Dear Friends,

YES! IT’S FINALLY A REALITY! After 3 1/2 years of fundraising, prepara-tion, shooting and editing Master Classes in the Michael Chekhov Tech-nique will be released by Routledge in early 2007.

THE DVDSArticles on this page are excerpted from MICHA’s DVD companion guide.

The Michael Chekhov Association (MICHA) was founded in 1999 for the purpose of teaching workshops in the Chekhov approach for actors, teachers and directors. Since the publication of Michael Chekhov’s books, many people are already familiar with his ideas and exercises. However, we at MICHA felt that seeing classes on fi lm would illumi-nate the work and make it more acces-

sible for the larger group of actors, teachers and directors who were inter-ested in learning the technique and incorporating it into their work.

We planned the classes as a progressive journey through some elements of the technique. Five teachers, seven actors, two cameramen, a sound man, and production assistants met at the Spencertown Academy of the Arts in upstate New York in December, 2004. We lived together in a nearby inn and fi lmed the discussions and twelve classes in three days. We fi lmed each class only once; there were no retakes. In editing the 40 hours of fi lm to 6 ½ hours, we attempted to make the classes as clear and sequential as possible. We also wanted the viewers to feel as though they were in the room and participating in the workshop.

Chekhov always spoke about his vision of the Theatre of the Future. The future is here, and the theatrical community has fi nally discovered the intense beauty as well as the practicability of Chekhov’s contribution to act-ing. Although no one can ever recreate the genius of Michael Chekhov, it is our hope that you may experience his legacy through this series of classes. (Continues on Page 2)

2006A publication of the Michael Chekhov AssociationMICHAnews

From the President . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MICHA’s Workshops-Our year in review by Jessica Cerullo . . . . . . . . . .Michael Chekhov at ATHE 2006 by Cathy Albers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MICHA joins Summer Arts 2006 by Hugh O’Gorman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Tribute to Jack Colvin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A synthesis of the Williamson and Chekhov Technique by Deborah Robertson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Objective and the Psychological Gesture by Lenard Petit . . . . . . . . . Michael Chekhov and Anthroposophy by Liisa Byckling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Path of a Character: Michael Chekhov’s Inspired Acting and Theater Semiotics - A review by Douglas Davidson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .MICHA Workshop Participants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Join Friends of MICHA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2007 Workshops and Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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In the Room with Michael Chekhov

Joanna Merlin shares her memories of working with Michael Chekhov.

While Michael Chekhov was living in Los Angeles he taught actors in a group called the Drama Society. Chekhov lectured, led

improvisations and sometimes directed short pieces. The actors who participated were a diverse group; some famous, oth-ers starting their careers. Joanna Merlin

was a member of the group from 1949 – 1955, the year Chekhov died.

_________________________________

At every meeting of the Drama Society, I felt the excitement of being a witness, a participant, and a student of Michael Chek-hov. Though he was of small stature, he fi lled the space with his immense spirit - with the riches of his imagination, his hu-mor, his mind, his playfulness, his human-ity, his soul. He was always immaculately groomed, dressed in a European fashion: stylish suit, starched shirt and tie, shoes shined, cigarette holder at the ready. The studio had been a residential garage in Hollywood and was renovated for our group. Chekhov treated it as though it were the Moscow Art Theatre in terms of the creative investment he made at every meeting. The atmosphere was charged with possibility, and, at 18, I began to un-derstand what it meant to be inspired.

Chekhov opened the door to our most creative space. He stimulated our minds, hearts and bodies; gave us permission to freely explore, to surprise ourselves. He al-lowed for all impulses - he would not criti-cize or judge; he would only suggest alter-natives that would take us in a different or better direction. No one ever felt foolish or fearful though we were using ourselves in new and different ways. We were safe because we could not fail. We learned to trust in the power of our intuition and imagi-nation.

Chekhov loved theatre, acting and actors; he generated that love in our group; a love for enlarging ourselves; for the endless search for art in the acting profession. This vision expanded our ability to develop our-selves in ways we had not contemplated or dreamed of.

