Ten years ago, recently out of theatre school, I went to an open call at the Berkshire Theatre Festival, also known as BTF.  I arrived extra early to “warm up and shake off some nerves”, a regular habit for me in those early days. BTF was mounting a production of Moon Children by Michael Weller. […]

Carol Reynolds gives her Body Dynamics’ students two homework assignments at their first class: (1) to take full-length photos of themselves from the front, sides, and back, and (2) to do a simple drawing, nothing fancy required, of how they view themselves, how they see their bodies. At the end of the three-month course, she […]

It’s really hard to hear your own voice, and every lie you tell makes your voice harder to hear, and a lot of what we do is lying. Especially when what we want so badly from other people is for them to love us. ~ Nora, A Doll’s House, Part 2 by Lucas Hnath Flashback: […]

I’ve been watching for 10 minutes. And I’m wondering why Fred Waggoner leads drill class relaxation with his students seated in chairs. I’ve only done relaxation work splayed on a floor or slumped against a wall, so I’m curious how you find full relaxation while trying not to topple sideways off your chair. “There’s a […]

Back when presentational acting was still a thing – before Chekhov and Stanislavski and The Group and The Method – the actor’s work was performed from outside–>in. The physical expression was all: gesture gave form and form gave feeling. (That’s roughly the idea.) As a focus on the psychological and emotional life of the character […]

At the beginning of April, Padraig and a new student, Bridgette, set to work on the one act play “Specter” by Don Nigro. Not all scenes transition from the table quickly, but Bridgette and Padraig very quickly tapped into the event of the scene. Finding the event of the scene is necessary before any scene […]

Part of the joy of being an artist in Cay’s studio is finding that you are “deliciously relieved of perfection.” These are not my words. I appropriated them from Sheilagh during the advanced class last Monday night. They are fitting though in that they sum up the experience of being in class week after week, […]

“I know only moments, and lifetimes that are as moments. It’s not where you take things from, it’s where you take them too.” Cate Blanchett, speaking to an attentive class of second graders, is saying these words. They are not her words, and this audience is not her true target. The words are a part […]

In the wake of the election earlier this month, I found myself asking the same question everyone seemed to be asking. What now? At my survival gig as a bartender I instituted a loose rule in the final few weeks leading up to Nov. 7th that his name was banned from conversation. This was an […]

I have become a creature of the left brain. My days are filled with emails, scheduling, phone meetings, and compulsively checking my inbox to see if we have gotten anymore contributions on the fundraising page. I remember years ago sitting in a class on entrepreneurship being taught all of the ways to fundraise for your […]

There is a power that comes from knowing what it feels like to be truthful and vulnerable onstage. Conversely, there is a sense of frustration that goes along with that power when an actor can sense that they are not as truthful and vulnerable as they are capable of being. Both Kieran and Ana of […]

Last week I wrote that I had been offered an opportunity to see “Hamilton” and that it was “exactly as good as they say it is.” Well, because I have had some time to process the experience, and because I am, for better or for worse, me, I’ve been rethinking that line. In college I […]

My classmates are blooming. Fitting for an unseasonably warm winter. One is racking up frequent flyer miles on regional theatre gigs, another is all over my television trying to sell me prescription drugs, the third is swinging in an Off-Broadway production that was was written by a the fourth (who is also starring in it); their production […]

I worry that my expiration date for working in the food industry might be close at hand. “Two lattes for the Princesses,” my coworker, let us call her B, mutters and we both laugh. “Two Princess lattes coming up,” I reply, and moments later feel the familiar weight of guilt come to rest across my […]

Sometimes loss seems to seep it’s way into our lives more heavily than others. The reaper is always there, of course, his shadowy figure looming on the fringe of our awareness, but occasionally his presence becomes palpable. When I started this post Sunday night, reports were just coming out of Paris about yet another series […]

