Acting Foundation (Level 2) | Q&A with Clare Catford

The Acting Foundation, Level 2 allowed Clare Catford to pursue her dream of being an actor alongside her career as a journalist. Following the Acting Foundation, she successfully auditioned for the Acting Diploma, Level 3 starting this year.

So as a kid, I was quite bossy and every Christmas from the age of about five onwards, I organized a pantomime with three other kids, my sister and two friends. We’d perform this every Christmas for our mums and dads, and it went on for about ten years. I loved it. I ended up joining a junior theatre school.

Eventually, I decided I was going to do a drama degree. I remember the headmistress say to me, “Oh, you shouldn’t. Can't you do something more sensible, like sociology or geography?” Both of which I was terrible at. But I dug my heels in and went to the University of Manchester to do drama.

I didn’t have the confidence or sense of self to pursue it as a proper actor, so I became a journalist - mainly radio. I was good at radio. When you present on the radio, you’re a bit like an actor in a way. I had a really reasonable career doing it.

But the nature of the job is that you're going to get hired and fired. That happened to me several times. It's not a particular surprise. I'd had depression over the years and was quite shut down, but acting always seemed to be able to encompass bits of me which were more alive.

I stumbled into City Lit almost literally. I'd been struggling to find work post-lockdown, having done all kinds of things (and despair isn't a great share on LinkedIn, even though I was very honest about it!) I started an acting day course after a recommendation from the director a theatre production I was in.

Then an email came around saying there were places on the Foundation course, for which you had to audition. I was worried it would be a huge commitment. I wanted to see if I could be an actor before I'm dead.

Therein began the journey. That's how I learned what City Lit has to offer and I haven't really looked back!

One of the joys of the Foundation course is that there’s a huge age range, from people in their 20s to people in their 60s. Everyone’s from different educational backgrounds. They may work down the mines; they may have their own businesses; they may have lots of qualifications. But when you get here it's all on a level playing field.

It's also a very safe environment to learn. That doesn't mean to say it's not challenging but it's safe to be who you are, whatever culture you're from. I feel very at ease here. I would say in some ways, acting here is a bit like coming home.

The tutors help you to access those bits of yourself as an actor that you may not know you have. And it's a work in progress. To use a rather overused cliché: who knows what will happen in the end?

Thanks to the course, I've begun the process of examining more complex feelings, deeper feelings with my acting. That in itself is an achievement.

But the process continues; I'm amazed to say that I auditioned for the Acting Diploma, having done the Foundation. And the good news is… I got in!

Eventually, my dream would be to be at the National. Maybe I'll be a spear carrier in a regional theatre somewhere and that's as far as it goes. But that that is my dream. However, there's a long way to go.

I'm going to use a phrase from a well-known philosopher, theologian and thinker; the person who wrote Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. If you're too young to remember, it’s a film where they flew up in the sky in a car and there's a line in it says, “From the ashes of disaster come the roses of success!”

And I like that line, because if, for example, you feel you failed something – and I've failed things in the past – or school wasn't something that you enjoyed, City Lit can help you turn that around.

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