What are the top ten acting colleges in the US?

What do you mean by “acting colleges”?

as in colleges that are very well known for their theatre and film acting

Aha; You mean excellent theatre programs——-> undergrad? Are you willing to take some liberal arts classes, such as English, History, the general core curriculum or do you want a professional school such as Juilliard?

here are a few of the big boys:
UCLA
NYU
North Carolina School of The Arts
Northwestern
Yale
DePaul
Julliard
Columbia
UCSD
U. of Evansville

and some up-and-comers:
Louisiana State (where I got my BA in Theatre Performance)
U. Texas
Oklahoma U.
Catholic U.
Rutgers

yes undergrad and I’m not looking for a professional schoo, just the private and state schools that have the best curriculum

what about USC? How does their program compare because from some I’ve heard its the best in the nation.

USC has a top notch film school, but more in terms of film-MAKING. It’s a great school for aspiring directors, cineamatographers, etc., but there are better acting schools out there. In regard to theatre, there are MUCH better programs out there.

you mentioned UT, how does there undergrad program look because I’ve heard from an alum that its not good because they focus most of their roles to the mfas and since there is no screening or auditioning for undergrads the actors get very little attention.

UT has what’s called Plan II. It’s an odd specialized liberal arts major, in which you can pick a “focus”. It’s like a major-within-a-major. Anyway, one of my best friends was a Plan II with a theatre focus, and he had nothing but glowing things to say; another guy I worked with came through that program and is one of the best actors I’ve ever seen.

hmm, that sounds kind of promising. I’ve been admitted to ut and USC. I live in tx and really would like to act in LA but money for school is an issue. Any advice as far as what I might consider doing like getting a BA here and a MA here. I’d really like to go to ucla but I wasn’t admitted so I’ll probably try again next year.

I would say explore all your options with USC in terms of $$. If it seemed I was implying that it was a bad program, I didn’t mean to. Acting just isn’t the focus there (much like the actual film biz— actors are low-man on the totem pole). BUT, having said that, their facilities are amazing, it’s a program with a lot of money, and you would have access to really amazing faculty and guest instructors.
Cal Arts is a strong program in LA also.

In TX, SMU has a fairly solid undergrad program too. As does U. Houston.

I’ll keeping looking into USC thanks for all your help!

Very welcome.

Don’t forget Carnegie Mellon!

very true. Carnegie Mellon is really good as well.

I think;
Stanford
MIT
Harvard
Northwestern
Yale
upenn
michigan
UVA
georgetown
cornell

Everyone at the college I went to acted crazy.

What about University of the Arts in Pennsylvania???

Southern Utah University with their Tony Award winning (best regional theater in US) Shakespeare Festival has got to be in the running. Though there is a MFA program, roles are given to others as well. A year ago, I traveled a long way to see a stomp down fabulous production of MacBeth in which MacBeth was played by a 4th year Biology major. He trumped many equity actors I have seen in the same role. Plus they have reportedly the most faithful replica of the Globe Theater anywhere outside of England. Thanks to the Schakespeare Festival, and the Neil Simon Festival in town, some students have equity before they graduate. They have very strong music, dance and design departments to support the whole scenario. Top notch standard and lots of opportunity. As I said, I travel a long way, like 8 hours, from a major metropolitan area with loads of theater to go there several times a year. I had never even heard of the place until a few years ago. Think of it as Brigadoon! Magical.