We focus for the most part on theatre in Teaching Drama, but the fastest growing part of the industry these days is actually television. That thing that a few years ago we might have said was on the decline, with the flooding of our screens with reality TV, and the advent of movie streaming services such as Netflix, has suddenly been revived by the very product which appeared to threaten it. Netflix and Amazon Prime are making a huge number of high-quality TV dramas now, and the old-fashioned terrestrial channels are having to up their game to keep up. The result is that TV drama is looking healthier than ever.
While traditional Drama courses at KS4-5 may seem only to prepare students for industry pathways into theatre, my conversation with Peter Ansorge, Head of Short Courses at the National Film and Television School (NFTS) persuaded me otherwise.
Understanding something about acting or directing drama in the theatre is actually a good base if you want to launch a career in television drama or film
‘The grounding of understanding something about acting or directing drama in the theatre is actually a good base if you want to launch a career in television drama or film,’ he explains, ‘because those rules still apply: that a good script is a good script, and it has to have powerful or comic parts for actors; and equally a good director must be able to know how to direct actors.
‘Understanding actors is a vital part of it all – you might be technically great with the shot and the editing, but if you don't have a script and a performance it isn't going to work, so if you have some experience of theatre it's useful, because drama is drama, and that's sometimes forgotten.’
Specialist skills
Short courses at the NFTS, held in Beaconsfield and in Glasgow, vary from a one day course where you learn about scheduling on Movie Magic software to a two-day introduction to Intimacy Directing, a four-day introduction to sound design for narrative filmmaking, a week-long scriptwriting course for film and television and, the longest of the courses, a four-week directors’ course which runs each summer, in which, as Ansorge explains, ‘they learn absolutely everything about the cameras, they work with actors and then they make a little film at the end.’
The demographic of students in these courses ‘really is a broad mixture,’ according to Ansorge. For the most part ‘they're not really just out of college or university, they'll have some other experience of doing something production-wise, as runners or ADs, for example – they might have worked in production offices, made the tea, they might have read a few scripts… then you do have people in their mid-twenties who are a bit more ambitious and want to come and write a script or find out about television drama, but if they have some experience that's useful too.’
A new world
In terms of the technical aspects of film and television making, the world is constantly changing and courses have to keep up, as Ansorge points out: ‘One of the changes in the last few years is that if you are starting out to be a documentary maker, you really have to know how to self-shoot, more or less on your own without a crew, so we have a course on self-shooting.
‘In terms of post production, we used to shoot on film many years ago, 16mm, 35mm: the film was made like photographs. Now with special effects and graphics you can more or less do what you like, and change the look of what's been shot. Cameramen are not always that happy about it! Given a budget and given time, you can more or less create any world that's believable.’
‘The biggest example of that, and this is on a huge budget, was The Crown: they didn't actually shoot at Buckingham Palace, they created that in post production, and you can't see the joins. We're planning a short course in visual effects with an ex-student of the school who became really the first producer of special effects in this country and went on to work on things like The Jungle Book, so yes, the world really is changing.’
But of course, these technical aspects aren't remotely daunting for the majority of young people who plan to go into such fields, because nearly all young people have experience now of editing, whether it be videos for social media or experimental short films. As Ansorge points out, ‘you can do it on your mobile phone.’
Often, nowadays, the technicalities of film-making are at least partially familiar to young people, and the skills that need to be taught are the human skills: directing actors, writing dialogue, and so on. In this respect, a grounding in theatre gained at GCSE, A Level or elsewhere, is enormously valuable.
If your students are keen to get started in the practical skills of film-making while still in their teens, however, the NFTS runs a two-week residential course in conjunction with the BFI, with places for 66 16-19 year olds to pursue the craft specialisms of directing, producing, screenwriting, cinematography, sound recording, editing, and production design. The BFI Film Academy runs annually and is well worth exploring for your students. https://nfts.co.uk/bfi-film-academy
Acting for camera
At the NFTS, the nuts and bolts of film and television making are covered by a huge variety of courses, but if it's screen acting that your students (or you) hope to pursue, a host of short courses can be found elsewhere.
For young people still at school who are interested in exploring filmmaking, the Pauline Quirke Academy have film and television modules in all their courses, which can be enrolled on UK-wide. www.pqacademy.com/our-modules/film-television/
The International School of Screen Acting in London runs a five-day ‘crash course’ in screen acting, covering acting technique for camera and understanding the difference between screen acting and theatre acting by experiencing it through practical work on screen; speed learning script technique; acting continuity and analysis; cinematic poetics, audition technique and requirements; surviving in the industry, gaining knowledge of CV development, head shots, working with agents and casting directors; and showreel coaching and development. www.screenacting.co.uk/one-week-crash-course
The Actors Studio, based at Pinewood Studios, offers a variety of courses, including weekends and five-day intensives in acting for screen and showreel, screen acting essentials, acting for film, and also acting for kids. https://actorsstudio.co.uk/products/
And finally the the Met Film School, based in London with an outpost in Berlin, runs a number of full-time short courses along similar lines to those at the NFTS, but also on acting for film at various levels. www.metfilmschool.ac.uk/find-a-course/short-courses
Viable career paths
As Ansorge says to me at the close of our conversation, ‘Television drama is booming – the investment has tripled in the last five years, and that is to do with the development of Amazon and Netflix. How long this will last of course nobody knows, but at the moment it is actually a good industry to get into if you are inclined to do it.’
And there's no shortage of viable career paths: ‘Grading and special effects now is a world of its own – and oddly enough, in television they're now short of writers, because the BBC and ITV a few years ago tended to use the same pool of writers – eight or ten. Now because Netflix and Amazon have bought them up there actually is the possibility of new talent breaking through, if they like your work. And there's a huge shortage of production accountants: we're running a course for them – if you are an accountant and you fancy going into showbiz you can do it now, you can get work almost straight away!’
There's a whole world of alternatives out there, and a grounding in Drama is the basis for them all, so tell that to those parents who are dubious about GCSE Drama as an option for their child!