Hello All!
The Fall Session is winding down. Feel free to visit any time. The 2025 Winter Session is filling up, so let me know if you’re considering taking a class!
Actor News
Sarah Freia:
Sarah started training with me around 10 years ago as a young, inexperienced actor; but her many talents were always apparent. Since then, she has flourished in many disciplines. She’s recently been a featured lead in Season 2 of Prime Video’s Creepy Bits.
Inspiration
Sharon & Josh Peck:
This is the final Sharon Chatten conversation with actor-comedian Josh Peck. Even though he started as a child actor, he recognized the need for training and his respect for what he learned from Sharon is apparent.
Recommendations
Somebody Somewhere
This is a sweet, award-winning show featuring a group of friends who are viewed as ‘outsiders’ in their hometown of Manhattan, Kansas. It features beautiful relationship work, private moments, listening, and very raunchy parts, too!
Between the Temples
Another sweet, quirky one featuring Jason Schwartzman and Carol Kane, with great turns by the entire supporting cast.
Woman of the Hour
Anna Kendrick stars in her directorial debut in this hard-to-believe but true story of a serial killer who was a guest on the Dating Game where he matches wits with a canny young actress. Kendrick’s acting and directing are great if you can navigate through the disjointed time jumps.
The Diplomat
Keri Russell and Rufus Sewell lead an outstanding cast in this superbly written political thriller. I’m so excited that Alison Janney has just joined the cast as the VP!
Here’s the next section of my ABCs of acting inspirational thoughts
9 | Always Be Centering Part 2
Actors need to be in constant training to create and maintain their centered Actor Self. We need to approach characters by exploring the contributing factors that formed their history, point of view and the choices they make, without also approaching ourselves. To do this we need to explore our own history; the incidents and training, that may have led to emotional blocks or physical and vocal habits. By identifying and consciously working on these tendencies, we can choose to make use of them or eliminate them for a character. But actors have to be strong and centered and focused to do this. Like all art, the discovery work is therapeutic but not therapy. Many of the acting exercises which have been developed challenge actors to “go the distance,” to go through the “wall” with 150% commitment and lack of self-consciousness. Be it the physical and vocal disciplines of Suzuki or Grotowski-like work, voice exploration, or method acting exercises, the common factor always is that the actor work with total discipline, stripping the “self” while revealing what is the most deep within.