Study Overseas

Drama Centre London was created in 1963, to make available to acting students many of the most important developments in training from France, Germany, Russia and the United States during the Twentieth Century. Today, Drama Centre's students are drawn from all over the world, and its former graduates include Adrian Noble, Artistic Director of the RSC; the Artistic Director of the Portuguese National Theatre in Oporto; freelance directors from all over Europe and Latin America; and teachers of schools in Canada, Australia, Israel, Greece and, most notably, Sweden.

Stephen Hudson, who graduated with a First in the BA (Hons) Acting Course in 1998, writes:

I arrived at Drama Centre London in the autumn of 1995 at the age of 25. Behind me I had three years of University and, more recently, three years of living and working in the Czech Republic. I had been acting in amateur and semi-professional theatre for two and a half years, and had left Prague in a whirl of flattery and congratulation. I was confident. I was going to be an actor.

Within ten seconds of my first day I was thrown back to the age of thirteen and my first day of 'big' school: acting terms and phraseology that I had never heard of were the main topics of conversation; scare stories of what trials the training put you through were eagerly told. All confidence I had plummeted. I wanted to go home.

That feeling remained with me for my first few months. I felt I had thrown my previously happy life away. I was working eleven hours a day at college plus weekends trying to complete research and other assignments, coming home to a depressingly brown bedsit, not having time in the evenings or being too tired to fix myself a proper meal. The programme I was taking had a reputation for being tough, for 'breaking the actor down', but I felt I was learning very little and that I was drowning in mediocrity where once I had been a success.

After six months, however, something happened. I began to stop resisting the choice I had made to go to London and, instead, allowed myself to be affected by the work and my surroundings; and it is this which I think in many ways sums up the ethos of the training. We all walk around with resistances which manifest themselves in different ways. Mine, I felt, were countless. I was living within past experience and not willing to face up to the present, feeling scared that London might swallow me up, not wanting to be active in difficult situations, along with the many other fears, tics and insecurities that fill up our day-to-day existence. We don't want to feel judged or laughed at as a result of the decisions we make for ourselves and, as a result, protect ourselves - whether it be by cracking jokes, shyness, intimidation or violence - everyone is different. Most of these resistances we take for granted. They form our very characters and as such, can't be dispensed with overnight.

Drama Centre does not tell you that any one reaction is better or more valid than another. It asks you to ask yourself why you react in the way that you do. That questioning is difficult and possibly needs a life-long commitment, but the benefits can be profound. As for my own experience, the revelations that are slowly appearing to me have enabled me to move forward in my work, but more importantly my life, with a clearer understanding than I could ever have hoped for before now.

This of course is only one facet of the training. There is precision voice work, arduous movement and physical training. You also learn about the heritage of the art form in which you are about to participate. Starting from Dionysos and Greek theatre and working towards the 20th Century, you are shown the relevance of your career choice within the context of the history of theatre - which as we enter the new millennium is perhaps more valid than ever. Which way will we go next?

I would recommend studying drama to anyone, but it is an experience which can easily be resisted or wasted. It's not an area to study if you are looking for an easy option. Yes, you may get in, but don't expect to be spoon-fed any answers: you, and not the college, are the most important part of your learning process, and if you yourself don't take responsibility for that process then you're wasting your time.

Drama Centre is a special place and you can't help but be affected and changed by it, but don't go because you can't think of anything else to do, but because you want to question your ideas about acting, about the world and about the place you occupy in it.

There are no quick fixes, but the ride can be incredible. Good luck.