The sharp-eyed among us will have noticed there’s another lockdown going on. And while auditions, rehearsals, and production are theoretically allowed to continue, the reality is that a lot of us are sitting at home with extra time on our hands.
But being housebound is no excuse for letting skills and practice slip. In fact, it’s made accessing high-quality tuition easier than ever as coaches and organisations get to grips with the reality of the pandemic and get savvier at utilising technology to enable their courses to continue.
Which leads to another challenge: with so much now out there, where do you start, and how can you tell which ones are worth your time and money?
The only way of truly knowing is to try them out – and luckily, actor Naomi Wattis has agreed to act as your very own guinea pig. We’ve put her through the paces at a wide variety of classes, from straightforward acting technique to improv, to self-taping. And so, here are five of the best currently out there, with links to Naomi’s full reviews.
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Naomi says: Casting director Manuel Puro’s Self-Tape Class is a five-day, part-time online group course covering the technical aspects of self-taping and how to handle common casting scenarios, alongside the more in-depth 21-Day Self-Tape Challenge.
The Self-Tape Class costs £49 and runs from Saturday to Thursday, with an online live Q&A with Puro on Friday. Each day we were emailed a new filming challenge – along with technical tips – for a specific audition piece to be uploaded by the following evening.
What’s the verdict?
For more details of Manuel Puro’s self-taping class, and to see if Naomi nailed the perfect take, read Naomi’s full review here.
Will This Online Self-Tape Class Land You an Acting Job? Naomi says: An improv course is a great place hone your flexibility, adaptability, creativity, and openness to trying new ideas. The Free Association specialises in long-form improv, a narrative style in which you build scenes as a team that has spawned award-winning shows such as Austentatious and Show Stopper.
The Introduction to Long-Form course runs (during lockdown) for six two-and-a-half-hour sessions. There are twelve participants and we take part over Zoom. The course costs £180, with diversity scholarships available.
What’s the verdict?
For more details of the Free Association’s online Improv course, and to see if Naomi’s improv improved, read Naomi’s full review here.
How an Improv Course Helped a UK Actor During Lockdown Naomi says: Bette Midler, Emma Thompson, Michael Keaton, Robin Williams, Whoopi Goldberg, Bill Murray, and Mike Myers all started out as stand-up comedians. Gráinne Maguire’s course helps develop a regular writing practice and takes an in-depth look at the process of joke-writing.
Maguire is an award-winning stand-up comedian and comedy writer with many TV and radio credits to her name. Your Next 20 Mins is her two-hour, five-week intensive online comedy writing course over Zoom. It costs £150.
Looking for your next TV or film role? Check out our UK castings
What’s the verdict?
For more details of Gráinne Maguire’s online comedy course, and to see if it floated Naomi's boat, read her full review here.
What Happened When an Actor Did an Online Comedy Course? Naomi says: Performance artist Bryony Kimmings is the high priestess of autobiographical theatre and an associate artist at Soho Theatre. She specialises in creating art out of crises, so this online workshop could be a good place to start. The workshop costs £30 and runs on Zoom for five hours.
What’s the verdict?
For full details of Bryony’s courses and to see what Naomi made of it all, read Naomi’s review here.
Will This Online Theatre Course Keep My Acting In Shape? Naomi says: With lockdown in place, how do we keep our acting practice up-to-speed, and foster the sense of community that acting work provides? We might just have found the answer in the Flux Gym – a gym not for legs and tums, but for exercising voice, body, creative, and critical skills.
What’s the verdict?
To learn about the Flux Gym and to see how Naomi’s acting workout worked out, read Naomi’s full review here.
Is This the Perfect Lockdown Tonic for Actors? More industry advice for UK actors? Click here.