It's difficult to compare the learning methods between The Theatre School and Central (Central School of Speech and Drama) because they're both so different. Trying to compare them is impractical because while they both may be undergraduate programs, their styles are immensely different.
At The Theatre School, we have coursework (classes, lectures, meetings, etc.) throughout the day Monday through Friday, and then we have production work (rehearsals, tech, performances) in the evenings Monday through Friday as well as during the day on Sundays. (For those of you who attend or work at The Theatre School, you know that the schedule can be much more technical and complex, but to keep things simple, let's stick with what I've written.) For the most part, our work as students and our work as professional theatre artists are rather divided, in the sense that we focus on them at different times of the day and often have to "switch gears" between students and artists. This is neither right nor wrong, yet Central has a much different way of scheduling their students. Rather than having classes in the day and rehearsals in the evenings, everything happens at once and is all finished by 6:00 pm (with the exception of tech week schedules). Sometimes, students miss classes because they're in rehearsals, and vice versa. Is this good or bad? At first, I though that this was a strange way to run an institution, but since I haven't yet started rehearsals, I really don't have an educated opinion on the matter.
Next week is the First Rehearsal for my show, which is a very important day for any artist working on the production, and especially important for the stage manager (as it's our first day to establish ourselves as managers in the room). Interestingly enough, I have a presentation in class on this same day. Assuming that I would need to reschedule my presentation, I spoke with my professor about my predicament. Solution? I'm simply leaving rehearsal for an hour to do my presentation in class. My heart almost stopped when I was told that I'd leave my rehearsal room. (It gets better - my ENTIRE team will be leaving the rehearsal room with me, as they are all part of my presentation group. Alas, there will not be a single stage manager present in the room during this time.) At moments like these, when rehearsals and class schedules so heavily conflict, I'm not quite sure how Central maintains the balance of coursework versus rehearsal work, but it will be interesting to see how this goes...
As I continue to blog throughout the next two months, I hope to touch upon the differences between The Theatre School and Central in an educated manner. Although I'm biased in some regards, I'm trying to be as open as possible to new ways of learning and producing theatre.
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