From the President, Joanna Merlin

INSIDE

In October of 2005, Co-DVD Artistic Director, Ragnar Fre-idank, and I met with Talia Rodgers, the head of Theatre and Performing Arts books for Routledge, an eminent English publishing house, to discuss the possibility of publishing our DVD series, “Master Classes in the Michael Chekhov Tech-nique.” I contacted Talia, whom I met at a Symposium in Eng-land a few years ago, because of her passionate interest in Michael Chekhov. Under her watch, Routledge had published the 2002 reprint edition of “To the Actor”, Michael Chekhov’s autobiography, “ Path of the Actor”, and Franc Chamberlin’s “Michael Chekhov”, in the Routledge Performers Practitioners Series.

Talia was very excited about the DVDs, but she had to deal with the fact that, in the past, her company had only published books. My husband, David, then MICHA’S lawyer, and I, met with Talia in January in London to discuss the next step. We talked about negotiating a contract as soon as she presented the idea to her Editorial Board, if they approved publishing the series. Talia researched general interest in the DVDs in the theatrical community with her U.S. and European sales rep-resentatives, librarians, book stores, etc. In April of 2006, the Editorial Board approved the publication of the series.

We have just signed the contract, thanks to Talia and MinhHa Duong in Development at Routledge.. They will replicate it, package it, market it, promote it, and release it in January of 2007. Besides the classes, the series includes a teachers’ conversation, actors’ conversation and a panel of three former students of Michael Chekhov, Mala Powers, Jack Colvin and me, remembering Michael Chekhov.

The series will be sold on the Routledge website, through the Routledge catalogue, and it will be linked to our website and the NYU Tisch School of the Arts website. It will be sold broadly, probably at a price of $150.

The series was presented at the ATHE Conference, along with a demonstration by MICHA actors and teachers. We hope to present the DVDs at other academic, theatrical or li-brary conferences. Let us know if any of you can be helpful in this effort.

On a Personal Note: To those of you who wrote to me after my car accident this summer, thank you for your concern. I ap-preciated all the cards, fl owers, gifts, emails and contributions to my husband’s death penalty organization. I am recovering physically and am back in my life. I am excited to see you all next year at the workshops.

Warm Regards,

Joanna Merlin MICHA President

HISTORY OF THE MICHA – ROUTLEDGEPARTNERSHIP

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 2 From the President, Joanna Merlin

Photo by Scott Burrell

2006 was full of change. MICHA began the year by organizing work-shops for teachers in two new loca-tions. After 5 years in snowy Spencer-town, New York, we settled into Long Beach, California where the warmer weather and California State University welcomed us with open arms. A few days later, with the assistance of the Accademia Dell’Arte in Arezzo, Italy, we met in Tuscany for a workshop with European teachers.

Our International Workshop and Festival was a well attended and suc-cessful event held at the University of Windsor in Ontario. Lionel Walsh, his colleagues and students hosted us for 10 days of gesturing, rehearsing, per-forming, dancing and an overall fan-tastic time. MICHA welcomed a new

faculty member, Phelim McDermott, from the UK. Phelim’s work as an ac-tor, director, theater divisor and impro-viser were introduced into the mix of classes, lectures, demonstrations and performances. Perhaps most memo-rable was a lecture on emotions and sensations which Phelim ‘performed’ while simultaneously listening to Mi-chael Chekhov’s lecture on his ipod.

At the festival, the Moving Dock The-atre Co., Chicago presented Eleemon-synary by Lee Blessing. The Actors’ Ensemble, NY shared a work in prog-ress of an original piece entitled Mary & Elizabeth. And Marjolein Baars, Holland, and Hanna Linde, Germany, presented an exploration in clown work. Andrei Malaev-Babel, who began a new teaching position at the Asolo Conservatory this Fall, gave two lectures about Chekhov’s use of com-position in performance.

With each passing year, MICHA at-tempts to address the interests of the returning workshop participants. An Open Space Forum which began in Amsterdam in 2003 continued in Wind-sor and we are taking steps to keep the questions that were asked alive in the

months between workshops. To ad-dress some of the many requests we received, this June we will bring back our Weekend Intensive at New York University. Concurrently with the In-tensive, we will organize a new Work-shop for Directors. Check our web-site for details about these events.

Outside of MICHA’s backyard,

Michael Chekhov’s ideas and methods have grown in popularity both in the rehearsal room and in the academic world. I attended the Association for Theater in Higher Education Confer-ence (ATHE) in Chicago this summer where numerous panels were held investigating Chekhov’s technique. Cathy Albers and Deborah Rob-ertson have both written articles ad-dressing the work presented at ATHE in this edition of our newsletter. You will fi nd Douglas Davidson’s review of Yana Meerzon’s new book as well as excerpts from Lenard Petit’s future book and Liisa Byckling’s soon to be published studies of Chekhov and An-throposophy.

