northwestern, CCM would be in my top...it's all a matter of what a particular person needs out of a theatre education and the amount of effort and energy that person devotes to their education. The professors are gonna be there to equip the student with the tools they need it's all comes back to what you put into it - my two cents at least, however unappreciated they are.

[kitkatgirl54]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 10:02am

JC15 your two cents are much appreciated. the reason why this entire subject conerns me is that, for instance, i feel like there are many schools that come up over and over in the general theater community. (CMU, NYU, CCM, etc.) However, (and this is just an example, I'm sure it's a very good school) i have never even heard of IU Bloomington, which someone had mentioned has been, in their opinion, #1 for a while. Not to say that this isn't a good school, but I feel like there needs to be some consistency here. i have done so much research and never come upon that school before. besides this, some schools are good and some are just not. When people are looking for colleges in general (completely unrelated to theater), it is clear that you wouldn't go to a two year trade school over Harvard. I mean, it's just obvious. However, in the theater world there are many that i'm sure will argue that AMDA has turned out more alumni than CMU and that it is a comparable school. Which is just completely ridiculous. I'm sure the local college in my town is not telling their students that they are as good as Harvard because they simply aren't and that's a fact. We have very little to judge from as theater majors except for what we have heard. and if i hear 25 schools are all the #1 best, i don't know what to believe. i just wish there was some sort of authority on this so we could all be on the same page here. maybe we need to write a "performing arts colleges horror stories" book along the lines of the recent success of "making it on broadway." :)

[JC14]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 10:13am

I've been through the entire college audition process thing...I've experienced everything and am starting my second year as a theatre major at my first choice school. If you've got questions feel free to PM me, I'd be more than happy to discuss anything and everything I went through.

[kitkatgirl54]

Posted: 8/12/04 at 10:20am

this is just my personal venting about the process in general. i am very happy at NYU. but thank you :)

[MaRiO54]

Posted: 4/24/06 at 11:07am

What do u mean go to CCM If u want attitude. I want to go to CCM. Do u mean the instructors have attitudes problems or you learn how to perform w/ attitude.