Limited Availability, Apply ASAP.
Thank you for your interest in our Chekhov & Shakespeare Intensives. Please feel free to fill out an application form.
$850 per program
Introducing new Spring programs with theater director and Atlantic faculty member Anya Saffir!
In a small, supportive, and dedicated ensemble of no more than 14 actors for each program, these mini-intensives present students with an opportunity to gain expertise and take a deep dive to fully immerse themselves in the works of Anton Chekhov and Shakespeare.
We expect these classes to fill quickly and space is limited. We recommend that you apply before the deadline.
Questions? Email admissions@atlantictheater.org.
Anton Chekhov Scene Study Intensive
may 14 – may 23, 2024
TUESday – Thursday
2:15Pm – 5:30pm ET
*no class Mondays & Fridays
“Don’t show me the moon…. show me the glint of light on broken glass.”
– Anton Chekhov
A scene study class designed to immerse students in the inimitable world of Anton Chekhov and provide the tools necessary to bring these texts alive. The class employs advanced script analysis work and an organic, embodied, spontaneous approach to live performance, following in the footsteps of Stanislavsky’s process-oriented rehearsals for Chekhov’s original productions. Working with a teacher who has studied, taught, and directed Chekhov for 25 years, the course functions as an advanced acting class for performers wishing to push their work forward to the next level of artistry: working on Chekhov’s famously layered, nuanced, emotionally rich, subtextual writing gives actors the fine skills to excel in any and all works of psychological realism, on stage and screen alike.
Practical Aesthetics will be used as a common vocabulary in the room with particular attention given to identifying the psychological beats in each scene and using script analysis as a way to express character. Once the textual, preparatory work has been done, students are encouraged to throw away technique altogether to find embodied spontaneity and emotional intimacy with scene partner. In this way our motto is, “prepare to improvise.” Students will also be given dramaturgical and historical context to guide us in our world-building and understanding of given circumstance. Students bring their scenes into class twice, with time for both rigorous table work and free exploration on their feet.
Emphasis is placed on creating an ensemble based on trust, support, and the freedom-to-fail in a non-hierarchical, non-perfectionist, warmly humane, and yet rigorous, environment. We will approach Chekhov, as with any “classical” text, inclusively and with an interest in what the plays say to us NOW. In order to do this, we must shuffle off the idea of Chekhov as dusty, white, and “period piece,” and instead embrace Chekhov’s essential modernism and originality. This will allow us to discover him anew as a fresh voice for our contemporary moment.
Production: Uncle Vanya dir. Anya Saffir | Photograph by Ahron R. Foster
Requirements:
- Ample time for outside-of-class rehearsal: Several weeks before the beginning of the course students will pair up and choose a scene with the help of the instructor. This allows students to dive into preparatory work- on their own and with their partner- in the weeks leading up to the start of the course. Please only consider joining the intensive if you have the time to rehearse with a partner in the month before the class begins, and in between the first and second work session of your scene. Actors can expect to spend a minimum of 8 hours of outside-of-class preparation for Week 1, and a minimum of 4 hours rehearsing for Week 2. Again, these are minimums. (More detailed instructions about what and how to prepare for Day 1 will be shared as we get closer to the start date).
- Some experience in a quality voice class of some kind (not singing).
- An interview and audition with Anya are required of anyone who has not previously worked with her.
- Some experience with Practical Aesthetics is recommended but not required.
Required Texts:
- None. Students will be provided with quality translations of all four masterworks (The Seagull; Uncle Vanya; Three Sisters; The Cherry Orchard) upon acceptance into the course.
$850
*Please note that in accordance with Atlantic’s school-wide policy, the door to our studio will close at 2:15pm precisely and the work will begin punctually. Any student who is late is asked to wait to enter the room until the doors next open (typically, this will be at the break between scenes). In all of our programming we stress the importance of arriving early so that the ensemble is focused and ready to begin the work together at the top of class time.
Shakespeare Intensive
may 14 – may 23, 2024
TUESday – Thursday
10Am – 1:15pm ET
*no class Mondays & Fridays
“A line of Shakespearean verse is like an atom; if you can manage to split it open, it will release infinite energy.”
– Peter Brook
Root yourself in strong foundational craft to discover embodied freedom, spontaneity, and imagination within the world of Shakespeare’s plays. A 2-week long Shakespeare intensive designed to help actors find clarity, life force, confidence, imagination, joy, spontaneity, and nuance in acting Shakespeare. Participants will be introduced to foundational principles and tools of acting Shakespeare. During the two weeks students will develop a rich and layered Shakespeare scene in collaboration with a partner and with the ensemble. Actors will create a “score” as part of their Shakespeare preparation. Actors versed in Practical Aesthetics will be taught to use their technique to find and embody the current of action embedded in every Shakespeare scene, and to explore the tactical topography of the scene through organic, embodied sensitivity to Shakespeare’s imagery.
