Don't knock the B.A.s!

SongSearcher
Sat, 30 Apr 2011 13:53:33 +0000

Speaking as a current B.A. theatre major/didn’t pass the B.F.A. audition student, I have to say and feel I should bring up here that being a B.A. was possibly the best accident of my life.

Yes, I was and probably everyone else on this board is rushing around, trying to find themselves a monologue and practice thier dancing and pull together 32 bars of a song while searching for that perfect school but there’s a reality that you may get rejected or that two years down the road, your school may have a sophomore barrier that you get blocked by. Or, you might want to do theatre, but like me, have no Broadway or Hollywood ambitions.

THERE IS MORE TO THEATRE THAN JUST BROADWAY! Or National tours and Equity. The theatre world needs people who will bring theatre to the people: directors, playwrights, theatre educators, actors, technicians, etc… And being a B.F.A. won’t guarantee you anything more than being a B.A. would.

I’m just finishing up my first year as a B.A. theatre student and I wouldn’t have traded it for the world. I took acting classes and dance, I built sets, made costumes, was an assistant stage manager, usher, crew for load-ins and strikes, learned filmwork, student blogger, a student actor for the directing class, wrote plays, did workshops, studied stage combat, I worked for our student theatre company, and all-together, was involved somehow in approximently twenty-five shows or filming. I was taught just as much as any B.F.A. freshman and maybe learned more than some of them.

True, I plan to re-audition in the fall (because I lack the ability to choose to not audition. If I get a second chance, I’m going to take it). But I haven’t decided if I want to change my major to B.F.A. if accepted. Plenty of B.A.s at my school have been cast in shows or done more out there in the real world than B.F.A.s

Embrace the possibility, of making your own opportunities!