Acting

Announcement: To enquire or apply for this course, please do so directly via JMC Academy

Do you have the passion, belief and courage to claim your future?

AFTT's Bachelor of Creative Arts (Acting) provides an exciting and immersive way of learning the principles of acting for film, theatre and television, giving you a diverse range of skills and the confidence to succeed.

AFTT's Bachelor of Creative Arts (Acting) provides an exciting and immersive pathway into your professional career as an actor for film, theatre and television. Our program will prepare you to pursue a professional and sustainable career in performance - preparing not only the actor's knowledge and skill base but also the actor's process to meet the specific needs and nuances in this changing and diversifying performing arts industry.

The systems taught at AFTT involve unique and dynamic processes of learning that will equip you with a robust and logical pathway to producing theatrical and cinematic performance. We are committed to nurturing versatility and flexibility for our graduates, enabling them to move with confidence between a variety of performance media, locations and contexts. We recognise the enormous creative potential of each individual student. Our Bachelor of Creative Arts (Acting) will nurture talent and performance craft, whilst supporting the genesis of new ideas, projects and creative ventures, ensuring the graduate is able to fully and confidently participate with personal leadership in all facets of their industry.

Collaborations between actors, filmmakers, animators and games designers create a dynamic and multi-disciplinary approach to learning, which coupled with our industry partnerships firmly place AFTT at the leading edge of the performing arts industry.

A new national story in actor training

AFTT brings a proud thirty year lineage of training actors In Sydney. Our course design processes and teaching approach continue to be dynamic, innovative and responsive to the changing needs of the performing arts industry. To equip actors for the future of our industry, requires bold new thinking in the way we train our next generation of performers. The success of AFTT’s Bachelor of Creative Arts (Acting) will now become a larger national story, with the rollout of this program in Melbourne and Brisbane, through our partnership with the JMC Academy. This exciting expansion of our acting program will firmly embed AFTT’s place in what will become the bold new story of actor training in Australia.

So what are you waiting for? 

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Master acting for all platforms; Theatre, Film & Television and Digital Media for maximum career opportunity

Work with on-campus student filmmakers, producers, directors & stage managers for collaboration & networking

Claim your space as a performer and creator

Perform in professional theatres incl. Belvoir for which AFTT is Education Partner

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Yerma 2020
Festival of the Creator 2019
Antony & Cleopatra 2020
Festival of the Creator 2019
Two Gentlemen of Verona
Yerma 2020
Last Days of Judas 2015 Production
Yerma 2020
Two Gentlemen of Verona 2020
Festival of the Creator 2019
Double Bill
Joseph K 2015 Production
Two Gentlemen of Verona 2020
Festival of the Creator 2019
Festival of the Creator 2019
Lucky 2015 Production
AFTT Production
Brothers
Joseph K 2015 Production
Joseph K 2015 Production
Breaking Bad
Judas 2015 Production
Last Days of Judas 2015 Production
Joseph K 2015 Production
Last Days of Judas 2015 Production
The Place Beyond the Pines
Lucky 2015 Production
Lucky 2015 Production
Jordan
Lucky 2015 Production
Lucky 2015 Production
AFTT Voice Class
Love Hate
On-Campus Collaboration
Spring Awakening Grad Play 2016
Last Days of Judas 2015 Production
Slut: The Play 2015 Production
Slut: The Play 2015 Production
Slut: The Play 2015 Production
Meow Warm Up
Creative Play
Double Bill 2016
Creative Play
Hopscotch
Lucky 2015 Production
Stalker Production Actors
Stalker Production
Zemma

 

BACHELOR OF CREATIVE ARTS (ACTING)

CRICOS 104617B*

THE AFTT ADVANTAGE

AFTT proudly claims its space as educators of the next generation of Australian actors, ready to add their unique voice to a long and proud history of performance.

Performance plays a significant role in Australian society and culture. From our indigenous heritage through to contemporary Australian society, performance has played a part in our rituals, storytelling and cultural practices, informing who we are as a collective and our links to our past and to each other.

The Australian performing arts landscape has contributed to our national identity both domestically and internationally, and Australian actors have enjoyed successes in both local and global markets. New and emerging trends in technologies and theatre, screen and other media are creating diverse ways for the consumer to engage with the arts and performance. These new digital platforms are placing expanded demands on the knowledge and skill requirements for the contemporary working actor and adding complexity to the process and scope of managing an acting career.