In the months ahead many indepen-dently sponsored workshops, confer-ences and symposia are on the hori-zon. Joanna Merlin will participate in the Symposium “Michael Chekhov. From Stage to Screen. From Moscow to Hollywood.” in Paris in September 2007 at the Institut National d’Histoire des Arts.

As always, we encourage you to join our organization as a Friend of MICHA so that you can not only support us but share the work you are doing within this unique community.

Best wishes for a creative and prosperous year,

Dear MICHA friends, MICHA’s Workshops - Our year in review

By Jessica Cerullo

If you haven’t been to www.michaelchekhov.org recently, please go and see our new website and sign up to be on our mailing list. The site now enables you to register for workshops and update your con-tact information. You can also view a three minute demo of our DVD series.

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 3

Tammie McKenzie looks on as MICHA’s new faculty member, Phelim McDermott, teaches a class at the International Workshop in Windsor, Canada.

Photo by Scott Burrell

Jessica Cerullo Managing Director

By Cathy Albers

Michael Chekhov at ATHE 2006

The Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE) held its 2006 annual conference in Chicago, Illinois in August. ATHE, a non-profi t profes-sional membership organiza-tion, serves the interests of its members, including college and university theatre depart-ments and administrators, educators, graduate students, and theatre practitioners.

As an advocate for the fi eld of theatre and performance in higher educa-tion, ATHE serves as an intellectual and artistic center for producing new knowledge about theatre and perfor-mance-related disciplines, cultivating vital alliances with other scholarly and creative disciplines, linking with profes-sional and community-based theatres, and promoting access and equity. For the fi rst time in several years, Michael Chekhov was well represented at this national conference by both MICHA faculty and its many colleagues.

The fi rst day and a half of the week, ATHE’s Acting Focus Group spon-sored a Pre-Conference, held at the studio of the Moving Dock Theater Company. Artistic Director, Dawn Ar-nold, donated her studio space in the magnifi cent Fine Arts Building. This building is dedicated to artist organiza-tions and is a historical wonder. Talk about atmosphere! Thirteen people took part in the Intensive and were introduced to some basic ideas of the

Technique, with a variety of teachers. Dawn Arnold began the workshop with space work, which led to intentions and then gesture. Mala Powers worked with Qualities and later Atmosphere and Wil Kilroy, from the University of Southern Maine, did an exercise on Imaginary Body. Dawn did some fol-low-up work with gesture and Jessica Cerullo worked on Sensations. Mala also gave a talk about her time work-ing with Chekhov. Lavinia Hart from Wayne State College lead warm-ups on both days.

Once the conference began there were many Chekhov offerings. Lavinia Hart (Wayne State University) and Sara Romersgerger (Southern Method-ist University) presented a workshop titled Elements in Action exploring the work of Chekhov and LeCoq. Deborah Robertson (Northern Illinois Univer-sity) and Ted Morin (Actors Movement Studio) taught a workshop integrating Chekhov, Laban and Williamson tech-niques (read Deborah’s article on page 6). Will Kilroy (University of Southern Maine) and Mala Powers held a panel

on holistic acting, using the Chekhov technique.

A centerpiece of the ATHE conference was the intro-duction of the Chekhov DVD’s to the world of edu-cational theater. There was a special double session on Friday evening in which a panel presented the Octo-ber 2005 release of Chek-

hov’s autobiography, The Path of the Actor, the re-release of the Chekhov tapes in CD format and MICHA’s DVD series, Master Classes in the Michael Chekhov Technique scheduled for re-lease by Routledge in early 2007. I served as moderator for this panel which included Mala Powers, Lionel Walsh (University of Windsor), Dawn Arnold, Jessica Cerullo, Bethany Ca-puto and Hugh O’Gorman (California State University). After viewing selec-

tions from the DVDs, Dawn led the at-tending group of teachers, actors and publishers in attendance in an explo-ration of Chekhov’s technique. The evening ended with a talkback session addressing questions about the DVDs and the variety of experiences and uses of the technique.

