Ah yes, time to start thinking about the Unified Auditions again! If you’re new to this or just haven’t gotten that far yet, my post from last year describes the Unifieds experience, and weighs the pros and cons a bit. But this question is more about the logistics and process:
I don’t know much about the unified audition process, but it’s something that I am leaning towards. I wanted to know if you have to sign up on the National Unified audition page, and how I would go about doing that, and I wanted to know if you have to apply to each college before going to the Unified auditions.
So. It’s a little confusing and not very intuitive, but here’s the overall scoop:
Unifieds are a cooperative of several college theatre programs that travel together to hold admissions auditions and interviews in multiple cities across the US: New York City, Chicago, and Los Angeles. For more about the Unifieds themselves, see my previous post and the chapter in my book.
The dates of the 2019 Unified Auditions are:
NYC – Jan 19-20
Chicago – February 4-7
LA – February 9-10
The website for the Unified Auditions is… sparse at best. It only lists the cities, dates, and participating schools, and it’s often updated very late in the year. I see, however, that the 2019 dates are indeed posted at this time, so I’ll assume everything else there is up-to-date. That site is for information only: There is nothing you need to do to register or sign up with any one central organization to attend Unifieds.
What you will need to do is contact each school (thankfully, their contact information is listed on the unifieds website) you wish to audition with at Unifieds to schedule your audition. This is often an ordeal – some schools want to see you in a specific time slot, some ask you to book an entire morning or afternoon with them, and still others hold a callback later, so you don’t even know what your availability is going to be until you get there. As I talk about in my book, there’s no real consistency among schools.
It’s going to be difficult, especially if you want to try to cram a lot of school auditions in there. Try not to lose your mind. Breathe.
Most of them will require you to apply before they will see you, which you have to do at each one or via CommonApp. But some schools will also accept walk-ins and have you apply on the spot or later. It really is different at each school, so get on the phone and start calling schools to find out what the requirements are.
The most important thing is to start scheduling EARLY. Find out when each school is opening registration, and get in there! It helps to have your apps done before you start the audition scheduling process, because some programs want to have you in the system before giving you a slot.
I know this seems like a lot of work, but that’s because IT TOTALLY IS. But as we all know, theatre people are superheroes.