AFTT are committed to nurturing versatility, flexibility and resilience, enabling our graduates to move with confidence between a variety of performance media, environments and contexts.

The contemporary performing arts industry needs versatile actors - people who have broad and coherent theoretical and technical knowledge of the profession and the industry, are able to work with flexibility, sustainable practice and innovation and are able to engage and develop opportunities for professional work across the mediums of theatre, film, television and digital performance.

This changing marketplace is also now placing further demands on the flexibility of the actor's skills and knowledge and emotional capacity to be able to adapt to the requirements and stresses of these new media and practices. The importance of a sustainable approach to both the process of acting and the way an actor interacts with the industry is significant. Supporting areas of resilience and wellbeing equip the actor to participate more fully and healthily in a personally demanding and competitive industry.

AFTT acknowledge that a successful and sustainable acting career is one in which the actor boldly claims their personal leadership in the pursuit of creative work opportunities.

Contemporary actors need to be more entrepreneurial, to seek out work, to identify creative business opportunities, to work with resilience and ethical behaviour and to manage themselves in a professional, financial and business sense.

The nature of an acting career is defined as being a portfolio career. Work and business engagements of the actor are from a large range of sources, over a variety of performance media, locations, durations and workplaces. Ongoing professional development and a commitment to lifelong learning is essential in the pursuit of what is referred to informally as a "gig career". The working actor is a professional able to plan and manage themselves sustainably as an independent artist, able to move flexibly through various job opportunities and relish the opportunities that a vibrant and evolving industry presents.

Course Code: CRS1400712

*Awarded by JMC Academy

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Bachelor OF Creative Arts (Acting)
CURRICULUM

The Creative Impulse

The creative impulse not only informs acting process but also supports the genesis of innovative and creative thinking and approaches which are integral to a successful portfolio career as an actor

This unit introduces the student to creativity through the impulse of the actor in improvisation and creative play exercises as well as the impetus to create as an individual and member of an ensemble.

The Acting Foundation

The acting foundation describes freedom and availablility as core principles of the actor's process. This approach to the work requires self-awareness to identify personal limitations or habitual behaviours and to then apply preparatory techniques to enable the actor to respond to stimulus moment to moment.

This unit introduces the student to the foundation principles of acting, which provide the base from which the actor begins to build their process.

Introduction to Voice and Movement

The integration of acting, voice and movement builds the essential embodiment of acting process. Acting requires a dexterous and flexibile physicality, as well as the development of the vocal support infrastructure of the body, breath, resonance and articulation.

This unit supports the Acting foundaton and incorporates voice and movement training into the development of the acting process.

Introduction to Professional Practice

The nature of the process of acting, ensemble challenges and demands of an acting career create unique stresses on the professional actor. These require specific processes and practices to ensure wellbeing is maintained and the actor is able to develop resilience in relation to these intrinsic stresses.

This unit introduces foundation principles of safe practice, professional and personal boundaries and conduct as well as warm-up, cool-down and preparation processes. It also introduces processes of reflective journaling, independent reading, research protocols and expressing a personal opinion.

Australian Theatre Performance

Craft skills of the actor involve meeting the obligations of a performance text and developing a role throughout a rehearsal period. Craft also requires the actor to apply acting principles and techniques to an audition context and whilst collaborating with a director, fellow performers and crew in meeting the performance and technical requirements of a theatre production

This unit builds upon the core foundation and introductory knowledge and skill developed in Trimester 1 and introduces the craft of theatre performance. This unit culminates in a performance of a contemporary Australian theatre text(s).

Voice and Movement in Performance

The actor's craft requires the integration of voice and body into the development of a role for performance. Voice and movement are integral to the actor's ability to embody a character in performance.

This unit develops further physical and vocal technique and integrates into acting practice to meet the obligations of text and character for performance.

Actor as Filmmaker

The contemporary actor's career demands flexibility of acting process to meet the specific requirements of screen performance media and to develop understanding of the process of cinematic storytelling.

The actor should embrace opportunities to utilise these skills and knowledge to develop work opportunities in the independent film and digital media industries.

