AList Girl APPRENTICE COMPANY
Now in its 38th year, the Acting Apprentice Company is one of the nation’s oldest continuing pre-professional companies. Each year we audition nearly 2000 young artists and choose 22 to spend a season-long residency at the Tony Award-winning home of the Humana Festival of New American Plays.

The program is designed to serve as a bridge between where you are in your professional career and where you’d like to be. Some apprentices go on to careers as actors in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Some move into nationally-recognized MFA programs. Others start their own theatre companies or settle in other major national theatre markets, like Atlanta, Philadelphia, or Seattle. And some discover a passion and talent for directing, playwriting or another facet of theatre. The year you spend at Actors is designed to help you figure out what your specific career in the arts will look like and to develop a plan to get you there.


2009-2010 Acting Apprentice Company

Program Details
The apprenticeship is a nine-month (mid-August to early May) intensive total immersion into the world of a major American regional theatre. It offers a unique combination of performance, training, observation and networking.

Performance
The Apprentice Company produces its own season of shows, focusing entirely on new works:
  • The year begins with the Apprentice Ensemble Project. Using personal stories and experiences, the company works together and with support from a team of directors and dramaturgs to create an original work that will introduce them to each other and the Actors Theatre community.

  • Each apprentice writes and performs a Solo Mio—a short solo-performance piece. The company participates in workshops with our literary department and with a nationally-known solo performance artist. Then each apprentice is assigned a director and a dramaturg to help shape the piece.

  • In January, the Company performs in an evening of Ten-Minute Plays. The plays are culled from the National 10 Minute Play Competition and are fully produced on one of the theatre’s main stages.

  • Each year, the theatre selects a group of emerging playwrights and brings them to the theatre for a weekend of workshops with the Company. The theatre then commissions those playwrights to write the Apprentice Anthology, a full-length and fully produced work written specifically for that year’s Company that is part of the Humana Festival of New American Plays.

  • The theatre sponsors a regional playwriting contest for middle and high school students called New Voices. The Apprentice Company helps these young writers workshop, revise and ultimately perform the winning plays on one of the theatre’s main stages.

  • Each season, members of both companies are encouraged to collaborate on Independent Projects. Groups are assigned mentors but given complete creative and business control over the projects they choose. The entire company then holds a debrief to discuss how what they learned could be applied to starting/running their own companies.

  • The full company performs an Industry Showcase – a group of short scenes targeted to an invited group of agents, casting directors, and other industry professionals.
Additionally, Apprentices are used for all age-appropriate non-union roles in our 22-show mainstage season. All apprentices who are cast in the mainstage season earn points in the Equity Membership Candidate (EMC) program and the theatre pays the admission fee for any apprentice not already enrolled in the program.

Training
The training component of the Apprentice program is very practical in nature. We’re not an MFA program and we don’t aspire to be one. Instead you’ll get a mixture of pragmatic business training and useful master classes.

The business training includes regular workshops on audition technique and mock audition sessions with Actors artistic staff and visiting professional directors, actors and playwrights.

Our Master Classes serve one of two purposes -- to give you a practical skillset (a professional director teaching text analysis that prepares you for a first table read, a New York casting director teaching film/television auditioning, etc.) or to offer an introduction to a specific discipline taught by a master of the field (Jon Jory teaching acting technique, Anne Bogart and members of the SITI Company teaching Viewpoints).

Most importantly, the training varies from year to year and is tailored to fit each year’s company.

Observation
Actors Theatre has an open-rehearsal policy. You can observe the rehearsal process of any show at any time.

Networking
You’ll have the opportunity to speak (both in formal and informal settings) with every visiting actor, director, and playwright that works at Actors. Additionally we’ll bring a host of Industry Professionals from New York, Chicago & other cities to see your work throughout the season.

Program Costs
The program is free of all tuition costs. In fact, every Apprentice is offered a stipend and the opportunity to apply for additional financial aid. We’ll also help you find low-cost housing and help get your student loans deferred for the time you’re with us. You are responsible for all costs associated with living in Louisville for the time of your Apprenticeship. For more details, see the application page.

Instead of charging tuition or fees, what we ask in return for the benefits of the program are your commitment and hard work. Every Apprentice participates in a work-study program that includes crewing shows and working all load-ins and changeovers. Additionally, Apprentices spend most afternoons assisting in various departments of the theatre, including Marketing, Development, Education, Props, Sets, etc.

For information on how to apply for the Apprentice program click here.

To see the current Company’s season and media page, click here.

To see more information about alumni of the program, click here.