Nathan Scott Dunn

Acting BA (Hons)

After being rejected from drama school for four years in a row, Nathan had the perseverance and drive to eventually make the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire his home. Nathan is now on the road to stardom with his already hugely successful show ‘1902’ paving an exciting path for the Actor.

“I always wanted to get a degree as my family all had them too, but my first dream was to be a professional footballer, like my dad. I fell out of love with it when I got dropped from my team. I then found performing, and studied it at college to decide if it was something I really wanted to get into.

After college, I auditioned for drama school for five years in a row, and didn’t get in for four of those years. On my fifth attempt, I finally got in. A lot of perseverance was needed, but Royal Birmingham Conservatoire (RBC) eventually became my home.

When you audition for drama schools, they all have a very different way of teaching. But when I went to RBC, it was really friendly and the nicest audition that I’d ever done. It was open, informative and they didn’t expect me to know absolutely everything. My experience of other drama schools was that they weren’t very inclusive. RBC felt very different and supportive.

From my time at University, I’m most proud of how I’ve been able to loosen up and relax on stage and on screen as that was a real barrier for me as a performer. I used to be very rigid, so unlocking that key to be more fluid and flexible when performing, has made me incredibly proud.

Back in 2016, before I’d been accepted into drama school, I started my own theatre company and wrote my first play called 1902. It was really successful in its first run and it has continued to build from there. I spent my spare time while at RBC improving my writing skills, taking notes on directing and much more.

I recently finished a run of the play in Birmingham and we’re soon taking it to the Edinburgh Fringe. It will be the fourth time that the show has been at the festival, and in previous years, we sold out every performance, so we’re hoping to do that again this year.

Later this year, the show will return to Birmingham for a few more performances before we hopefully transfer it onto the West End in London. It’s taken a long time to get to this point and when performing at the likes of the Edinburgh Fringe, you can get lost amongst thousands of shows. It’s great to see it now starting to do really well.

In the long term, I’d love to work more in theatre, but I also would like to be in a big TV show or film. I’d also love to show others that the arts is a viable career and to prove to people that we really do need the arts industry. I’ve recently signed up with a new agent in London, who has lots of connections within TV, which is really exciting and I’ll be moving down to the city later this year.

My advice to other students is to knuckle down. Studying Acting isn’t like studying other courses, it is intensive and you have to really apply and immerse yourself in the training. But if you don’t do the work, you won’t get anywhere. 

Acting is a lot about your drive and I’m lucky that I found a way to create my own work. But when you fall flat in this industry is when you expect it to come to you. It’s not just going to happen for you, you’ve got to put the work in and speak to people. If you don’t ask, you don’t get.”