Being a theatre major leads to questions from your parents, your great uncle’s best friend, and your own subconscious. However, people don’t do things for no reason. Being a theatre major isn’t a choice you make because the wind blew a certain way one day. Just because it doesn’t guarantee you a career within the field doesn’t mean it isn’t a meaningful, rich, and exciting course to take your education.
I am a theatre major. I did theatre in elementary and middle school, but I did almost none of it in high school. When I happened to be placed in a theatre advising class during my first year in college my eyes were opened to a whole new art form that I had never considered doing myself. I was too busy to do any theatre in high school, and that made it hard to ever have an interest in the field. However, the more I learned about it, the more I realized how amazing it was and the importance it has on our culture. I realized how much I wanted to be a part of it, have an understanding of it, and appreciate it.
You don’t have to become a theatre major. It is a choice you make because you have a passion for theatre. Passion means love and support of the art. It is important to remember this when people are asking you questions.
What does majoring in theatre teach you? For me, I learned how exciting and intimate it feels to be in the theatre. To watch a play and learn about a new perspective, and to see how a play can be interpreted so many different ways just because it has had many different productions. You could see Romeo and Juliet in London’s West End, and it would be a completely different experience and have a totally different meaning from one you saw at a small Seattle theater. That teaches how incredibly diverse and imaginative the theatre can and needs to be.
Majoring in theatre taught me how intertwined art and the political climate are. It taught me that the speech that happened at the end of Hamiltonwhen Mike Pence was in the audience needed to happen. That theatre is political and theatre reacts to what is happening in the world. Art is inspired by reality, and art is a facet of reality.
Majoring in theatre doesn’t mean that you screwed up. It means that you are willing to learn about anything and everything. It means you have an appreciation for life, and a desire to see life through a million different mediums.
