What is the best college for an interest in musical theatre?

I really want to be an actress, and I am starting to look for colleges that will allow me to get a BFA in musical theatre. I know about Juliard and Boston Conservatory...but what are some others? Cheap ones too =)

What is the best college for an interest in musical theatre?performing arts center

okay so i semi agree with the other person who posted...but that is for acting. Believe it or not musucal theater can be very different. What do you want out of your schooling? If it is to perform then the BA BFA arguement doesn't exsist. You just want to go to the best school that will train you so that you are hireable. If you want all the education and don't care about the performing then i guess you would have to do the homework. I am currently working toward my BFA in Musical Theater at The University of the Arts in Philadelphia. This school is fantastic. It is close to new york but far enough away to remain sane. It is not just singing acting and dancing all day either. You have a certain amount of liberal arts you are required to take. In terms of contacts alot of the teachers live here but have many connections to NY. Philly has an awesome theater community as well. Check out the website www.uarts.edu and look at the MT major. You should come and check it out too if you can. If you speak with the head of the department you can sit in on classes and take a dance class or two. It is fun and everyone is well...crazy theater people, but there are also alot of schools around with regular people so you are not stuck with theater people if you don't want to be. In terms of price, it is expensive but they help out a bit and the training is worth every penny!

Good Luck!

What is the best college for an interest in musical theatre?sunshine opera theater

First answer these questions.

What are you looking for from the College/ University.

There are many different programs, with many different goals and approaches to training a performer in musical theatre.

First and up front:

Training to be an actor is not cheap.

Even if you go out to california and skip college, you are going to pay. Training is expensive. College is expensive. Professional reputable acting coservatories are expensive. There is no such thing as a cheap acting program. Remember, you get what you pay for.

At a big university like Yale, Carnage Mellon, NYU/ Tisch

Missouri Rep, Seattle Rep, you will find amazing acting programs that are really graduate training/ conservatory programs.

If they have an undergraduate acting program you could spend 4 years training with some of the best acting coach but may never act on the main stage and have most of your work consist of scenes and one acts directed by graduate students? You may also take some of your beginning acting classes from graduate students not the acting faculty.

This is what many of the larger acting programs are like because their graduate students or conservatory company members are the key emphasis of their program.

This will give you the chance to work with some the very best and most talented acting teachers but also you might get lost in the crowd. You will also have to audition with many, many other people looking to get into the same program. If you got the chops, go for it. If you don't get in then look at the smaller more educational programs.

If you want the chance to be is shows from your first year and take classes with acting coaches that are good to great then look to the smaller colleges and universities. Some have very good acting programs that will give you the skills you need to get into one of the big grad programs or conservatory companies.

If you have the skills and raw talent to get into a Julliard or Tisch, then go for it. But there you are committing yourself to one career. You will live, eat, dream, work, performing. Nothing else must get in the way. No real life outside of chasing the dream. Many people start this path but fail to have what it takes to continue on it.

One thing in closing. The BFA is not as important these days as the BA. Graduate schools in acting are looking for well educated, broad knowledge based students. They want more from their students than hours in acting/ dancing/ singing classes. They want humanities, social sciences, science, world culture, dramatic literature and history, text analysis, reading, writing and communication skills. They want people who can grasp ideas and explore them because they know more that how to memories lines, sing a scale accurately and dance well.

Ask performers you meet how they got their start. Listen closest to the ones with MFAs and/ or Equity cards they got in a professional training program. The few that made it by going to New York and or Hollywood and getting luck are very few and far between those that chose a career and work very hard to get there.

Break a leg however you choose to go.