Theatre and Film

Theatre and film studies brings two powerful art forms into productive relationship. Theatre is one of humanity's oldest art forms, rooted in live performance, collective experience, and the physical presence of performers and audience in the same space. Film arrived more recently but has become the dominant storytelling medium of the past century, shaping how billions of people understand the world and themselves.

Studying both together develops your ability to analyse how meaning is made across different media, how stories are told through performance, image, and sound, and how these art forms are embedded in their historical and cultural contexts.

The University of Bristol's four-year full-time Theatre and Film degree includes a foundation year and has a typical entry tariff of 168 points. As the course describes, you will study the historical, contextual, and critical dimensions of theatre, film, and television alongside practice-based work in each medium, giving you both the analytical tools to interpret what you study and the creative skills to make work of your own. Bristol has strong traditions in both subjects, and the combination encourages you to move between scholarly criticism and practical exploration.

You will engage with a wide range of theatrical and cinematic traditions, developing the critical vocabulary and cultural breadth that both academic and professional work in these fields demands.

Graduates of theatre and film programmes work in theatre production, film and television development and production, arts administration, directing, writing, dramaturgy, arts journalism, cultural policy, education, and community arts. Many also move into adjacent fields in media, communications, and the creative industries more broadly, where the analytical and communication skills the degree develops are genuinely valued. Postgraduate study in theatre, film, performance, or media is a natural direction for those wishing to specialise further or pursue academic research.