ASPIRING actor Howard Perret from Farnham went back to school in his first performance at The Old Vic in Future Conditional, starring loveable Welshman Rob Brydon.

Howard spent the best three years of his life at ArtsEd in Chiswick, in London, studying drama. While there he was lucky enough to be directed by English theatre, film and television director, Sir Trevor Nunn – who according to Howard is “arguably one of the biggest theatre directors in the world” - in his last production of Two Gentlemen of Verona, in which he played Proteus.

The play Future Conditional is Matthew Warchus’ first play as artistic director and is about the current education system in this country. Howard is part of the ensemble and understudy.

He was first spotted by the casting director from The Old Vic, who asked him to audition after watching all of Howard’s final year shows. It was his first professional audition and he managed to it.

Howard said: “The whole process has been absolutely incredible. It’s been so nice to go into such a welcoming and talented company. To work with Matthew Warchus has been a dream too, he’s a genius and such a lovely guy. I was a little bit nervous but it was mainly just excitement. When we had our bows for the first curtain call it was so overwhelming. I tried to play it cool but couldn’t hold in my smile.”

While taking drama for GCSE, he performed in a number of plays and decided to further his studies at A-level. He began auditioning for drama schools, but found he was very unprepared, therefore failing to secure a place.

However, failure was not an option for Howard, as he went on to complete a foundation year at PPA in Guildford, which helped him secure his place at ArtsEd the following year:

“I’ve always been showing off, since I can remember but I guess I really got into acting at school through drama classes. I actually almost dropped it because I didn’t like my teacher that much. She went on maternity leave and the teacher who replaced her basically told me I could do it for a job.

“I’ve always loved it but I definitely love it more now. The arts have such a massive role in our society and I believe it’s a very important job. I can’t imagine doing anything else.”