On Saturday morning there was a “wrap-up” session, again moderated by me, but with all the pre-conference teachers and most of the participants. The purpose of this fi nal session was to determine the value of such pre-confer-ence sessions in which extended time could be taken to work in the studio pri-or to the full ATHE conference. It was forcefully stated that sessions like ours were not only enjoyable but extremely helpful and brought many people to the Technique who had never before had the opportunity to experience it. There were several people who expressed interest in following up this experience with attendance at either the teachers’ workshop in January or at the summer festival.

As the person who decided last year at the Amherst Festival that organizing all of this would be a good idea, I can only say that while the workload was extensive for all those involved, it was well worth the effort! Not only was the work presented in a wonderful way, but also the DVDs were introduced to an academic community who may be potential purchasers of the set. Those in attendance witnessed a profes-sional and fascinating approach to the making of the DVDs and experienced fi rst hand how beautifully our master teachers work with students. The ex-perience made me proud to be even a small part of such an organization. I offer kudos and thanks to all those who so generously gave their time and tal-ents to make it happen.

Cathy Albers is Associate Professor, Head of Undergraduate Theater Studies at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio.

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 4

MICHA joins Summer Arts 2006

As temperatures averaged over 100 degrees during the last two weeks of July 2006, six MICHA teachers led a hot and sweaty workshop in the Mi-chael Chekhov acting technique at the California State University (CSU) Summer Arts Festival in Fresno, California. While Fresno was making the front page of the New York Times for record breaking tem-peratures, Dawn Arnold, Jessica Ce-rullo, Scott Fielding, Ragnar Friedank, Mala Powers and David Zinder toiled inside the, thankfully, air conditioned theatres with 36 college students from across the country.

Each summer the 22 campuses of the CSU system present the Summer Arts Festival, a multidisciplinary workshop

in the visual, performing, and literary arts. Over 500 student artists are in a two-week residency studying a wide variety of artistic mediums.

This festival format allowed the young actor to delve deeper into their artistic process than ever before by working side by side with the MICHA teachers over an extended period of time, while also living, eating and interacting with artists from other disciplines.The Summer Arts festival highlights

world-renowned guest artists with per-formances, exhibits, and lectures on campus and throughout the commu-nity. MICHA was in good company as guest artists from past seasons have included: Bebe Miller Dance Compa-ny, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, The Second City, UrbanBush Wom-en, New York New Music Ensemble, Janacek String Quartet, George Se-gal, Sue Coe, Bill Irwin, June Wayne, Bobby McFerrin, Ming Cho Lee, Jane Henson and the Muppets, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, William Friedkin, San Francisco MimeTroupe, Augusto Boal, Shakespeare & Company, SITI Company, and Edward Albee.

Hugh O’Gorman

Many of the young MICHA students afterwards spoke of the intensive as a “life-altering”, “inspiring” and a “deepening” experience.

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 5

Jack ColvinActor, Director, Teacher, Playwright, Producer, Production Designer1932 – 2005

Jack Colvin taught the Chekhov work all over the world, as well as at MICHA events, over the years. In addition to serving as Artistic Director of the Chekhov Studio in Los An-geles, he also served on MICHA’s advisory board and could always be relied upon for a piece of advice, a good joke and a bit of philosophy. After teaching at our NYU intensive in 2004, Jack sent MICHA President, Joanna Merlin, a note recounting his last meeting with Michael Chekhov. Below are his words as well as the drawing he rendered back in 1955. Jack’s presence will be missed and often remem-bered.

The last night I saw Michael Chekhov in 1955 was down on Harper Street. He had just come back, as you know, from being ill again. It was a drizzly night in late Sep-tember and he was wearing an overcoat and carrying an umbrella. I doodled a caricature of him on the back of my notebook, said goodbye to him at the end of the evening and never saw him again. Traveling about as much as I have, the notebook became misplaced… New York, Hollywood. Who knows? A couple of months ago I came across it again. I hope you like the little picture.

