Get Ready to Perform, Design and Construct Your Next Performance
Webster University’s Sargent Conservatory of Theatre Arts offers professional training programs in acting, musical theatre, directing, design, technical theatre, and stage management.
Sargent Conservatory is associated with professional theatre companies, two of which are on campus: The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis and Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. Explore below to learn more about our sequential and intensive programs for training theatre artists.
Meet our current seniors, whose work for Senior Showcase highlights the array of experiences and artistic work integral to our training.

Join us at the theatre
American Idiot | Oct. 7–9 |
Sueño | Nov. 4–13 |
Seminar | Dec. 2–11 |
A Bright Room Called Day | Feb. 17–19 |
Rain and Zoe Save the World | Mar. 3–5 |
Mud | Mar. 31–Apr. 2 |
Myths & Hymns | Apr. 21–23 |
American Idiot
Music by Green Day
Lyrics by Billie Joe Armstrong
Book by Billie Joe Armstrong and Michael Mayer
Browning Mainstage Theatre
Oct. 7–9, 2022
American Idiot follows the exhilarating journey of young Americans as they struggle to find meaning in a post-9/11 world, borne along by Green Day's electrifying score. The rock musical draws on all the songs from “American Idiot,” plus material that did not make the album, plus a handful of numbers from Green Day's Grammy-winning album, “21st Century Breakdown.”
Sueño
Translated and adapted by José Rivera
From the play by Pedro Calderón de la Barca
Emerson Studio Theatre
Nov. 4–13, 2022
Sueño is Obie Award–winning playwright José Rivera’s sharp translation and adaptation of Calderón de la Barca’s Golden Age classic Life Is a Dream. Sueño follows the life of young Prince Segismundo, heir to the Spanish throne, who is imprisoned at birth when astrologers predicted his reign as king would result in the country’s ruin. When his father King Basilio finds his own life ending without a legitimate heir, he releases Segismundo and places him on the throne. If Segismundo is gentle, he will be allowed to reign. If he is as barbaric as the stars predicted, he'll be sent back to his imprisonment and told that his brief moment of freedom and power was only a dream. In this brisk, contemporary adaptation, Rivera asks the question that haunted Calderón: If life is a dream, who is dreaming us?
Seminar
By Theresa Rebeck
Stage III
Dec. 2–11, 2022
In Seminar, a provocative comedy from Pulitzer Prize–nominee Theresa Rebeck, four aspiring young novelists sign up for private writing classes with Leonard, an international literary figure. Under his recklessly brilliant and unorthodox instruction, some thrive and others flounder, alliances are made and broken, sex is used as a weapon, and hearts are unmoored. The wordplay is not the only thing that turns vicious as innocence collides with experience in this biting comedy.
A Bright Room Called Day
By Tony Kushner
Emerson Studio Theatre
Feb. 17–19, 2023
From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Angels in America comes this powerful portrayal of individual dissolution and resolution in the face of political catastrophe. A Bright Room Called Day centers on a group of Berlin artists and the changes in their lives as Nazism rises in Germany. The audacious play urges us to contend with the present as it narrates a story set in the early 1930s.
Rain and Zoe Save the World
By Crystal Skillman
Original Music by Bobby Cronin
Emerson Studio Theatre
Mar. 3–5, 2023
Two teenage climate activists embark on an impulsive motorcycle journey to join a group of oil protesters. What begins as two young environmentalists’ longing to belong to something greater than themselves gives way to their discovering that the true danger in this world might just be growing up. This brand new play is a funny, sincere and profoundly moving adventure about the ethics of standing up for what you believe, whatever the cost.
Mud
By María Irene Fornés
Stage III
Mar. 31–Apr. 2, 2023
A quintessential Fornes play, Mud won the OBIE Award for Best New Play in 1984. It is one of the playwright’s many explorations into humanity's darker side. In it, Mae seeks to escape the basic life she has been living with Lloyd through education. She befriends Henry, who offers to teach her, but he has a stroke and is forced to remain in the care of Mae and Lloyd. Mud challenges audiences with its uncompromising look at poverty, gender, and illiteracy.
