Performance: Acting - BFA
Performance: Acting - BFA
Is it for you?
Train with top industry professionals and be featured in original work in downtown Toronto by joining one of Canada’s premier acting conservatory programs in a university environment. The Performance: Acting program has a 50-year history of offering students unparalleled professional acting training, providing you with access to world-class professionals and links to the industry for further training opportunities, jobs and mentorship. This is a creative place where hard work and courage help you to become your best self as an actor, artist and human.
The program trains actors in the craft, skill, and business of live performance. You’ll bring your classroom learning to life on stage through training in voice and movement, and by exploring acting techniques in theatre, film, television, motion capture and commercial voice-over. You’ll also study a multidisciplinary approach with the unique opportunity to collaborate with students from the Performance: Dance and Production programs to make stories come to life on stage
You’ll do it all in the heart of Toronto, home to the third-largest English language theatre district in the world and a North American hot spot for television and film production.
Program info
Faculty:
The Creative School
Program format(s):
Full time: 4 Year
Degree:
Bachelor of Fine Arts
Grade range:
Mid 70s1
Requirements:
Grades-Plus
Experiential learning:
Studio and public performances
Tuition and fees
For detailed fees information, visit tuition and fees by program.
Full-time format 2023-2024:
Ontario students fees range: $7,232 - $7,738
Out-of-province students fees range: $8,060 - $8,582
International student fees range: $33,462 - $33,881
First-year courses
Here is a preview of first-year courses based on the available undergraduate calendar information.
1st & 2nd Semester
REQUIRED:
- THF 120 Music I: Introduction
- THF 121 Music I: Advanced Introduction
- THF 111 Creative Performance Studies I
- THF 112 Creative Performance Studies II
- THF 100 Anatomy of Movement and Lifestyle I
- THF 101 Elements of Production I
- THF 200 Timelines of Performance History I
- THF 201 Timelines of Performance History II
LIBERAL STUDIES:
Two courses from Table A - Lower Level Liberal Studies.
REQUIRED GROUP 1*: Two courses from the following, based on student's program:
Performance Acting students:
Your future
- Acting for stage, film or television
- Arts administration
- Trade and industrial shows
- Education
- Entrepreneurship
- Casting director
- Acting coach
- Director
- Graduate studies in the arts
Thinking of applying? Make sure the program is still accepting applications.
Requirements
Academic requirements
Ontario Secondary School Diploma (OSSD) or equivalent with a minimum of six Grade 12 U or M courses including the following program specific requirements.
Typically, a minimum overall average of 70% establishes eligibility for admission consideration; subject to competition individual programs may require higher prerequisite grades and/or higher overall averages:
- English/anglais (ENG 4U/EAE 4U preferred).
- The minimum grade required in the subject prerequisite (normally in the 65-70% range) will be determined subject to competition.
Academic admission requirements for all other applicants are available on the admission requirements page.
Non-Academic Requirements for fall 2024 are coming soon! Please use the following instructions from fall 2023 as a temporary guide and check back here soon for updates.
This is a Grades-Plus program. In addition to meeting competitive academic requirements, you are required to submit the following non-academic requirements. Your ability to follow and adhere to the requirements is part of the assessment of your application.
Fall 2023 applicants due dates:
February 1, 2023 or 10 business days from your application submission date, whichever comes later.
Submit a recent 8x10 photograph of yourself.
Please save the image as a .pdf file and upload it per the submission instructions below.
Toronto Metropolitan University’s audition panel uses your personal statement to learn more about you as an individual and gain a sense of who you are beyond your application, transcript, and audition.
Please describe your artistic goals and why you have decided to become an actor. We are not asking for an academic essay, rather we are asking you to frankly share the heart of who you are and your creative ambitions in this personal statement. We encourage you to write about your relationship to performance and why you think it’s necessary to perform in today’s world. Consider pointing towards your passion for people, community, politics, different forms of art, or anything that is of great importance to you. We want to see YOU in your writing.
Your statement should be 400 words, typed and in English. It must be your own original work.
Please save your personal statement as a .pdf file.
Stage 1: Online Audition
Use YouTube or Vimeo to show us your work. Please provide a link to your work in a .pdf file and upload this file (see Submission Instructions below). Ensure the link does not expire. Make the link public or be sure to include the password in your .pdf file. Confirm that your link works. Your application will not be considered if the link you provide does not work.
You are to include Speech A and Speech B (see below) in one video. Introduce each speech with your full name, pronouns if it is safe for you to do so, age, and the name of the high school or last program you attended. Include the name of the play the speech is from, the writer of the speech, and the name of the character you are playing (if applicable).
- Background: If possible, choose a wide-open space that you can move around in for your speech. Some people find a neutral background useful.
- Lighting: Try to ensure that you are lit in such a manner to avoid stark contrast and dark shadows.
- Sound: Please check your digital recording to make sure that you can be heard.
- Size of shot: Use a full shot for your poetic speech and full or medium shot for your contemporary speech. Please refrain from using close-up shots.
- Length: Your video should be no longer than five minutes. The panel may stop watching if your recording exceeds this time.
We encourage you to use the full capacity of your body and to move freely within the architecture of your space when making your digital recordings.
Speech A – Poetic Monologue (approximately 2 minutes)
The audition piece should be in poetic form using heightened language. This is a piece in which words are chosen for their sound and suggestive power as opposed to a naturalistic speech. While it need not be originally written in English, we ask that you perform an English translation for your poetic monologue. There is no boundary in time period, culture, or form (as long as it’s poetic) in which you choose this speech from. For example, Shakespeare, Tang Zianzu, Kate Tempest, Aleshea Harris, The Mahabharata, Suzan-Lori Parks, and Joseph A. Dandurand are all appropriate choices.
Speech B – Contemporary Monologue (approximately 2 minutes)
The contemporary piece should provide a clear contrast to your poetic piece. It ideally uses naturalistic speech and was written after 1960.
Speech C - Alternative Contemporary Speech (approximately 2 minutes)
We request that you have an alternative contemporary speech prepared for Stage 3. You may or may not be asked to share this alternative speech.
The same parameters of Speech B apply.
Stage 2: Call-Back Audition
Only select applicants will receive an invitation (by email) to participate in a call-back audition.
The call-back will occur on campus with the audition panel. For those who live out of province, arrangements can be made for the call-back to occur on Google Meet or Zoom. Further details will be provided in an invitation.
You will be asked to repeat Speech A and Speech B.
You will also be required to sing a short unaccompanied song (one chorus only).
There may be a short interview component of the call-back, where we try to learn more about you beyond what you shared in your speeches and personal statement.
Final Stage: Workshop Day
Candidates who are successful in Stage 2, will be invited to participate in an in-person workshop weekend with other applicants to the program.
There will be two Final Workshop dates for two different callback groups:
- Saturday, April 1, 2023 from 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.
- Saturday, April 15, 2023 from 10 a.m. - 5p.m.
The workshop will utilize Speech B from earlier rounds. We may ask to see Speech C. The workshop will include opportunities to get to know other applicants, faculty, and a student from the program. You will work individually, in pairs, in groups, and as an ensemble. Training may include sessions in movement, voice, performance creation, and redirection of your speech. It is our hope that the workshop will be relaxed and fun for all applicants. We want you to have a rewarding experience regardless of the outcome.
The non-academic requirements assessment fee is $50 CDN and must be paid in order for your submission to be reviewed. Here’s how to pay:
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Access your ChooseTMU Applicant Portal account (instructions to access the portal can be found below under Submission Instructions).
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Click on the button to link to the eForms Centre.
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Next, click on the eForms Centre tile.
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Then click on the Non-Academic Fee Form link.
Applicants are required to submit all components of their non-academic requirements via the ChooseTMU Applicant Portal. Due to the volume of applications received and our system performance, we strongly encourage you to submit your documents well in advance of the noted deadlines.
Admission decisions are provided via the ChooseTMU Applicant Portal. The selection committee’s decision on admission is final. Unfortunately re-evaluation/reassessment of the non-academic requirements or individual feedback will not be available. Consider seeking feedback from a teacher or mentor who knows you more deeply than we can in our short time together.
Here’s how to access your ChooseTMU Applicant Portal account:
- Get your TMU Student Number in the email acknowledgement of your application
- Activate your TMU Online Identity. Fill in the Activation Form on the Accounts website. When asked for your Student/Applicant ID, enter your nine-digit TMU Student Number. Keep a record of your user name and password
- 24 hours after activating your TMU Online Identity, visit the ChooseTMU Applicant Portal
Instructions on how to upload documents, as well as common questions and answers, can be found on our Ready to Submit Your Documents? web page.
If you are applying for readmission or reinstatement, you may not be required to submit non-academic requirements. You must inform Undergraduate Admissions of your intentions.
Contact ServiceHub at 416-979-5036 and ask to speak with the admissions officer by February 1, 2023, or 10 business days from your application submission date (whichever comes later).
Student spotlight
Performance: Acting alum is the star of Canadian film ‘Retrograde’
Performance: Acting alumna Molly Reisman is the star of Vortex Media’s drama film, Retrograde, written and directed by Canadian filmmaker Adrian Murray. During her time in the Performance: Acting program, Reisman said she involved herself in a balance of acting and business classes to ensure she was well prepared to enter the industry.
Read more: Performance Acting alum takes the lead in feature film by Canadian writer and director Adrian Murray
Virtual tour
Explore Toronto Metropolitan University's unique urban campus in the heart of downtown Toronto from the comfort of your own home!
Notes:
- Actual minimum grade ranges required for fall 2024 admission/wait list consideration will be determined based on grades and qualifications presented by the applicant pool as they become available. Required grade ranges may fluctuate from year to year (up or down) as a result of competition. Applicants not educated in Ontario may present the equivalent of the Ontario requirements. TMU reserves the right to determine equivalency at its sole discretion.