Jack Colvin Drawing courtesy of Michael Chekhov Studio, California

By Deborah Robertson

A SYNTHESIS OF THE WILLIAMSON AND CHEKHOV TECHNIQUES

“And then I saw that our profession is even more diffi cult than any other, be-cause we have only one instrument to convey to the audience our feelings, our emotions, our ideas ----- our own body. It is terrifyingly true.” ~ Michael Chekhov

As Michael Chekov tells us “there are no purely physical exercises in our method.” His approach to acting is often re-ferred to as “psycho-physi-cal.” This orientation is also true of the Williamson Tech-nique. Each exercise within both techniques aspires to the involvement of the entirety of the artist; physical, psycho-logical, intellectual, emotional, even spiritual aspects of the fully activated “self.” My train-ing in the acting method of

Sanford Meisner instilled the necessity of a strong connec-tion to the inner life in order to stimulate an external re-sponse. My journey as a teacher and an artist involves a synthesis of the values in the work of Sanford Meisner with the pedagogies of the Williamson and Chekhov approaches to actor training.

The Williamson Technique is a physical training for the actor created by Loyd Williamson who was himself trained as an actor by Sanford Meisner at the Neighborhood Playhouse in New York City and by Harold Clurman. He also trained and worked in the dance/theatre company of Anna Sokolow, The Players Project. Ms. Sokolow taught at the Group The-atre, the Lincoln Center Repertory Theatre, Neighborhood Playhouse, the Actors Studio, and was on the faculty of the Julliard School in both the dance and drama divisions for forty years. Mr. Williamson has told me that the beginnings of his technique began to stir within him during his years of study in the Meisner method while observing his fellow actors’ challenges in attempting to process the heightened emotional responses characteristic of the Meisner acting training. The methodology he created refl ects these asso-ciations. The Williamson technique is currently taught at the Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University, Tisch School of the Arts, New York University, University of the Arts, Northern Illinois University, University of Nebraska, the William Esper Studio, the Maggie Flannigan Studio, and the Actors Movement Studio in New York City.

The Williamson work, in the broadest sense, is concerned with the physical aspects of communication: the interaction of the actor’s body with the people, places, and things of the imaginary world and the intersection of the human body with this process. The opening, taking in and receiving of information, and the release of behavior in response to an experience, are two important aspects of the technique. For these experiences to be transformational and the beginning of an artistic process as opposed to an everyday event, there must be a true contact with another person, circumstance, or with some aspect of the environment, using the senses.

This work is unlike other physical training approaches in its focus on the body as a processing tool. The technique is very useful in freeing the actor from the pedestrian mannerisms, societal constraints, and historical patterns that constrict, in-hibit, and compromise vivid and responsive behavior. The actor is then more available to his or her own impulses as they relate to the creation of the inner life: the imagination and its emotional connections.

As described by William Esper, Artistic Director of the William Esper Studio, NYC, “Loyd (Williamson) understood the issue was fi nding a way of freeing an actor and dissolv-ing those muscular blocks in the body, and that permitted him to experience fully his emotional response so that ev-erything was able to fl ow into him and through him and be processed, and then fl ow back out of him without any kind of impediment…”

“Michael Chekhov made me realize that truth as naturalism was far from the truth. In him I witnessed exciting theatrical form with no loss of content, and I know I wanted that too.” ~ Sanford Meisner

Deborah Robertson is currently the Head of the B.F.A. Acting Program, and the Undergraduate Advisor for the School of Theatre and Dance at Northern Illinois Univer-sity, and the vice president of the Association of Theatre Movement Educators (ATME). Her work as a choreogra-pher and movement coach has been performed interna-tionally, in regional theatres, university productions, and on television. As an actress and dancer, she has appeared on Broadway, National Tours, Off Broadway, industrials, regional theatres, and television. Recently she received a grant to complete work on the creation of a digital video documentary of Loyd Williamson and the movement train-ing that he created.

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 6

Williamson classes begin with an exercise called the Ten Minutes To Do Nothing, simply lying on the fl oor, a time of attention and awareness of self with no agenda or expecta-tions, which can be thought of as the beginning of a transi-tion from the pedestrian world to the world of the artist. This has proven to be in alignment with the Chekhov Feeling of Ease that we are told “produces immediate sensations and visceral energy.” (Chekhov, 1991, p.xxxix) Using these ele-ments from both vocabularies has proven to be highly pro-ductive in establishing the working environment of the class, a space for the actor to take risks and explore the physical and emotional dimensions of themselves.

