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Acting & Performance

This section contains content on the craft of acting, created by performers of all types.

The Latest

On Devising in the Classroom
Podcast
On Devising in the Classroom
by Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder, Andy Paris, Emily K. Harrison
16 April 2024
Resisting “Yes, And” Culture and Learning to Say No
Essay
Resisting “Yes, And” Culture and Learning to Say No
by Sara Božin
8 January 2024
Evolving Our World Through the Power of an Actor’s Empathy
Essay
Evolving Our World Through the Power of an Actor’s Empathy
by Yura Sapi
2 November 2023
A woman sits looking at a camera while two others kiss in the background.
Being Authentic in a New Theatre Practice
Essay

Being Authentic in a New Theatre Practice

A Conversation with Jyreika Guest

31 August 2022

Ann James chats with Jyreika Guest, who works as both an intimacy specialist and an actor, about framing intimacy work for actors. Jyreika shares her hopes for a future in which consent is an automatic part of rehearsal processes.

Full cast sit together for a picture.
Seeing Double: Double Consciousness as a Black Theatre Practitioner
Essay

Seeing Double: Double Consciousness as a Black Theatre Practitioner

14 July 2022

Ekemini Ekpo applies W.E.B. Dubois’ concept of “double consciousness” to the experience of performing Blackness for a predominantly white audience that may or may not be interested in disturbing the primacy of their own lived experience.

Kunafa and Shay Teaser Image.
Balancing Comedy and Drama as a MENA Playwright
Podcast

Balancing Comedy and Drama as a MENA Playwright

With Yussef El-Guindi & Leila Buck

1 June 2022

As politicized ethnic groups, playwriting comes with a sense of responsibility and history for many MENA and SWANA writers. Balancing drama and comedy in plays that deal with MENA politics, identity, and history can be difficult, but is also crucial for inviting audiences into our stories and addressing stereotypes and historical harm. Join two prominent playwrights and pillars of the MENA community, Yussef El-Guindi and Leila Buck, as we have an open conversation about how they approach their writing and reflect on what their work means in a greater societal context.

Kunafa and Shay Teaser Image.
Multihyphenate Artists
Podcast

Multihyphenate Artists

With Denmo Ibrahim and Sarah Fahmy

25 May 2022

Artistic identities can be complicated, and many theatremakers work equally within two or more disciplines simultaneously. The most interesting work is rarely created in a vacuum. These multidisciplinary artists create diverse projects in all senses of the word, broadening our idea of what theatre can and should be. Today, two such multihyphenate artists, Denmo Ibrahim and Sarah Fahmy, converse about their multiple identities, how they reconcile and manage their myriad expertise, and the role of multihyphenate artists in today’s theatre landscape.

lavender event poster for nonbinary acting methods workshop.
Nonbinary Acting Methods with Jo Michael Rezes
Video

Nonbinary Acting Methods with Jo Michael Rezes

Rezes Offers Exercises and Techniques in Performance Expansion through Gender Play, Object Study, Queer Reflections, Sense Memory, and Repetitious Failure

Friday 25 March 2022
United States

Jo Michael Rezes (they/them) presented the workshop Nonbinary Acting Methods livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network on Friday 25 March 2022 at 2 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 4 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 5 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

Gender Euphoria teaser image.
Gender Euphoria, Episode 4: Training Cisgender Producers and Directors: It’s More than Remembering Pronouns
Podcast

Gender Euphoria, Episode 4: Training Cisgender Producers and Directors: It’s More than Remembering Pronouns

With Maybe Burke

3 March 2022

Gender Euphoria, the podcast, host Nicolas Shannon Savard sits down with actor, writer, and human rights advocate Maybe Burke to talk about her role at the Transgender Training Institute and their signature course, “Supporting Transgender Actors & Creatives.”

Several actors standing or sitting in a practice space.
Casting Roles with Nudity: Body Checks and Why They Never Should Have Existed
Essay

Casting Roles with Nudity: Body Checks and Why They Never Should Have Existed

17 February 2022

Katrina Stelk discusses the role of nudity in theatre and the problem with requiring body checks during the casting process.

