March 12, 2008
Taking Flak for Being Well-Rounded (not fat)
Recently, I was talking to a fellow blogger who is a grad student getting her MFA in Directing. Obviously, this is a route that I want to go. However, during our conversation, she mentioned that she took some flak from the faculty about the few times when she stepped outside of the field to participate. She won an award or some such for a research paper she wrote, and her professors nagged her how she should be in an M.A. program if she likes to write so much.
Last weekend I visited SETC for some grad school auditions and interviews. During my grad school interviews, a college rep came up to me and asked to see my resume. Excited, I handed him one. Rather than interviewing me, though, he started rattling off tips for improving my resume. I felt slightly better after he mentioned he was doing this for everyone and not specifically because my resume sucked. He had some good advice.
At one point I pointed to a line on my resume indicating that I had a masters degree in Secondary Education.
“Is this a good thing to have on here?”
“Oh yes, absolutely,” he replied.
“It won’t show that I’m, I don’t know… flip-flopping, indecisive?”
“Oh no, not at all,” he answered. “It tells me a lot of things about you. It tells me that you’re an educated person. It tells me that you’ve already completed one masters program, and if you can do that, you can complete another. By having graduated with the degree, it tells me that you’ve completed one course of study and are now moving on to another. It tells me that you’re a well-rounded individual, and I know that when I take you and the other grad students out to dinner after a rehearsal, I know we’ll have something to talk about besides the show.”
So, apparently, it’s good to be well-rounded, educated, intelligent. Why, then, was my friend getting flak from her professors? It’s not even like she left the field of theatre altogether. She wrote about a theatrical topic. Shouldn’t directors be knowledgeable in all aspects of theatre? Won’t that make them better directors? If a director doesn’t have a clue about lights and how they work, how, then, can she communicate to the lighting designers what exactly it is that she wants?
I feel that exploring all of my options is very important. Even if I commit to a specific sub-field or course of study, I still feel that I should keep my eyes open on the horizon. I should feel free to study other subjects, so long as they don’t interfere with my main priority — directing.
Doesn’t everyone feel this way? Why wouldn’t they?
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I ran into the same thing when I was at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. One of my teachers saw me reading a book by Eric Bentley, and she said “That’s the LAST thing you need to be doing.” Some people in MFA or conservatory programs think that being a theatre artist is the opposite of thinking — in fact, that thinking actually gets in the way of being a theatre artist. This, of course, is nonsense. In my opinion, when you talk to people in a program, you should design some question to ask that would get at this attitude, and if you find it, run in the opposite direction. You want to be somewhere that your intelleigence is appreciated, not denigrated. It is too bad your friend is already in such a program.
Comment by Scott Walters — March 12, 2008 @ 8:24 am
Thanks for the comment, Scott. I’ve been trying to learn from my friends’ problems. Another friend joined an MFA program for lighting design and spent all of his time teaching and building sets rather than taking classes on lighting design or actually working with lights. That’s another kind of question I’m making sure to ask.
Comment by director — March 12, 2008 @ 3:15 pm
as someone with quite a bit experience in the employment, education and arts field i’d say let’s not forget there are a gazillion of opinions out there for every resume and career and educational path. you don’t want to drive yourself crazy listening to all of them, do you?
to scott’s very useful suggestion i would add - if you DO want to have someone’s opinion, make sure it’s the opinion of someone you value and respect.
there’s lots of room out there for someone with your unique combination of education, experience, talents, skills and interests.
Comment by isabella mori — March 18, 2008 @ 7:49 am