Myths & Hymns
Music and lyrics by Adam Guettel
Browning Mainstage Theatre
April 21–23, 2023
In his song cycle, Myths & Hymns, Guettel paints an emotional landscape of faith and yearning. The lyrics were inspired by Greek mythology and a nineteenth-century Presbyterian hymnal; the musical vocabulary sweeps from romantic art song and rock to Latin, gospel and R&B. Myths & Hymns elucidates our fantastic desire to transcend earthly bounds, our intrinsic need to connect with something or someone greater in our restless search for enlightenment.
Undergraduate Majors and Minors
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Costume Construction
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Costume Design
- Bachelor of Arts in Directing
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Lighting Design
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Musical Theatre
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Scene Design
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Scene Painting
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Sound Design
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Stage Management
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Technical Direction
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Wig and Makeup Design
To complete a minor in theatre, students must take a minimum of 18 credit hours from the courses below. All credit must be completed at Webster. Courses to fulfill a requirement for any major cannot also be used to fulfill a requirement for the minor in theatre.
Theatre Courses
- THEA 1050 Theatre Appreciation (3 hours) — GCP Arts Appreciation/Written Communication
- THEA 1080 Studio Acting (3 hours) — GCP Arts Appreciation/Oral Communications
- THEA 2100 Introduction to Theatre Design (3 hours)
- THEA 2030 History of Theatre: Greeks to Elizabethan — GCP Roots of Culture/Written Communication
- THEA 2040 History of Theatre: Restoration to 1915 (3 hours) — GCP Roots of Culture/Written Communication
- THEA 2050 History of Theatre: 1915 to Present — GCP Roots of Culture/Written Communication
- THEA 2060 Introduction to Dramaturgy and Play Analysis — GCP Arts Appreciation/Written Communication
- THEA 2080 Studio Acting II (3 hours) — GCP Arts Appreciation/Oral Communications
- THEA 3040 Topics in Theatre (3 hours) Repeatable with different titles
- THEA 3070 Creative Dramatics: Social Issues (3 hours)
- THEA 4060 Advanced Dramaturgy Seminar (3 hours)
- MUTH 1030 History of American Musical Theatre (3 hours)
- ENGL 4150 Shakespeare (3 hours)
Additional Information
Theatre Minor Advisor — Doug Finlayson, finlaydo@webster.edu
Apply to Webster's Sargent Conservatory of Theatre Arts
All future Webster Conservatory students follow a three-step process. (Note: The Conservatory does not require a video or prescreening.)
1: Apply to Webster
Application may be made through our website at webster.edu/apply, or you may apply through Common App or COALITION App.
After applying, you will receive email with a form link.
2: Submit Form and Fee
Use link in email to submit the Fine and Performing Arts Student Assessment Request Form and $30 fee for the Conservatory. You will be contacted by Patti Baygents with next step information to schedule a date and time for your review or interview.
3: Schedule Audition/Interview
To schedule your audition or interview at Webster, please go to Webster's Conservatory Auditions.
(Note: Accepted does not take the place of a Conservatory audition or interview.)
If you have any questions regarding the Conservatory or the audition or review process, please contact Patti Baygents, Audition Coordinator for the Leigh Gerdine College of Fine Arts, at pbaygents80@webster.edu or 314-246-4216.
Use of Acceptd is not required to be admitted to the program and does not take the place of a Conservatory audition or interview.
The Sargent Conservatory of Theatre Arts is working in association with the online digital audition/portfolio company Acceptd. The use of Acceptd allows students to submit perusal materials to Webster and other programs. Although we view all postings to the Acceptd site, students interested in the Conservatory must schedule an official Webster audition or interview for the program to which they are applying. Acceptd does not take the place of a Conservatory audition or interview.
To schedule your audition or interview at Webster, please go to Webster's Conservatory Auditions page.

