Joan See, who has run the School for Film and TV in New York City for almost three decades, is nothing if not a realist.
Starting out in New York theater during in the '60s, See embraced acting as a kind of religion, but to put food in her stomach and pay the rent, she became one of the busiest actors in commercials, appearing in more than 300 of them. (Esquire dubbed her "the Stanislavsky of the 30-second spot.")
"Acting in daytime dramas and commercials and doing voiceovers have supported some great theatrical careers," she says, seated in her compact office in a nondescript Chelsea office building, whose elevators move with the speed of Elmer's glue.
A bundle of energy, See wears her blonde hair page-boy style and sports black pantsuits, bearing a resemblance to Vanessa Redgrave (although about a foot shorter than the statuesque Brit).
If videogame voiceovers have allowed top-rank stage actors to continue treading the boards, lesser performers have frequently abandoned the theater altogether: A regular role in a New York or Los Angeles soap opera can make actors forget their dream of a life in front of the footlights, eager to replace it with a life in front of the camera.
And that's where the School of Film and TV comes in. See has just tacked on a fancier name -- the New York Conservatory for Dramatic Arts -- but she has no illusions that her students will make their living on the stage.
"Unfortunately, art doesn't sell in this country," she says. "We're anti-intellectual, anti-art, anti-language." Untrained actors in TV and movies, she adds, "tear the English language to tatters every time they open their mouth."
The school has pretty much resigned itself to theater's bottom-rung position on the totem pole of mass media. For See, a school that enrolls students who are steeped in a culture that elevates such artifacts as "Grey's Anatomy," "American Idol," "The Young & the Restless" and "National Treasure: Book of Secrets" to the pantheon of success has one key goal: to teach fledgling actors how to emote for the camera.
James Calleri, a veteran New York casting director, says a school like See's that's so directed toward movies and TV is somewhat unusual. "The training programs of most acting schools tilt toward the stage," Calleri says.
Casting directors seeking an actor for a serious role in a movie or TV show tend to prefer candidates with theater training, he continues, although a less rigorous standard would apply to a light-hearted series peopled with young actors like CW's "Gossip Girl."
Marc Hirschfeld, head of casting for NBC, says a school focused on soap operas is not a bad idea because "soaps are a fantastic training ground for actors. You have to learn new scripts every day, and you have to deliver a performance in one or two takes."
"NBC has created new primetime stars out of actors who came out of daytime soaps," Hirschfeld continues, citing Josh Duhamel and Vanessa Marcil, the leads on "Las Vegas," and Justin Bruening, who made such an impact on the two-hour pilot of "Knight Rider" last month that Peacock has picked it up for series.
Joan See couldn't agree more that what she calls daytime dramas are a great place to learn and a potential springboard for actors with talent, intelligence and drive.
The first year of the two-year program at her school trains students in the fundamentals of voice, movement and improvisation, tied, in part, to the philosophy of the late Sanford Meisner, one of the noted acting teachers whose heyday was the 1940s and '50s. (Spontaneity and imagination were two of Meisner's watchwords.)
In the second year, See says, "the students apply these techniques to the literature of film and television," not of theater. One of the school's bright lights, a Keri Russell look-alike named Bonnie Swencionis, says she's learned a lot about the business through seminars and talks with her teachers, all of whom have done stints as working actors.
"I'm getting practical tips that will help me start a professional career," she says. "The members of the faculty bring into the classroom a feel for what's going on outside, in commercials, soap operas and films."
Matthew Fox of "Lost" graduated from the school, as well as four current soap-opera regulars: Scott Holroyd, Ryan Brannan, Travis Wood and Don Mooney.
In her second year, the school's most recent prize pupil, Shelley Hennig, 21, a former Miss Teen USA from Louisiana, went to her first audition for a recurring part in NBC's "Days of Our Lives" and landed the role.
But Hennig took a roundabout journey to soap stardom. "I really didn't have any ambition to become an actor," she says. "I never acted in plays in high school and, except for 'Full House,' I never watched much TV."
Even when she won Miss Teen USA, which included a scholarship to the School for Film and TV, she moved to New York more as a lark than anything else.
"But from my first day in class I fell in love with acting, and became obsessed with it," she says. "I really kicked butt in the school."
One of her advantages, she says, is that "I brought a clean slate. Some of the kids who had studied theater acting in high school had to strip themselves of their stage habits."
"The school is tough on its students," says David Palmer, the school's chief executive, who's responsible for keeping the ledger books filled with black ink. Although more than 4,000 people apply each year, the school has room for only about 180 students. Tuition is $21,650 a year, but the school hands out a number of scholarships.
What's agonizing for Palmer is that the school will drop upward of a third of its freshmen, denying many of them a second year even if they meet the 3.0 grade-point requirement.
A committee of the faculty "will evaluate their professionalism, growth and natural ability," says See. Quoting the Bible, she declares, "Many are called but few are chosen."
But what keeps Palmer awake nights is all that second-year tuition money flying out of the door marked exit.
Contact the Variety newsroom at
news@variety.com