The Spotlight Prize 2024 winners and finalists share their top tips to help you prepare for your drama school auditions.
Many acting careers start with a pivotal choice: should you go to drama school or not? While training at drama school is not essential for a successful career, your time there will definitely help you flourish as an actor, and there are a number of other good reasons why actors do decide to attend.
If you want to go to drama school, only one thing stands between you and your place there: the audition to get in.
At the Spotlight Prize 2024, we asked our winners and finalists – all of whom were successful in their own drama school auditions – for their top tips and advice for auditioning for drama school. Here’s what they shared:
Choose the Right Audition Piece
When you’re picking your audition piece, you shouldn’t base the decision on anything other than your own connection to the piece. As our next finalists highlight, you need to choose something that will play to your acting strengths, and not worry about whether it’s something the panel know or like.
Tsen Day-Beaver: “Find the monologue that really speaks to you.”
Cindy Chawula: “Find a piece that’s closest to you so you’re not working as hard to be truthful.”
Scott Bowden: “Make sure you find a piece that you are so comfortable with.”
Adam Hashmi: “Choose something you enjoy doing. Don’t try and pick something really, really obscure for the sake of it.”
Niamh-Ella McCann: “Don’t worry about whether it’s popular. Don’t worry about whether the panel know it. Go with your gut.”
Trudy Akobeng: “Rather than picking a piece that has become a bit stale, or you think is going to impress, pick something that you actually like, because then your passion will come through.”
Lara Dailey: “I always choose songs from my favourite shows and stuff I really enjoy, and it comes across.”
Prepare for Your Audition
As well as picking the right piece, you also need to ensure you prepare for your audition. This can take the form of learning some breathing exercises to calm you down before the audition, learning your chosen piece well, or doing your research on the drama school you’re auditioning for.
Emma Symmonds: “Breathe! Breathing is a really big thing. Start as early as possible with your prep.”
Senam Akpokavi (Screen Prize winner): “Really study the piece that you’re going to choose, and think about the influence that you can put onto it, the unique thing that everyone has in themselves because every person is different. Think about what you’re trying to show them. It’s not about creating something that’s perfect but showing them the potential and the hunger that you have.”
Alfanso May: “Be confident in the work and put the work in. Make sure that you do research into the institution that you’re going to as well.”
Be Yourself
As with any audition, you need to trust your acting instincts and commit to your choices. It’s up to you to put your own unique spin on your piece and show the drama school what you bring that no one else can.
The majority of our Spotlight Prize finalists recognise the importance of being yourself in an audition, and offer the following advice:
Dúa Róberts: “Just be yourself. Know who you’re talking to, know what your motivations are for speaking and just have fun with it.”
Jaden Asha Evelyn: “Trust in yourself, believe in yourself. Just take the right steps and I’m telling you – you will get in.”
Zannie Benfield: “Be yourself. Do pieces that you like. Show them who you are as a whole rounded person. I think they’re interested in knowing what you are beyond being an actor.”
Gabrielle K. Appiah: “Be playful and just be yourself.”
Callum Alexander-Smith: “You really need to lean into who you are as a person and your heritage and your roots and how you see the world, because where you’re from influences all of that. Those qualities are the things that enrich a performance and also enrich an ensemble and a rehearsal room when you’re there.”
Alyssa Thabisile Sibanda (Stage Prize winner): “You’ve got to know your spark, but when I say ‘spark’ it doesn’t mean you have to intend to go in and make everyone see it. I think just [make sure] you’re in tune with yourself.”
Jessica Oppong: “Understand who you are and what you want to tell other people. What is your story and what do you have that separates yourself from all of the people that are around you, because we are individuals and everyone has something that they want to say. And don’t try to merge yourself into what you think people want from you. You are more than what you look like, I think is my top tip.”
Bethany Wooding: “Don’t try to do what you think they want from you, because you’ll find as long as you go into there being who you are, you’ll end up in the right place.”
Katie Shelley: “No one wants to see a finished product. They want to see potential, and if you’re yourself, that’s what you’re going to show.”
After the Audition
Once you’ve completed your audition, it’s out of your hands. The drama school panel will make their choice on who to admit, and while this will mostly be based on the success and quality of your audition, there may also be some forces at play that you have no control over. While you wait for the outcome, here are a last couple of tips from our finalists to keep in mind:
Penny Morris: “I feel that these people who are auditioning you to get in, they have gone through so many thousands of people, and they’ll know when you’re ready to get in.”
Georgi Arthur: “You are auditioning the school. That’s so cheesy, but it’s true. Not everywhere’s going to fit you. So make sure that you like the vibe of the audition and you like the people that are auditioning you as well.”
A massive thanks to our Spotlight Prize 2024 winners and finalists for sharing their experiences!
Take a look at our News & Advice section for more video interviews and drama school tips and advice, including:
