Lila Neiswanger
The Balancing Act
full-time students-slash-actors juggle studying and the spotlight
PrintEver seen someone muttering at a highlighted packet as they wait in the Dodge Hall lobby, or gesticulating at a brick wall outside Milbank? If so, you have probably spotted a student actor at Columbia. Among this group are a select number of undergraduates who take acting beyond college theater and film to auditions and studios across New York City. These are undergraduates who do it all: take a full course load while maintaining a professional career in film and theater.
Melissa Macedo, a Barnard junior, Maura McNamara, a CC sophomore, and Asher Grodman, a CC senior, are three such undergraduate actors. They have taken on the rigorous demands of a Columbia education—and a profession that takes no excuses. Each of these actors has transcended institutional obstacles to pursue their passion in the real world, and though they have approached the process in a variety of ways, their Columbia educations have served and continue to serve them in the professional world.
Who are these students and where do they come from? Macedo, a Los Angeles native, came to Columbia with acting experience. “I thought I would take a break from acting while I went to school on the East Coast, but, as you can see, that didn’t happen,” she says with a smile. “I just couldn’t stay away.” Grodman also worked professionally before coming to Columbia. In high school, he acted in a theater production in Queens, two-and-a-half hours from his home in New Jersey, while playing varsity football. Though he described the experience as brutal, he concedes, “It prepared me for acting at Columbia. I’ve gotten used to juggling a hectic schedule.” McNamara has been packing her schedule with acting opportunities since she was six years old, and took a year off before attending Columbia to live and act in New York. “It’s nice to already have friends, connections, and experience in the theater world, so I’m not starting from scratch,” she says.
Though Macedo, Grodman, and McNamara all have past acting experience, they have had to adjust to the time constraints that come with going to an Ivy League school. We’ve all experienced nights in which we find ourselves exhausted, un-showered, and ready to slam our heads up against a wall, before sitting down to write a 10-page paper. So how, exactly, do these students manage to balance full academic schedules and full-time acting jobs?
Macedo agrees that time is the greatest constraint for student actors. Even though she has managed to act in graduate student films, an independent feature, and an off-Broadway production while attending school, Macedo tells me, “People here don’t have enough time as it is—try fitting in a rehearsal and a shooting schedule, and it is almost impossible, not to mention tiring.”
Tiring, yes, but not completely impossible. McNamara, who just finished a run in Tom Stoppard’s The Real Thing at T. Schreiber Studio, the first professional job she has done while attending Columbia, says, “Once I got through the initial how-many-hours-are-in-a-day panic, I seemed to find time for it all.”
Having time for it all, though, does require a bit of micromanaging. For McNamara, taking 18 credits is just right, but the real challenge was “arranging my class schedule so that I wouldn’t be penalized for all the class I was going to miss.” Grodman, who has acted in several independent films and had a role in an off-Broadway production of Artfuckers during his sophomore year, notes, “Talking to teachers is really important. They tend to respect your choices, and make exceptions. Whereas Columbia College does not.”
So why come here? Columbia College and Barnard hardly seem like ideal schools for a working actor: They provide limited coursework in the practical application of theater arts, and the few classes both schools do offer are often hard to get into because of space constraints. Moreover, their programs are not designed to provide flexible schedules outside the classroom. According to Grodman, this is a mistake. “Columbia is running from a reputation they naturally have as an arts center,” he says.
Yet Columbia and Barnard provide each of their students with an invaluable liberal arts education—one that is impossible to receive in a conservatory program like Tisch or Juilliard. Furthermore, it’s an education that is particularly valuable for actors. As Grodman puts it, “I am reading things most actors won’t read.” Conversely, McNamara argues that acting professionally while attending school has helped her as a student: “I think that ultimately, being able to go off to the theater has made me a better student, because my focus and energy is broken up, so it’s not just school, school, school, all the time.” In an ideal world, all actors would have the benefit of getting an undergraduate education equal to the one students get at Columbia. Though people complain about Columbia’s Core Curriculum and Barnard’s Nine Ways of Knowing, a well-rounded education introduces a student to a variety of disciplines and viewpoints and encourages the development of strong analytical skills—useful tools for any actor. Maybe these students actually get the ultimate balance between theory and practice.
Macedo, Grodman, and McNamara all had the opportunity to jump straight from high school into the professional world, but they saw the value of coming to Columbia to diversify their knowledge and experience. When asked about choosing to go to college rather than launching straight into the acting world, Grodman replies, “Acting is all about your experience. It is about what you’ve seen, what you’ve read, who you’ve known. The work I’ve done in school, and the friends I’ve made, have made me a better actor.”
Macedo has a bit of advice for aspiring actors who think acting professionally while attending school sounds like the best of both worlds: “Keep your goals for school and work distinct and clear. It’s not easy, so be sure it’s what’s right for you. But,” she says, smiling, “if it is, go for it!”
16 April 2009
vol. 6, issue 10
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