This unit develops the student's understanding of the film aesthetic and how principles of acting, improvisation and creativity can be harnessed int other areas of script development, directing and performance. This unit culminates in the development of a short self-devised film scene.

Acting Process and Analysis

An independent and reliable acting process sits at the heart of a sustainable acting career. The actor must develop systems to analyse their own process and incorporate areas of new knowledge to build a robust, adaptable and flexible professional acting practice.

This unit introduces the student to research and analysis skills as they relate to the building of an independent and reliable personal acting process. It is from this base that further writing, research and critical analysis skills are scaffolded throughout the course.

New Media and Performance

New and emerging trends and techonologies in new media are creating diverse performance platforms for the contemporary actor. This changing industry is placing further demand on the flexibility of the actor's skills and knowledge in order to meet the specific performance requirements of these new platforms.

This unit prepares the actor to develop knowledge and apply technique across new and emerging media platforms and technologies, which may include web-based content, games/animation, voiceover and/or virtual reality.

Heightened Voice and Movement

Theatrical performance requires a robust embodiment of voice and physicality in order to meet the demands of this performance media. Theatricality may also require the actor to embody physical and vocal extremes as well as a range of theatrical storytelling styles and forms beyond realism and naturalism.

This unit extends the actor's theatrical capacity in voice and movement, enabling them to meet the obligations of heightened text and theatricality. This unit develops knowledge and skill to perform a range of theatrical performance styles.

Devised Theatre

Devised and experimental theatre contributes a significant and growing sector of the contemporary performing arts industry. The associated skills and knowledge required of the actor involves understanding of a range of theatrical forms and styles, improvisation and collaboration techniques as well as the recording of developmental processes through to the finalisation of a concept.

This unit develops the capacity of the actor to apply knowledge of performance styles, principles of theatrical storytelling and creativity and collaboration to develop a short group devised performance piece for theatre.

Critical Analysis and Reflection

The working actor must have mechanisms to ensure a process of lifelong learning and development of skills and techniques. Theoretical knowledge of acting approaches and addressing issues of resilience and career sustainability are integral to the development of a successful portfolio career.

This unit develops the actor's ability to research acting theory and technique and to apply this to their own personal practive, developing a versatile, sustainable and robust personal, collaborative acting practice.

Heightened Language Production

The Classical Heightened text forms not only a significant part of the western theatre tradition but remains a staple of contemporary theatre performance. The rigour demanded of an actor to perform the heightened text extends their ability to adapt to a range of theatrical forms and styles.

This double unit will involve studio-based training to develop an understanding of the classical text. Students are then required to apply technique to the audition, rehearsals and performance of the Heightened Language Production.

Actor as Creator

This unit integrates the student's knowledge and skills in performance with the principles of creativity and collaboration. With a focus on the actor creating their own work, the student plans and develops a piece of performance to be performed as part of a festival production. This unit allows the individual student to develop and articulate their unique voice as intelligent, passionate and vocal artistic citizens.

This unit enables the student to harness their creativity to create new performance opportunities of their choosing.

Australian Performance History and Culture

The function of performance in storytelling contributes to national identity and culture. In order to assure the performer’s role in this function the contemporary actor must possess knowledge of the cultural history of Australia and the influences on performance from indigenous ritual and storytelling to modern Australia.

This unit will develop theoretical knowledge of the history of performance in Australian theatre, film and television, and how this history has evolved into creating the contemporary performing arts industry.

Screen Performance for Showreel

The audience's expectation and appetite for realism in screen performance is creating extended demands on the actor's process. The demand for 'truth' in performance is now a fundamental requirement of any working actor's performance career.

This unit develops advanced screen acting technique, through a deepened understanding of the screen performance medium as well as studio-based training and practice. It culminates in a film shoot of a showreel scene suitable for industry.

The Working Actor

The contemporary performing arts industry presents a complex and unique structure. Work opportunities are diverse and the mechanisms to secure employment vary across the range of performance media and contexts.

This unit integrates industry knowledge, practice and processes into the workplace context of the actor. Students will acquire in-depth knowledge of structure and the operations of the contemporary performing arts industry and how the actor may successfully navigate their place as professional working artists.

Advanced Acting Technique

The flexibility of the contemporary working actor to adapt to the vast range of performance media and platforms places extended demand on both practical skills and theoretical knowledge of technique, forms, styles and performance language.