The essential component of all Williamson course work is the bringing of the fi ve senses to the creation of the imagi-nary world. This concept is introduced in Fantasy Exercises, which explore textures, smells, tastes, sounds and visual stimuli as tools for establishing a visceral connection with the relationships and circumstances of the moment. These sensory contacting techniques have proven benefi cial in creating what Chekhov refers to as Atmospheres that he de-scribes “as sensory mediums such as fog, water, darkness, or confusion, which permeate environments and radiate from and to people, a source of ineffable moods and waves of feeling.” (Chekhov, 1991, p.26)

Also included is a series of physical variation exercises that are a synthesis of movement forms from a variety of physical disciplines employed to enhance the actor’s malleability and articulation in physical shaping, and create heightened ex-pression and spontaneity. Using the concepts of Chekhov’s Imaginary Centers, “an imaginary area inside or outside the body where the character’s impulses for all movement origi-nate” (Chekhov, 1985, p.144), and Qualities of Motion, “to coax feeling, psychological qualities in order to make the body more artistic, fl exible, and expressive…” (Chekhov, 1991, p.48), both open the actor to a more complex level of responsiveness. Application of these Chekhov methods of igniting inner experience as it fl ows into gestural response greatly increase the dimension and dynamics of the physi-cal variation work. Performing a movement, a simple reach outward with the arm, a stretch of the foot, or arching of the spine with a change in center, and/or the suggestion of add-

ing a quality of molding, fl owing, fl ying or radiation, trans-forms what was once the physical performance of an action of a ‘callisthenic’ nature, into a dialogue with the imagination and the body. They allow the actor to convert these emo-tional and psychological impulses immediately to physical action, with freedom and a sense of playfulness.

A series of simple contact exercises known as the Intimacy Exercises are also an element of the Williamson training. These consist of two actors sitting across from one another and simply Receiving and, what I now call, Radiating, back and forth. The actors begin by opening their eyes and just receiving what is there, with no expectations and without trying to create added layers of experience, simply and honestly allowing themselves to be as transparent as one can be with another person, with no apologies. The text of “you” is added, representing each actors experience of the other person and is also intended to keep their attention on the other person rather than themselves. As the exercise evolves layers of fantasy relationship and circumstance may be added. I now employ the elements of Atmosphere, Cen-ters and Qualities with these foundational contact exercises, which produce enhanced expressiveness. As the actors generally become very emotional during these exercises, a gentle reminder of adding a Feeling of Ease to the moment reminds the actors to continue Processing the build up of heightened experience in their bodies.

My exploration of the synthesis of these two techniques continues to illuminate new strategies for enhanced contact with the imaginary world and provides the actors that I have the pleasure to work with and me with fresh opportunities to reveal ourselves.

By Deborah Robertson

Bibliography

Chekhov, Michael Lessons for the Professional Actor, from notes transcribed and edited by Deirdre Hurst Du Prey: (Performing Arts Journal Publications, Baltimore, 1985)

On the Technique of Acting (Harper Collins, New York, 1991)

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 7

Deborah Robertson works with a gesture while rehears-ing Awake and Sing at the International Workshop in Windsor, Canada.

Photo by Scott Burrell

“The body is a channel for processing experience into behavior which is motion and sound.” ~ Loyd Williamson

By Lenard Petit

The Objective and the Psychological Gesture

The all important contribution Stan-islavsky made to the art of acting was his idea of the objective. It is a way to form the work and this helps the actor sustain the performance over time be-cause it gives the actor a solid, clear and energetic footing. This dramatic action allows the actor to speak his text and interact with others in a way that is consistent with the confl ict presented. Without it, the text of the author would be merely words spoken aloud. Knowing how to be active in the scene is a real concern for every actor. We can defi ne it with words, verbs, strong verbs. We can have these verbs in our minds and this will give us a guide to stay on course with the inten-tions of the playwright.

We can also translate these verbs into arche-typal statements of action which will lead us to gestures, and these ges-tures can become our energy source, connecting us to the objective. Mi-chael Chekhov called these forms Psychological Gestures; they come to the actor directly as knowledge. They are a physical understanding of the action. Impulses to satisfy this ac-tion surge through the body. The ac-tor experiences them as a bidding to do the necessary action, leaving the intellect out of the effort. The inner (psychological) gesture is the spark to the fi re of life on stage. When we talk about action, we are talking about the will, which is centered low in the body. Student actors are often led to action by way of the intellect ,which is centered quite high in the body. Thinking often causes diffi culty, some faltering and fl oundering. Action is not the thinking of the character, it is the will of the character taking on a form. What am I doing? is a question we

inevitably come to as actors, it leads us to the form. What I am doing must be very specifi c, the more specifi c the better.

