Foundation Course Rose Bruford College

Our Acting Foundation Courses provide rigorous and intensive vocational training that will give you vital skills, techniques and confidence essential for higher education (degree or MA/MFA), or a career in the performing arts.

Students enrolled in this course benefit from a dedicated full-time professional preparation week. This week offers an opportunity to review CVs and engage in mock auditions guided by experienced professionals and casting directors.

Our Foundation courses are designed to support your development as an actor in training, auditioning and future practice in a way that is rigorous and professional.

In 2020, 100% of our students expressed that they were ‘satisfied’ with the course, with many noting that it exceeded their expectations.

Please email [email protected] to request an Information Webinar recording about the course.

Rose Bruford College

Why choose this course?

Three locations to choose from

Foundation Acting is available at Sidcup, Brighton and Edinburgh

Flexible

Our courses all operate on a 4 day week, allowing you more time to work alongside the course

Teaching and industry connections

Delivered by experienced professional actors, tutors and directors with many guest leading experts

Student support

Each student has a personal tutor and is expected to keep a Personal Development Journal that is reviewed in 1-1 tutorials each term. You will also be given support and advice regarding applications for further study and entering the world of professional work

Course breakdown

Each course is designed to develop you physically, vocally and imaginatively whilst encouraging an independent and in-depth approach to your work. We arrange a number of workshops as well as audition panels with outside theatre and casting directors. Students get help to build their actor’s portfolios of songs and speeches.

Sidcup

  • The Foundation Course in Sidcup is a 22 week course and includes 26+ hours of teaching and learning per week.  Classes are delivered between the hours of 9am and 9pm
  • Delivered on our Sidcup parkland campus by experienced acting staff and visiting directors
  • Masterclasses include; Building your audition portfolio, Grotowski, physical theatre, audition technique, Augusto Boal, acting through song, Uta Hagen, acting for camera, clowning, stage fighting and unarmed combat, Alexander Technique, musicality (all masterclasses are subject to change)
  • Classes include; acting (studying Stanislavski and Meisner), performance/audition technique, movement, ensemble, voice, text study, sight-reading, Shakespeare, singing, acting for TV/film
  • There are two full-time rehearsal projects during the course; Term 1 contemporary scene study and Term 2 Shakespeare, as well as weekly masterclasses with outside professional directors and theatre companies.

Split into two terms:

  • TERM 1: The Actor and Foundation Skills (September to December)
  • TERM 2: The Actor and the Audience (January to March)

Brighton

  • The Foundation Course in Brighton is a 20-week course and includes 24+ hours of teaching and learning over 4 days per week
  • The course is designed to support your development as an actor in training, auditioning and future practice in a way that is rigorous and professional. It will also develop you physically, vocally and imaginatively whilst encouraging an independent and in-depth approach to your work
  • Classes include; Acting (studying Stanislavski and Meisner), Performance/audition technique, Movement, Ensemble, Voice, Text study, Sight-reading, Shakespeare and Singing
  • There are two full-time rehearsal projects during the course: Term 1 contemporary scene study and Term 2 Shakespeare, as well as weekly masterclasses with outside professional directors and theatre companies. Highly experienced tutors from our performance B.A courses as well as professional practitioners deliver the course
  • Masterclasses include: Building your audition portfolio, Grotowski, physical theatre, audition technique, Augusto Boal, acting through song, Uta Hagen, acting for the camera, clowning, stage fighting and unarmed combat, Alexander Technique, musicality (all masterclasses are subject to change)
  • Split into two terms:
    • TERM 1: The Actor and Foundation Skills (September to December)
    • TERM 2: The Actor and the Audience (January to March)

Edinburgh

  • The Foundation Course in Edinburgh is a 20-week course and includes 24+ hours of teaching and learning over 4 days per week
  • Daily classes (led by the staff team) will include practice in acting, voice, movement; acting methodologies; acting styles & contexts; professional preparation & audition technique
  • Termly masterclasses may include audition technique, physical theatre, Boalian theatre, clowning, stage combat, acting for camera, building your audition portfolio, musicality, Alexander Technique, approaches to classical text (all masterclasses are subject to change)
  •  Full-time rehearsal projects (led by the staff team and/or industry professionals) will include contemporary scene study, devising and a classical theatre project.
  • Split into two terms:
    • TERM 1: The Actor and Foundation Skills (September to December)
    • TERM 2: The Actor and the Audience (January to March)

Your future career

At the end of our programmes, you will be prepared to study on either BA/MA/MFA courses. Graduates of the Foundation Course have also successfully found professional employment and agent representation in the UK, EU and USA.

Students from our courses have been offered places on both our BA and MA courses, whilst others have been offered places or had final round auditions at; Central, East 15, RADA, Drama Centre, Italia Conti, LAMDA, Royal Welsh, Mountview, Guildford, Drama Studio, Guildhall, The American Academy of Dramatic Art and Stanford University.

You will receive guidance in CV writing, professional headshots and show reels, self-taping and practice mock auditions with casting directors. There will also be workshop Q&A’s with actors and directors,  so you understand about the industry as well as a toolkit to manage your well-being and build resilience and discipline.

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Pat O’Toole

Course Director Foundation Acting

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Edward McGurn

Course Coordinator for Foundation Actor Training (Edinburgh)

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Jenny Long

Co-ordinator and Teacher

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Brian Ferguson
Brian Ferguson

Course Leader & Acting Foundation Tutor

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Andrew Midgley Foundation Acting Brighton
Andrew Midgley

Course Leader Foundation Acting Brighton

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How to apply

Open to applications from anyone over 18 years old at time of enrolment.

There is no academic qualifications entry requirement.

Please complete the short form on this page.  You will then be asked to complete another form and submit 2 self-taped pieces of no more than 2 minutes each from one classical and one contemporary play.

Successful applicants are recalled for an informal interview online.

Useful Information

Please note that these courses are not eligible for Student Finance England (SFE) funding, so you will need to have the funds in place if you are made an offer.  All students who are offered a place are required to provide the name of a guarantor before commencing the course.

Early bird discount: A £500 discount is available for early payment of full fees by 31st July 2023.

International students can take part in the courses under a standard 6 month visitor visa, a student route visa is not required.

Scholarships and Bursaries

Sidcup

One Bernardine Evaristo Scholarship, which is the full course fee of £9,350 for our Sidcup course

Edinburgh & Brighton

Bursaries of £3,737.50 a year will be awarded (with a maximum of two bursaries awarded per course) to successful students on one of our Foundation Courses in Edinburgh and Brighton.

Institution code: Not applicable

Course code: Not applicable

Auditions and interview guidance

Course Summary

Duration

6 months

Mode of study

Full time

Start date

September 2024

Course Type

Foundation Course

Qualification

Foundation Course

Sidcup Acting Foundation Course Tuition Fee for UK & International students

£9350

Brighton and Edinburgh Acting Foundation Course Tuition Fee for UK & International students

£7475