A Giant Rant

OKAY. All this MT-competition-College-Confidential-is-my-kid-good-enough-top-tier-what-are-the-odds-talent-pool BULLSHIT is starting to piss me off.
Here's the thing: yes, colleges want "talent," although I think the better word is "skill." But we're artists, okay? There's no definitive way to RANK artists. STANISLAVSKI, GUYS. "There is no good or bad or right or wrong; there is only what is true." My acting teacher at Circle said that like 6 times a day. Hasn't everyone been told this by their acting teacher? I just don't understand what else people think theatre is for. We all get so caught up in the numbers and the competition that it becomes a game of getting in or having the best audition and we forget why we even started. The whole point of theatre is moving people and being unique and brave and individual. Why else would it exist? Because the freaking ancient Greeks loved Glee when they were in middle school?
There is no way they are ranking people from most to least talented and taking the top 24 or 50 or 8 or whatever. I refuse to believe that, because it doesn't make sense! They're not! Because there is no definitive number of "best" people. We're all talented. There's no way anyone auditioning is not a little bit talented--er, skilled. I just don't think there's a way to rank people, except in terms of that technical skill and whether they tell the story honestly, like Stanislavski said. Everyone also forgets that there's more to a college audition than your actual performance. My mom has been on a lot of audition panels and even for music, so, so much of it is the interview. They ask you to pull up that chair because they want to KNOW you so they can figure out whether it's going to be a good match. They literally say it! And people still freak about the one crack on the last note and how that means they're never getting in. I've had some relatively meh auditions, but the interview was so spectacular that I counted it as one of my "good ones."
And of course, there's a randomness to the whole thing. In the BU info session, the woman said she sees 850 auditioners and thinks 250 would do well in the program (and since we all have some technical skill I swear to God those 250 are the honest ones, I know this because that same woman looked at my resume and told me she had also trained with my teacher who quoted Stanislavski) but can only accept 90. Even if you're what they want, they might have too much of what they want. That's why you can't feel bad when you're rejected. UNLESS you didn't show your real self.
So what are colleges looking for? I don't know, people they can see and TEACH every single day for four years and not want to MURDER? Maybe??? People who don't waste time trying to figure out what the people behind the table want and are solid enough in themselves that they can actually express shit and be a person and relate to other people? People who are unique???! Actual people like human beings??!!!??? MAYBE.
Or maybe, they are looking for the people who are most technically skilled, the most commercial, the ones who'll book the most the fastest. Clearly, some are. Some are. I acknowledge that. But if that's what "top" colleges want, then how incredibly stupid. I don't want to go to one. I didn't audition for the ones with those reputations. I want nothing to do with it because I got into this as an ARTIST, dammit, and I will stay an artist if it's the last thing I do.
Unless I become a producer. Oops.
I have to believe there are musical theatre programs out there that are doing more than plugging their students into this Broadway formula for maximum revenue. There must be some that are looking for people they get along with, can play with, can teach. It's literally so easy to be one of those people. You just have to stop freaking out about whether the mysterious faculty members behind the table think you're "talented" enough to get in.