In keeping with the inimitable Tim Bell, I also love a quote that is on Cay’s wall, one by Robert Frost. I realized after having taken an extended hiatus from Cay’s class (life, gigs, pregnancy, a baby), that I have been perpetually misquoting it.  Like, a lot.  I’ll meet a young actor with young actor stuff […]

Last Tuesday I found myself looking around the studio, taking in as much as I could of my last class with Cay for the next few months. I’m off to the DC Fringe festival which will take me out of class until August at the earliest. My eyes fell on a quote we have pinned […]

A friend and I were talking this morning about the insane things we had access to while we were in school. A visual artist, she spoke longingly of a massive 8 peddled loom and a free for all 3D printer. For me it about the space of undergrad and the constant immersion in Theatre. We had […]

A few Tuesday’s ago Cay sighed and commented that “the more I do this, the more important I see relaxation is.  I’m may be turning into one of those teachers who’s only note every week is going to be “see if you can relax’.” Part of drill class with Fred is a weekly 15-20 minute […]

Around this time last year I was just outside of Los Angeles being drive to the San Diego airport by my older brother. As career and lifestyle go we couldn’t be more opposite. I’m an artist, he works a blue-collar job. I jam on craft beer and running, he has a love affair with Corona and […]

Monday afternoon, winter has fully engulfed the city again, and Ciara is conjuring up her own ice storm in the form of a monologue about a wife’s frustration with her husband. Jeff, the target of the frozen blast, sits with his back facing the class. Ciara finishes with a familiar ultimatum: change or leave. “What attracted […]

When my scene partner texted me the night before class to let me know she wasn’t feeling well and was not going to be there I knew what it meant: I needed a monologue. Monologues are a total pain in the ass. Everyone sort of knows that. But we also accept that they are a part […]

We are celebrating the return of Fred Waggoner at the studio, perhaps nobody more so than Max Meisel who finally has a place to go every Friday morning again. Every. Morning. Seriously, the guy never misses drill. The first session back was just as challenging, just as eye-opening, and just as beautiful as all of […]

At the start of this year I had the good fortune to attend a question and answer evening with a gentleman who I had met previously and who is a writer on House of Cards. We rode the train home together and I asked him why he did those sorts of events, ones that have […]

I knew what this week’s blog was going to be about. As I packed up my bag after class I pictured myself knocking it out in an afternoon, possibly that very same day. I ignored the nagging feeling that I hadn’t actually written a blog for last week, weekly posts being something that Cay and […]

For some reason Autumn always feels like the start of a New Year for me in the city. Maybe it’s that I was conditioned to look at it that way by years of Summer break followed by the start of school. Or maybe it is the ability to finally use the word “autumnal” for a […]

  “They’re photographs,” Cay whispered to me on Sunday as we watched the workshop participants tape an alarming amount of printer paper on the usually blank studio walls. “Yesterday we were looking at pictures of old Russian homes and one of the things we noticed was that they were filled with photographs, paintings, and drawings, […]

    When I think of Chekhov, I think of going to the museum and looking at a Vermeer. I look at the paintings and I think, how can that be so alive and so present? The depth of Chekhov’s understanding of thehuman condition allows actors who approach his characters to spring to life if they bring themselves to […]

Melissa Smith is the conservatory director and head of acting at A.C.T. in San Francisco. Prior the A.C.T. she served as director of the program in theater and dance at Princeton University where she taught introductory, intermediate, and advanced acting. She has taught acting, improvisation, and scene study to students of all ages in various colleges, high […]

“Alright Champ, I guess we’ll be seeing you on Broadway.” That line sounds like a Sondheim lead in to the 1st Act big finale. I imagine it being the final stinging blow tossed out the door by an agent named Harry Goldstein, counting his gobs of cash right on the desk, as our hero realizes his quest for glitz […]

This week I caught up with Tuesday afternoon’s class. Migina and Christina are working on a scene from SAVAGE IN LIMBO by John Patrick Shanley. They’re doing lovely work and really stretching themselves by playing against type. The play is set in the Bronx and Cay had this useful tip for working on the Bronx […]