The gesture I seek for this action be-comes alive for me when I fi nd the es-sence of that action. If, for example, I determine that my action in the scene

is to seduce the other character, then I must fi nd a gesture that is about se-duction. In seeking it, I will fi nd that the gesture has something to do with a pulling in toward me. I am seducing so that I can have the other come to me for whatever reason. When this happens then I have (taken) the other and essentially this is what is happen-ing - a taking in in a very special way which is seductive. “I Take” could be called an archetypal action because it holds the smaller actions of seducing or spying or plundering or seizing or stealing etc.

What do I want? Asking the ques-tion is how I fi nd the objective. For an actor playing Richard III it might sound something like this: “I want to be king”. This is okay, it has started to wake up something in the actor. In the end it will become more important to say, “how do I become king?” Then it is not about wanting something, but

about doing something. Richard be-comes king by murdering, by lying, by stealing, by seducing, and by seizing power. He takes in one form or anoth-er, with different qualities. If the ac-tor fi nds the gesture for, “I Take”, and works with it in many ways, it will take him far. The simplicity of the choice helps the actor to explore its various

potentials and range. The exploration is through the qualities. To take slowly and sneakily is very dif-ferent than to take explo-sively, which is different again from taking grandly. These qualities added to the gesture supply the specifi c of each moment of taking, all the while the actor is involved with one simple gesture. The ges-ture opens within the ac-tor a steady stream of tak-ing. Literally streams of taking generate impulses to fulfi ll the action. The body comes alive in new

and unexpected ways, and the actor engages us because he becomes fas-cinating. This is the real gift of the per-forming artist - to sustain a condition of fascination for the audience. We who work in the theater are always fascinated by the potential of Shake-speare but rarely are we fascinated by the actor. Yes, it is always our hope that we will be, but more often it is just the play that holds us, the language, the structure, the twists and turns of plot, the author’s form. We are often let down by the actor because he is bogged down in text and is living in his head and not his body.

When we look at action in an arche-typal way we fi nd that there are not so many actions. Everything begins with wanting and then leads to something else. Yet “I Want” is itself an arche-typal statement of action. There is a lovely gesture that clearly speaks this, a primitive gesture that wakes up in

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 8

By Lenard Petit

us these streams of wanting. This Gesture is likely the very fi rst gesture we make. It is a gesture made by the infant who sits alone and calls out to the mother, not with words, but with the voice and body. It says, “I want comfort, I want food, I want you”. gesture. We all know this gesture. We have all made it. And if you make this gesture now you can still feel the streams of wanting move through your body. It bids you into action. As we develop and become more sophisticated we wrestle with words, concepts, and ideas. We eas-ily confuse one thing with another, so many things have names now and we must remember them all. But when we look to the arche-typal then things become simpler, yet no less profound. Our primi-tive needs and wishes do not disappear from us, they stay within the body and we are in a direct yet unconscious contact with them.

This work has enthralled me for sometime and I have looked long and hard at it. What I have discovered is this: There are six state-ments of action which could be called archetypal, and all other ac-tions or objectives we would want to play as actors are based in I Want---I Reject, I Give---I Take, I Hold My Ground---I Yield. These will suffi ce. Because they are archetypal they hold so many things within them. Qualities are infi nite, and the quality we use in doing the gesture will always change the archetypal to the specifi c. Kissing and punching which seem to be opposite actions are truly both giv-ing actions. One of them is tender and soft, the other is violent and hard. The specifi c gestures themselves may differ as well, but giv-ing is essentially something which is coming from me and going to you. It is best to be as specifi c as one can be. It will not do to simply say “I Give” if what I intend to do is to cheer you up. This specifi c choice needs to be settled fi rst. The next question is HOW can this happen? If I begin to talk about this out loud, and while I am talking about it I use my hands to help me, I will fi nd that I unconsciously begin to make gestures which are very much about giving. Now I know that this is how it is done, and I can fi nd the Psychological Gesture of “I Give” with its light quality and upward direction which will satisfy the action of cheering you up. My mind is satisfi ed, so I no longer have to think about it. But better than that, this gesture of Giving begins to wake up impulses in the body which help me to lift you out of your doldrums or cheer you up.