Six black actors on stage under multicolored lights.
Audience Behavior in the West and Africa
Essay

Audience Behavior in the West and Africa

3 February 2022

While performing across the West and in Africa, Misheck Mzumara noticed stark differences in typical audience behavior. He discusses those differences, their cultural contexts, and their impact on theatremakers’ experiences in cross-cultural theatre productions.

Several performers with large puppets standing in a field.
Ground Lessons: Performing with the Potato People at Bread and Puppet
Essay

Ground Lessons: Performing with the Potato People at Bread and Puppet

26 January 2022

Denise Rogers Valenzuela shares the way that learning to perform improvised crowd scenes with large, flat puppets—called naked population puppets or potato people—encourages an embodied practice that resists individualism.

Several people sitting in a field watching a puppet show.
Bringing Trouble: An Account of a Travelling Bicycle Puppet Show
Essay

Bringing Trouble: An Account of a Travelling Bicycle Puppet Show

25 January 2022

In 2021, Ian McFarlane and Laura Stinson of North Barn Theatre launched into a bicycle tour that brought a puppet circus to rural communities across Nova Scotia. They discuss the creation and performance of their show, which joyously embraced troublemaking as a path to activism.

5 Actors on stage looking at a TV Screen. Four actors wear schoolgirl uniforms. One actor stands wearing a green blouse one and skirt
To Be a Long Hauler; or, If We Build It We Can Thrive
Essay

To Be a Long Hauler; or, If We Build It We Can Thrive

16 November 2021

Actress and diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant Tania Richard gets candid about her experience having long-haul COVID as a theatremaker and offers tips on how to create more inclusive and equitable rehearsal spaces.

A portrait of Tana Wojczuk.
Lady Romeo: Learning About Nineteenth-Century Actress Charlotte Cushman with Tana Wojczuk
Podcast

Lady Romeo: Learning About Nineteenth-Century Actress Charlotte Cushman with Tana Wojczuk

3 November 2021

In the nineteenth century, Charlotte Cushman became United States’ first celebrity actress. Tana Wojczuk, who has written a new biography of Cushman, joins the Mike Lueger to talk about the actress’s remarkable life both on stage and off.

A woman cutting a girl's hair.
Exit Descartes: Reimagining Theatre Training Through an Embodied Lens
Essay

Exit Descartes: Reimagining Theatre Training Through an Embodied Lens

18 October 2021

Eve Bernfeld discusses creating a culture of care in her Alexander Technique classes by paying attention to embodiment. She asks: What if we heal the false rift between mind and body in our theatre making and training?

Several half-naked actors with lacrosse sticks. One actor is front and center, wearing a red hat and white underwear, with his hands behind his head. The actresses on his sides are using lacrosse sticks to cover their chests.
The Island of Lost Chorus Boys: Professional Theatre’s Broken Promise to Accept Us in All Our Glorious Queerness
Essay

The Island of Lost Chorus Boys: Professional Theatre’s Broken Promise to Accept Us in All Our Glorious Queerness

8 July 2021

Kieron Cindric talks about how the theatre industry—and, in particular, musical theatre—has continually reinforced a narrow and harmful version of masculinity.

Five people holding different sections of an auditorium and piecing them to the central part of the auditorium..
The Future You Build
Essay

The Future You Build

24 May 2021

Melisa Pereyra writes to students of the American theatre from the future, sharing what the field looks like years down the road.

graphic of syringe injecting into an earth globe with text covid monologues.
Covid Monologues
illustration of a carrot with orange text single carrot theater.
Single Carrot Theatre
Video

Covid Monologues

Where science meets theatre to build community resilience and relevancy for theatre in unusual times.

Tuesday 20 April 2021
United States

Single Carrot Theatre presented Covid Monologues: a series of fictionalized stories responding to peer-reviewed research about the social and societal impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in America, livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Tuesday 20 April 2021 at 3 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 5 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 6 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

graphic of syringe injecting into an earth globe with text covid monologues.
Covid Monologues
illustration of a carrot with orange text single carrot theater.
Single Carrot Theatre
Video

Covid Monologues

Where science meets theatre to build community resilience and relevancy for theatre in unusual times.

