What's this about?

I just celebrated my 25th anniversary as an actor in January. My first role in 2001 was Professor Harold Hill in The Music Man, done with a local community theater group. I was... okay. I could sing well, dance passably, but when it came to the acting part, let's say that I delivered my lines accurately and with enough volume. I had no idea what to do with my body, and it showed. When I saw the video recording, I was appalled, and decided I needed to learn a lot more about this craft called "acting."

I devoured books from all of the well-known acting teachers, including Stella Adler, Sanford Meisner, Michael Chekhov, and, of course, Konstantin Stanislavski. I found something useful in each of their pages, but didn't find any of them to be the complete package. I read a book by acting coach Harold Guskin about a year into this journey called How to Stop Acting, and it made a big impression on me. Guskin's book was less a specific set of exercises or techniques, and more about finding the truth about your character as you live and breathe the character's words. While not rejecting other methods, he suggested actors might borrow what works from them while primarily focusing on the play's text. That made a lot of sense to me, because it was achiveable, and that became the genesis of my personal approach to acting and directing work.

Within a couple of years, I had the opportunity to direct a production, and began learning the ropes - literally - backstage as well. In 2008, I became the artistic director of student theater productions at a community college, where I also taught acting, improvisation, and public speaking classes.

Since that first audition 25 years ago, I've been involved in 66 stage productions. (That's over two-and-a-half per year!) I've acted in 30, directed 41, and was the set designer on 34 of them. On four of the musicals, I doubled as the vocal director, and I even wrote one of them.

Along the way, I've picked up a lot of tips, exercises, and advice from other actors, directors, and other theater artists, so I decided, to celebrate my theater anniversary, to put together a series of short videos to share that knowledge with others. While many of the ideas are aimed at actors just getting started, my hope is that even experienced actors and directors may find many of these useful.

I think every community deserves art. Theater isn't reserved for New York, L.A., and other big cities. It speaks to who we are as human beings, so no matter whether you live in a town of a few thousand people or over a million, the opportunity to experience art, as a creator or as an audience, is vital. That's why this newsletter and the video series is called "Acting for Everyone." Because everyone who wants to create theater art should feel welcome to be part of the fun!

A quick note: As I've noted, I'm not a follower of any specific acting method. I've borrowed many ideas from my fellow actors and directors in addition to the well-known acting teachers listed above. In my humble opinion, it's less important to find a single "method" or "style" and follow it to the letter than it is to find things that work for you. Maybe a few of the ideas I'll be presenting in these videos and articles will find their way into your acting tool box.

Each of the videos will be accompanied by its text in a newsletter, which will also be available on this site. So if you prefer reading text to watching videos, you have that option. Either way, consider subscribing to my video channel or to this newsletter (or both!) to stay up-to-date on new content. All of the video content, including the text versions, will always be free.

One of my mentors, the late educator David Korff, often used to shoo me out of his office after our meetings with the same phrase, and I end each video with it. It's time to stop thinking about it... "Go be an artist!"