QUESTION:
Hello,
I’m French and I’m seriously thinking about going to an acting school in America (preferably Los Angeles).
I would like to know if you have any recommendation, if you know any school that provides good classes and have a 2 years program (to get a student visa).
Thank you very much,
Matthieu
ANSWER:
(Bonjour, Matthieu. Je suis Franco-Americaine donc tu t’es addressé à la bonne personne. Je continue en Anglais…)
There are plenty of good full-time acting programs in Los Angeles. I can’t recommend one in particular because I don’t know what your strengths and weaknesses may be as an actor, but if you haven’t already, browse the Los Angeles acting school listings to start making a short list.
You can study almost every acting technique you’re interested in in LA, including method acting (Lee Strasberg Institute), the Adler Technique (Stella Adler Los Angeles) or the Meisner acting method (The Sanford Meisner Center). I believe each one of these schools has a full-time 2 year program, but please check first.
If you have an accent in English, my recommendation is to go for the school that has the strongest speech program. Getting rid of a French accent is incredibly hard and without what is called “a standard American accent”, you will find yourself very limited in the types of roles you get cast in if you want to do any kind of professional acting in the States on your training visa. Of course, if you just want to study here to go back to act in France, the accent is not really an issue.
If that’s the case, though, I’d like to point out that a lot of networking can happen in acting school, and you’ll be missing these connections if you don’t study in France. Everybody’s experience is different, but I find that most European actors who make it here have usually reached a certain amount of success in their own country first.
If you’re interested, you can read more about this on this other post.
Good luck with your acting career!