Tuesday 13 April 2021
United States

Single Carrot Theatre presented Covid Monologues livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Tuesday 13 April 2021 at 3 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 5 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 6 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

text "the jazz equation" over sheet music.
The Jazz Equation
Ambiance Theatre Company
Video

The Jazz Equation

A young and gifted math teacher receives a special request to teach a teenage prodigy

Saturday 27 March 2021
United States

Ambiance Theatre Company presented a performance of The Jazz Equation livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer-produced HowlRound TV network howlround.tv on Saturday 27 March 2021 at 5:30 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 7:30 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 8:30 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

Chasing the Wolf by Nathan Singer
LA Writers Center (LAWC)
Video

Chasing the Wolf by Nathan Singer

with LA Writers Center's "Breathe" online play reading series

Saturday 27 March 2021
United States

LA Writers Center presented a reading of Chasing the Wolf by Nathan Singer as a part of their "Breathe" online play reading series livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer-produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Saturday 27 March 2021 at 11 a.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC-7) / 1 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC-5) / 2 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC-4).

Downtown Variety: SeoulArts Edition
CultureHub Logo
CultureHub
La MaMa Logo
La MaMa
Video

Downtown Variety: SeoulArts Edition

Bringing La MaMa's 1960s café aesthetic to a virtual platform that links performers and audiences in real time across distance

Friday 26 March 2021
Seoul, Korea

La MaMa and CultureHub presented Downtown Variety: SeoulArts Edition livestreaming on the global, commons-based peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Friday 26 February 2021 at 6 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 8 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 9 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / Saturday 27 February 2021 at 10 a.m. KST (Seoul, UTC +9).

overhead shot of people walking on sidewalk with long shadows.
Opening Ceremony & Walking Mass
CultureHub Logo
CultureHub
Video

Opening Ceremony & Walking Mass

The opening ceremony of Re-Fest to commemorate the one year mark of the pandemic hitting the U.S.

Friday 12 March 2021
United States

CultureHub presented Opening Ceremony & Walking Mass with Re-Fest livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Friday 12 March 2021 at 9 a.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 11 a.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 12 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

two actors onstage
The Perpetual Crises Engulfing British Theatre
Essay

The Perpetual Crises Engulfing British Theatre

An Interview with Migrant Theatre Director Alex Istudor

8 March 2021

verity healey speaks with Alex Istudor, the Romanian-born director who lives and works in the UK, about the challenges of migrant theatremakers, different attitudes towards creating shows between the UK and continental Europe, and more.

Villains by Marquis Ewing
LA Writers Center (LAWC)
Video

Villains by Marquis Ewing

with LA Writers Center's "Breathe" online play reading series

Saturday 27 February 2021
United States

LA Writers Center presented a reading of Villains by Marquis Ewing as a part of their "Breathe" online play reading series livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer-produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Saturday 27 February 2021 at 11 a.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC-8) / 1 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC-6) / 2 p.m. EST (New York, UTC-5).

Glod: Political Theatre as a Civil Right event poster.
A performance and conversation of The Sitaraha (The Stars) by Monirah Hashemi
bezna theatre black text
BÉZNĂ Theatre
Video

A performance and conversation of The Sitaraha (The Stars) by Monirah Hashemi

Performance followed by a panel discussion

Monday 22 February 2021
United Kingdom

Glod: Political Theatre as a Civil Right presented The Sitaraha (The Stars) by Monirah Hashemi livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Monday 22 February at 10 a.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 1 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -54) / 6 p.m. GMT (London, UTC +0) / 8 p.m. EET (Cluj, UTC +2).

Glod: Political Theatre as a Civil Right event poster.
Chris Thorpe reads extracts of his work
bezna theatre black text
BÉZNĂ Theatre
Video

Chris Thorpe reads extracts of his work

Performance followed by a panel discussion

Monday 8 February 2021
United Kingdom

Glod: Political Theatre as a Civil Right presented Chris Thorpe reading extracts of his work livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Monday 8 February at 10 a.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 1 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -54) / 6 p.m. GMT (London, UTC +0) / 8 p.m. EET (Cluj, UTC +2).