This unit will solidify a robust and reliable process to deliver impacting performances across theatre, film, television and digital media.

Theatre and Performance Styles

Style and form build a theatrical language and are used by dramatists and performers to fulfil a performance aesthetic. The contemporary actor must have a theoretical understanding of the use of form and style as a theatrical construct, but also be able to meet the specific demands required in performance.

This unit exposes the student to a broad and diverse range of theatrical performance styles, forms and significant dramatists from the late nineteenth century to today.

Industry Theatre Production

This graduating theatre production will be staged at Sydney's iconic Belvoir St Theatre across a season of performances. Students will work across a full-time schedule of rehearsals, technical and production activities for a performance in a professional theatre venue. This production will involve external theatre directors, creatives and crew.

This double unit requires the student to integrate their personal acting technique and professional practices into the audition, rehearsal and performances of their Industry Theatre Production.

The Entrepreneurial Actor

The professional actor must have the ability to move between artistic and business application of their skills. The development of creative projects is often borne through artistic endeavour, whilst bringing such a project to realisation requires skills to be applied in a business and industry context. The synergies of these skill sets allow for the development of the entrepreneurial actor.

This unit seeks to place the individual actor as a professional, self-sufficient and active industry participant capable of taking control of their careers.

Career Sustainability

The creative arts industry is a unique work environment which places a variety of demands upon the working professional. The nature of portfolio rather than permanent employment opportunities demands a thorough understanding of the industry structure and operation, business and financial skills as well as the ability to plan, forecast and examine self as a working professional.

This unit develops a self-aware, responsible and sustainable approach to long-term participation in the performing arts sector.

CAREERS IN THE INDUSTRY

GRADUATES MAY FIND EMPLOYMENT WITH

Upon graduation you will be equipped with the skills and knowledge to navigate a career within the performing arts industry. Previous graduates have enjoyed success in both theatre and screen with many gaining employment with theatre companies such as; Belvoir St. Theatre, The Sydney Theatre Company, Sport For Jove as well as numerous independent production houses. On screen our graduates have worked all over the world with guest and lead roles in film and television, as well as gaining recognition through peer awards. Most recent television credits include Underbelly, House Husbands, Sea Patrol and a raft of local and international television and film productions. 

In the independent theatre and film scene our graduates have enjoyed critical and commercial success working as actors, directors and producers across countless theatre and film productions.

AFTT actors are highly skilled and prepared to step confidently into the performing arts industry.

SPECIFIC ROLES MAY INCLUDE

Film actor
Television actor
Theatre actor
Voice-over artist for film or radio
Computer-Generated (CGI) or animation character actor

Motion-capture actor
Music theatre performer
Television commercial actor
Live entertainment performer

 

DIPLOMA OF CREATIVE ARTS (ACTING)

CRICOS 104614E* 

AFTT's Diploma of Creative Arts (Acting) comprises the first two trimesters of our Degree program, providing an exit point for students wishing to develop the introductory skills of acting as a pathway for further learning.

The rationale for this Diploma course is that the contemporary performing arts industry provides entry level opportunities in the areas of community and fringe theatre, film and digital media and self-generated performance concepts. Fringe, community and cooperative theatre models are a significant component of the live performanmce industry. The presence of smaller and multipurpose performance venues has created a landscape of opportunity for small scale performances, projects and productions. New and emerging technologies provide greater accessibility to resources to create film and digital media content, whilst the emergence of online platforms have created new ways for an audience to interact with performance.

This course equips students with underpinning skills and knowledge to apply the foundation acting principles to a performance, to develop creative and collaborative performance concepts and provides the necessary educational and academic framework to enable further study.

Course Code: CRS1400711

*Awarded by JMC Academy

APPLY NOW

Diploma OF Creative Arts (Acting)
CURRICULUM

The Creative Impulse

The creative impulse not only informs acting process but also supports the genesis of innovative and creative thinking and approaches which are integral to a successful portfolio career as an actor

This unit introduces the student to creativity through the impulse of the actor in improvisation and creative play exercises as well as the impetus to create as an individual and member of an ensemble.

