Anyone have sons or daughters in the theatre industry?

[jpgreenwood]

My daughter will soon be finishing college and her A levels. She is forecast very good grades in drama and English, and is hoping to go on to drama school/Uni.
As a family, we don’t know anyone who has followed this career path, but we understand it is an incredibly hard industry to get into, more-so for girls.
Her dream is to go to Guildford( we live in North East England) but she will need to keep her options open and be realistic that she might not got her preferred choices.
she can sing, dance, tap, and act so hopefully has all of the attributes required.
we just don’t know where to start and the college careers advice service are useless.
It would be nice to hear some personal experiences or any advice that we can direct her. Many thanks

 

[Box Brownie]

I cannot offer any direct family experience but as fairly regular Guildford goers, pre Covid it was quite common to see what I surmised as Guildford music(performing arts?) students busking and they were darned good.

Furthermore, in either 2018 or 19 we went to what I think I recall was the 'end of final year show' at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre in Guildford and again only as far as I recall.....all student disciplines i.e. musicians, dancers, singers etc were performing. It was to say the least an immensely enjoyable show.

One counter point, as I perceive it training in the performing arts with the end goal of full time employment can be very difficult........no doubt the creme de la crème succeed well but what about the 'chorus'.

If your daughter has her dream, I wish her all the best in her aims & achievements. Afteral, look what determination has done for Emma Raducanu.

PS back in the 70's I worked with someone whose sister dropped out of RADA to appear in what turned out to be flop. She was a contempory of Elaine Paige.. ........I never learned whether my co-workers sister stayed in the industry.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

My sister spent the first part of her career working for what became the Job Center and managed branches, areas and finally a region. Her view of entertainers is that they often make good catering staff because that's where they spend at least 90% of their working lives.

I also had a friend, during the 1960s, who was a relatively successful actress, with good roles in major productions. She put her success down to having first trained as an accountant, so she always had an income and could go to auditions confident that she had money in the bank.

My wife's best friend has a son who's a reasonably busy actor. He also has a second string as a tutor in English and History, so again, he has a steady income when he's resting.

I'm sure your daughter won't wish to hear it but from what I've been told, her best bet is to aquire a non-acting skill in a field which uses a lot of temporary staff, such as programming.

 

[lindsay]

I did a very brief spell as an Assistant Stage Manager in the mid-70's doing walk-on parts in provincial repertory theatre. Most of that has gone now, theatres cannot afford to maintain their own company so touring theatre groups are the thing for stage work unless you can get into one of the major houses like RSC. The thing is to keep looking for and going to auditions and calls, in the hope of fitting a profile in the directors and producers minds.

I have no current knowledge of the business, but a colleague at work and his wife, both trained as actors and worked in small productions for a while, but now they make a living as software developers and run a theatre group for children as a sideline.

Musically, the X-Factor/Voice/BGT programmes haver their place (I don't now what if any are still running). Building a cv/portfolio is really important, as is networking.

 

[jpgreenwood]

Thanks. She has already been on BGT (as part of a singing choir) and got 4 yesses. Unfortunately they never made the TV cut. Not a good enough back story.