Course includes an introduction to ways of framing iambic pentameter, as it can be a source of great confusion for many actors! How to use it? How NOT to use it? Actors will be guided towards greater enjoyment of verbal relish and sensitivity to poesy in poetic texts. These skills can ultimately be applied to the acting of modern and contemporary poetic texts, as well (Suzan Lori-Parks; Eisa Davis; Jean Genet, etc.) Additionally, discover some invaluable Shakespeare resources (books, websites, films) which are every Shakespeare actor’s best friend and can be relied upon to inspire, instruct and guide in parsing out even the knottiest passages.
Emphasis is placed on creating an ensemble based on trust, support, and the freedom-to-fail in a non-hierarchical, non-perfectionist, warmly humane, and yet rigorous, environment. The ongoing work of decolonizing the Bard will be discussed and employed as it would be in any contemporary, inclusive, mindful, and loving theater-making environment. This will allow us to discover him anew as a fresh voice for our contemporary moment, shuffling off the word “classical,” and focusing on what the plays can mean to us and our living audience now.
Production: Twelfth Night dir. Anya Saffir | Photograph by Ahron R. Foster
Requirements:
- Ample time for outside-of-class rehearsal: Several weeks before the beginning of the course students will pair up and choose a scene with the help of the instructor. This allows students to dive into preparatory work- on their own and with their partner- in the weeks leading up to the start of the course. Please only consider joining the intensive if you have the time to rehearse with a partner in the month before the class begins, and in between the first and second work session of your scene. Actors can expect to spend a minimum of 8 hours of outside-of-class preparation for Week 1, and a minimum of 4 hours rehearsing for Week 2. Again, these are minimums. (More detailed instructions about what and how to prepare for Day 1 will be shared as we get closer to the start date).
- Some experience in a quality voice class of some kind (not singing).
- Some experience with Practical Aesthetics is recommended but not required.
- An interview and audition with Anya are required of anyone who has not previously worked with her.
Required Texts:
- The Shakespeare Lexicon, Volumes 1 and 2 (Schmidt)
- A quality edition of the play that you will work on. Arden, Oxford, Norton and New Cambridge are most recommended.
Not required:
- Experience with acting Shakespeare is not required.
$850
*Please note that in accordance with Atlantic’s school-wide policy, the door to our studio will close at 10am precisely and the work will begin punctually. Any student who is late is asked to wait to enter the room until the doors next open (typically, this will be at the break between scenes). In all of our programming we stress the importance of arriving early so that the ensemble is focused and ready to begin the work together at the top of class time.
Anya Saffir
ANYA SAFFIR is a theater director, writer and educator based in and hailing from New York City. Directing credits include Much Ado About Nothing at the American Repertory Theater Institute, Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle at Theater for a New City (ITBA Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Show; New York Innovative Theater Award for Best Original Score), Hamlet with Orpheus Productions (three New York Innovative Theater Award nominations, including Outstanding Director), American Sojourns: Three Plays by Thornton Wilder at The Moscow Art Theater, Romeo and Juliet at The American Theater of Actors, a new translation of Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull co-developed with translator Moti Margolin, Pierre Corneille’s L’Illusion Comique at The Abe Burrows Theater, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs at Classic Stage Company, Chekhov’s Three Sisters for Muse Theater, numerous Atlantic Theater student productions including 12th Night, Pericles: Prince of Tyre, As You Like It, Our Country’s Good, Mad Forest, The Winter’s Tale and Uncle Vanya, and new works by Kate Robin, Jerome Hairston, Mike Dowling and Tom Donaghy for Atlantic’s New Works Series and 10×25 Play Festival. With frequent collaborator-composer Cormac Bluestone Anya co-wrote and directed an operetta of Marjorie Williams Bianco’s classic story, The Velveteen Rabbit, which premiered at Atlantic Theater Company and was nominated for an Off-Broadway Alliance Award Nomination for Best Children’s Play. Anya was co-director and story editor of two seasons of the fiction podcast It Makes a Sound, and a recurring contributor on Shakespeare topics for NPR’s The Takeaway. She has taught and directed B.F.A. and M.F.A. actors at Tisch School of the Arts at NYU, Brooklyn College, Penn State, and The Center for Advanced Theater Training at Harvard University, with a special focus on Shakespeare and the plays of Anton Chekhov. She has taught master classes in Practical Aesthetics in Sydney, Australia, and ongoingly at La Teatrería in La Roma, Mexico City.
Health & Safety
At this time we will no longer be requiring masks or proof of vaccination from Atlantic staff, faculty, or students. Click here for additional information.