Actor Teaching Preferences
NICOLA ALEXIS:
Education:
DeMontfort University - B.A. Honours in Dance Drama (major) English, Language/Literature (minor)
Graduate work in Phonetics, voice, camera technique, movement for actors, Alexander technique, Shakespearian text analysis and musical theatre technique.
Topics of Interest and Expertise:
Playwrights: Arthur Miller, Federico Garcia Lorca, George Bernard Shaw, Anton Chekhov, Alan Ayckbourn, Henrik Ibsen, Bertolt Brecht and Aphra Behn.
Dance: Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham, Jose Limon, Doris Humphrey and various physical theatre companies
English: Popular culture postmodernism; strands of feminism in society and language and American Literature; feminist writing and black literature; conventional and unconventional fairy tales
Screen Acting: Script analysis, screen auditioning skills and television commercial techniques.
Styles: Mask work with Sir Peter Hall, 1920’s British comedy, and traditional British Pantomime.
Personal interests: Over ten years of professional singing classes, stage combat, horseback riding, photography, interior design, choreography, writing for screen and music, counseling and working with young people.
VICTOR GARDENER (coming soon!)
ANDY GREENHALGH:
Education:
MA in English, Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge
Post-graduate Acting Certificate, Webber-Douglas Academy
Topics of Interest and Expertise:
Shakespeare text and performance
Audition technique
Presentational skills
Stand-up comedy
Improvisation
Corporate training and speaking
With years of experience in stage, television, and film acting, Andy is a great resource for understanding the differences and relationships between the three medium.
MARTIN PARR:
Martin teaches on the Access Course at RADA. This course enables young actors to experience a day at Drama School and the processes of being a working actor; namely the engagement of the voice, body and mind (which can include memory techniques and 'mind-gym' techniques), the exploration of a piece of text and subsequent performance or the exploration of a devised piece and subsequent performance.
Martin's areas of expertise include:
- Shakespeare's Sonnets
- Verse speaking and could incorporate:
- The Tempest, Twelfth Night, Measure for Measure, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Comedy Of Errors, Julius Caesar, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, and Hamlet
- Works of Oscar Wilde, Noel Coward, G. B Shaw, and Priestly
- Restoration/Georgian text
- Improvisation/devising technique
- Acting technique
- Scene Study
LOUISE YATES:
Education:
Sheffield University – B.Sc. (HONS) M.A.
Topics of Interest and Expertise:
Physical Theatre: Working with exponents of physical theatre in the European style ( for example, creating roles in Neil Bartlett’s Dickens productions) has broadened Louise’s natural instinct for physical expression and interpretation, which began at school. Her knowledge of breathing techniques and the physical training necessary to produce a strong clear sound is highly effective.
- Workshop includes: Self-awareness; the body in space; breath production and vocal technique; performance preparation and the physical exploration and development of a character using the body; exploring of physical space and the effect of physicality on the voice; story-telling.
Vocal techniques: Louise’s work as a professional jazz singer and participation in management development workshops for global companies enhances her classroom knowledge of voice production and improvisation. These skills prove invaluable in the corporate world, enabling non-professional speakers to make presentations/representations in front of peers to maximum effect.
- Workshop includes: Physical awareness and professional presentation; breath production; the effect of physicality on the voice and vocal techniques to control nerves.
Maximising Text: Louise’s professional experience of a broad range of dramatic texts, from Shakespeare and Dickens, through Miller and Steinbeck to Ayckborn, brings genuine diversity of application to her skills. Some of her most successful classes in 2006 included the de-mystification of Shakespeare, comparing his prose with that of 21st century rap artists.
- Workshop includes: relationship between the physical demands of public speaking on the voice and breath with the demands of the text; use of a broad range of texts from modern to Shakespeare, illustrating how vital physicality is in the delivery of speech on stage; understanding the importance of breath control in the delivery of long or convoluted verse and prose; the effect of breathing on the meaning of text.