The Acting Foundation

The acting foundation describes freedom and availablility as core principles of the actor's process. This approach to the work requires self-awareness to identify personal limitations or habitual behaviours and to then apply preparatory techniques to enable the actor to respond to stimulus moment to moment.

This unit introduces the student to the foundation principles of acting, which provide the base from which the actor begins to build their process.

Introduction to Voice and Movement

The integration of acting, voice and movement builds the essential embodiment of acting process. Acting requires a dexterous and flexibile physicality, as well as the development of the vocal support infrastructure of the body, breath, resonance and articulation.

This unit supports the Acting foundaton and incorporates voice and movement training into the development of the acting process.

Introduction to Professional Practice

The nature of the process of acting, ensemble challenges and demands of an acting career create unique stresses on the professional actor. These require specific processes and practices to ensure wellbeing is maintained and the actor is able to develop resilience in relation to these intrinsic stresses.

This unit introduces foundation principles of safe practice, professional and personal boundaries and conduct as well as warm-up, cool-down and preparation processes. It also introduces processes of reflective journaling, independent reading, research protocols and expressing a personal opinion.

Australian Theatre Performance

Craft skills of the actor involve meeting the obligations of a performance text and developing a role throughout a rehearsal period. Craft also requires the actor to apply acting principles and techniques to an audition context and whilst collaborating with a director, fellow performers and crew in meeting the performance and technical requirements of a theatre production

This unit builds upon the core foundation and introductory knowledge and skill developed in Trimester 1 and introduces the craft of theatre performance. This unit culminates in a performance of a contemporary Australian theatre text(s).

Voice and Movement in Performance

The actor's craft requires the integration of voice and body into the development of a role for performance. Voice and movement are integral to the actor's ability to embody a character in performance.

This unit develops further physical and vocal technique and integrates into acting practice to meet the obligations of text and character for performance.

Actor as Filmmaker

The contemporary actor's career demands flexibility of acting process to meet the specific requirements of screen performance media and to develop understanding of the process of cinematic storytelling.

The actor should embrace opportunities to utilise these skills and knowledge to develop work opportunities in the independent film and digital media industries.

This unit develops the student's understanding of the film aesthetic and how principles of acting, improvisation and creativity can be harnessed int other areas of script development, directing and performance. This unit culminates in the development of a short self-devised film scene.

Acting Process and Analysis

An independent and reliable acting process sits at the heart of a sustainable acting career. The actor must develop systems to analyse their own process and incorporate areas of new knowledge to build a robust, adaptable and flexible professional acting practice.

This unit introduces the student to research and analysis skills as they relate to the building of an independent and reliable personal acting process. It is from this base that further writing, research and critical analysis skills are scaffolded throughout the course.

CAREERS IN THE INDUSTRY

GRADUATES MAY FIND EMPLOYMENT WITH

Upon graduation you will be equipped with the skills and knowledge to navigate a career within the performing arts industry. Previous graduates have enjoyed success in both theatre and screen with many gaining employment with theatre companies such as; Belvoir St. Theatre, The Sydney Theatre Company, Sport For Jove as well as numerous independent production houses. On screen our graduates have worked all over the world with guest and lead roles in film and television, as well as gaining recognition through peer awards. Most recent television credits include Underbelly, House Husbands, Sea Patrol and a raft of local and international television and film productions. 

In the independent theatre and film scene our graduates have enjoyed critical and commercial success working as actors, directors and producers across countless theatre and film productions.

AFTT actors are highly skilled and prepared to step confidently into the performing arts industry.

SPECIFIC ROLES MAY INCLUDE

Film actor
Television actor
Theatre actor
Voice-over artist for film or radio
Computer-Generated (CGI) or animation character actor

Motion-capture actor
Music theatre performer
Television commercial actor
Live entertainment performer

STUDENT TESTIMONIALS

You learn lots of different techniques – the Morris technique helps you become emotionally available and accessible, but you also get to study movement and voice...

Alana Birtles | AFTT Alumni

You owe it to yourself and to the art that's inside you – you have to honour that will and that drive. Attending AFTT has allowed me to honour that, and that's really rewarding.

Campbell Briggs | AFTT Alumni

AFTT is very proactive in inviting agents, casting agents, industry professionals to our events, which has been fantastic. It feels like a family

Gav Fenwick | AFTT Alumni

CALL AFTT 1300 410 311

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