Amélie

Student Voices

Burial at Thebes

Learned Ladies

The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Sondheim on Sondheim

Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again.

“I feel very lucky to be even attending this school. It’s an honor to be a recipient of the Webster University Endowed Theatre Scholarship and be able to keep living out my dreams.”

BFA in Acting, '24
Take a Virtual Tour
Explore Photos of Our Previous Productions
Each season, Webster has multiple productions. Select a season below to view its photos:
- American Idiot
- Sueño
- Seminar
- A Bright Room Called Day
- Rain and Zoe Save the World
- Mud
- Myths & Hymns
- Ismene
- Twelfth Night
- Bomb-itty of Errors
- Picnic
- Machinal (capstone)
- Miss You Like Hell (capstone)
- Bright Star
- [title of show]
- As You Like It
- Lysistrata
- Men on Boats
- She Kills Monsters (capstone)
- Fly by Night (capstone)
- Brigadoon
- Slasher
- Macbeth
- The Glorious Ones
- The Philadelphia Story
- Next Fall (capstone)
- Rhinoceros (capstone)
- The Drowsy Chaperone
- Dogfight
- Stage Door
- Shotgun
- The Miser
- Mr Burns, a Post-Electric Play (capstone)
- The Cockfight Play (capstone)
- The Pajama Game
2014-15 Season Photos:
- Stop Kiss
- Spring Awakening
- Hay Fever
- Big Love
- Honk! (capstone)
- The Last Five Years (capstone)
- The Tempest
2013-14 Season Photos:
- Alice in Wonderland
- The Country Wife
- Smokey Joe's Cafe - The Music of Leiber and Stoller
- The House of the Spirits
- Reckless (capstone)
- A Reconsolidated Life
- Into the Woods
2012-13 Season Photos:
- The Children's Hour
- A Midsummer Night's Dream
- Yours, Anne
- Uncommon Women and Others
- Eurydice (capstone)
- The Pig Iron People (capstone)
- Legally Blonde: The Musical
2011-12 Season Photos:
- Top Girls
- Carousel
- Hot L Baltimore
- Hello Again
- Edgar Allan Poe's Nevermore (capstone)
- 100 Saints You Should Know (capstone)
- Dinner With Friends (capstone)
- Lady Windermere's Fan
2010-11 Season Photos:
2009-10 Season Photos:
- The Proposal
- Company
- The Winter's Tale
- Cloud Nine
- On The Razzle
- The House of Blue Leaves
- The Wedding Singer
2008-09 Season Photos:
- On the Edge
- Our Town
- Stepping Out
- Picasso at the Lapin Agile
- Dancing at Lughnasa (capstone)
- Betrayal (capstone)
- Cabaret
2007-08 Season Photos:
- Tied to a Stick
- Anton in Show Business
- Tartuffe
- The Cripple of Inishmaan
- Angels in American: Millennium Approaches
- The Spitfire Grill
- Oklahoma
2006-07 Season Photos:
- The Siren Song of Stephen J. Gould
- A Month in the Country
- The Comedy of Errors
- The Night of the Iguana
- Bat Boy
- Private Eyes (capstone)
- You're a Good Man Charlie Brown (capstone)
- No, No Nanette
2005-06 Season Photos:
- The Spirit is Willing
- Our Country's Good
- Bye Bye Birdie
- The Memory of Water
- A New Brain
- String of Pearls
- The Man Who Came To Dinner
2004-05 Season Photos:
- Red Ink
- The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
- The Lucky Chance
- Ruthless! The Musical
- A Piece of My Heart
- Blythe Spirit
- Frankie and Johnny at the Claire de Lune (capstone)
- Scotland Road (capstone)
- Into the Woods
2003-04 Season Photos:
- Twenty and Two
- Summer and Smoke
- Rodgers and Hart: A Celebration
- A Midsummer Night's Dream
- Lysistrata
- Loot
- Woyzeck (capstone)
- Nine
2002-03 Season Photos:
Full Season Archive
- The Importance of Being Earnest
- An Evening of One Acts 2002
- Pippin
- Violet
- The Laramie Project
- On the Verge
- As Bees in Honey Drown (capstoned)
- Two Rockin' Gents
2001-02 Season Photos:
Full Season Archive
- Ten Little Indians
- 42nd Street
- 5th of July
- Blood Wedding
- Lucky Stiff
- Heartbreak House
- The Shape of Things (capstone)
2000-01 Season Photos:
Full Season Archive
- Female Transport
- Company
- As You Like It
- Hedda Gabler
- You're a Good Man Charlie Brown
- The Women
1999-00 Season Photos:
Full Season Archive
- Collette Collage
- Caucasian Chalk Circle
- Picnic
- School for Scandal
- And Evening of One Acts 2000
- Guys and Dolls
1998-99 Season Photos:
Full Season Archive
- Gemini
- Grand Hotel
- The Philadelphia Story
- The Cherry Orchard
- Cole
- Macbeth
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