Theatre Performance & Creation
A Competitive Edge
New! Red Deer College is proud to announce the Theatre Performance & Creation program - an innovative hands-on program designed to guide the emerging theatre artist. Directed by faculty and staff who are energetic, Theatre Performance & Creation prepares graduates to enter the marketplace with a competitive edge or to continue further training at leading institutions around the world. It's intense, real world experience combined with the smaller class sizes and personal attention that makes RDC a great place. We know that when you get here . . . you'll be glad you did.
Discover Your Passion
If you could live, eat an breathe anything it would be Performance & Creation at RDC. The best theatre training demands excellence in nurturing an expressive body and dynamic voice with a keen intellect, a sharp intuitive sense and a vibrant imagination. You core courses in these areas will study the technique of masters of each form and encourage your growth in the narrative.
Solid acting blended with interdisciplinary opportunities in music, drama, visual art, film dance, and creative writing allow you to discover your passion. Our two-year diploma program involves a working equilibrium between modules of focused classroom instruction and the equally demanding practical training during production periods. This distinctive approach allows more personalized and focused learning through one-to-one mentoring with experts in the field – all of which helps you to add some life balance and catch some down time. In other words, you won’t be expected to turn in a paper the morning after a late-night production. After all, there is more to life than just books.
Be Inspired By Artists All Around You
Theatre Performance & Creation is an integral part of the Performing Arts at RDC. Collaborating with filmmakers, musicians, visual artists, directors and designers and sharing access to costumes, props, weaponry, special effects and lighting and sound equipment. RDC offers tremendous resources and a chance to seek a broader understanding of the world around you through the true nature of the arts. All of our faculty are working professionals in the arts industry. Your classroom experience is enriched from the energy and focus of artists who are dedicated to the ongoing growth of their own creative expression.
Put that Passion to Work
All Performance & Creation students are active members of our resident production company Theatre at Red Deer College. Over your two year program, you will be involved in five to six different performing opportunities and professional field placements. These include large and small ensemble works on our Mainstage, Theatre for Young Audiences tours, solo performance and site specific creations. Our commitment to you is to produce a season of innovative and challenging plays drawn from a variety of styles and historical periods.
Innovative Learning Structure
Theatre is more than just acting. Studying 20th century trends in music, drama, visual art, dance and creative writing is part of your RDC education.
Beyond courses in researching development of theatre, critical dramatic analysis and English literature, your training will explore structure and format for devising theatre in both solo and group creation work. Material is generated through improvisation for theatre pieces using stimuli such as theme, music & sound, art, experience, image and character. You'll then experience playwriting as you craft and format the improvised outcome.
When not involved in studio practice, students take four days of intense classes with components of career planning, theatre history, dramaturgy/play analysis, acting, voice, movement, creation, improvisation, writing, dance, stage-fighting, lifestyle and well-being, interdisciplinary arts, and devising theatre. An enriched fifth day is reserved for speciality intensives, industry-related events, creation sessions and one-on-one coaching with a professional theatre artist.
Throughout your two-year program, speciality workshops (or intensives) are offered to augment instruction and to focus artist development. Taught by guest professionals, these intensives cover topics such as: mask, combat, opera, film, new media, aerial performance, voice-over, period movement, business planning and other areas of importance to the theatre artist.
Unique to RDC, a course in Wellness & Lifestyle management provides students with practical strategies for developing and maintaining a healthy lifestyle including tips on fitness, nutrition, stress management and self-responsibility. This is just a taste of what you'll experience at RDC. For complete course information visit Theatre Performance & Creation in the Academic Calendar.
Study Tours
Learning occurs everywhere and RDC offers hand-full of study tours each year to work-class theatre centres such as London, New York, Toronto, the Stratford & Shaw Festivals and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Travelling as a group, students attend professional productions, tour theatre facilities, take workshops with guest professionals and visit art galleries, museums, concerts and cultural sites.