We work with fi ve gestures as archetypes, and for training purposes these fi ve are rich. Gestures of Pushing, Pulling, Lifting, Throwing, and Tearing. are a means of realizing the six statements of action. There are six directions to exercise them in: forward, backward, up, down, left, and right, and there is different information from each of these directions. As stated above, there are an infi nite number of qualities to work with. Qualities are merely adverbs. Of course, this can become tricky business. In the beginning students are cau-tioned to work with qualities that that can easily be imagined as a way to move. Qualities like tenderly, slowly, quickly, lightly, heavily, quietly, carefully, carelessly, sneakily, explosively, sluggishly etc. Emotional words like angrily are less effective because actors can fool themselves into believing they are moving violently, when in fact they have become violent and start moving. The former is full of artistic potential while the latter can become a hazard for the other actors on stage.

This essay is excerpted from a book currently being written on the practical application of Michael Chekhov’s Acting Technique by Le-nard Petit. Mr. Petit is the Artistic Director of the Michael Chekhov Acting Studio in New York City. He is on the faculty and serves on the Board of Directors of MICHA. Warming up at the Windsor workshop

Photo by Scott Burrell

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 9

By Liisa Byckling

Michael Chekhov and Anthroposophy: from the History of the Second Moscow Art TheatreExcerpts from an article by Liisa Byckling to be published in Nordic Theatre Studies, 2007.

“One of the most remarkable actors of our time, Michael Chekhov, is ardently and passionately seeking new means of theatrical expression”, Pavel Markov, the distinguished Moscow critic, wrote in 1928 in an article devoted to the an-niversary of the Second Moscow Art Theatre. In the same year, Michael Chekhov, the director of the Second Moscow Art Theatre, emigrated from Russia for good, as it turned out. The complex reasons for his departure are connected both with the search for new means of expression and the policy of the “taming of art” of the Stalin period and repres-sion of religious groups in Soviet Russia. This searching came about in part on the basis of the ideas of the anthro-posophist, Rudolf Steiner; Michael Chekhov was his most famous follower in Russian theatre.

Chekhov’s method of acting was laid in the acting style of the Moscow Art Theatre. At the same time Chekhov expressed the spirit of the turn of century Russian culture, symbolist poetry and non-naturalistic theatre. His favorite writer was Dostoevsky, one of his spiritual fathers was the symbolist writer Andrei Bely, his sources of inspiration came from phi-losophy, legends and fairytales.

Chekhov’s self-education in philosophy started early, in-spired by his father Alexander, the writer and journalist, and he read extensively all Western philosophers. He came to Rudolf Steiner’ ideas during a period of nervous illness and crisis relating to his attitude to the world, when his soul “was so weary of the hopeless severity of his world view”, a weari-ness caused by materialism, that he had already given up hope of fi nding another relationship to life.

Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), the Austrian philosopher and occultist, was the founder of the Anthroposophical Society. Anthroposophy sought to achieve clairvoyance through the use of intellect and reason, to overcome materialism and return the spiritual dimension to human life, and to heal the rift between religion and science. The Russian Anthropos-ophical Society was founded in 1913. Many famous Russian artists were interested in Anthroposophy, for example the famous Symbolist writer Andrei Bely and the painter Vasily Kandinsky.

For Chekhov, anthroposophy was the revelation of the mod-ern form of Christianity. “Chekhov strove towards harmony,” Maria Knebel, Chekhov’s pupil, later a distinguished Rus-sian director and teacher, wrote: “As an actor, he sought after and aimed for harmony on stage and in his roles. As a person, he was constantly in torment in that he sensed the disharmony of affairs in the external world. Hence his fears and restlessness.” Chekhov found the meaning and goal of life in anthroposophy, it gave him his mental health and equilibrium. He joined the Russian Anthroposophical Soci-ety (RAS) in Moscow, apparently in 1919-20.

After the death of the great Russian director Evgeny Vakhtangov in 1922, Chekhov became director of the First Studio of the Moscow Art Theatre, which was renamed the Second Moscow Art Theatre (or MAT-2) in 1924. Here Chekhov implemented his new system of aesthetic thought. The few productions staged in MAT-2 under Chekhov’s di-rect management, in cooperation with assistant directors, the most important of them Hamlet and Petersburg, which is an adaptation of Belyi’s novel, were meant to be defi nite landmarks in the mastering of new methods of acting. Chek-hov, himself an outstanding actor, shaped the attitude to the world and interpretation of life of the holistic organism of the theatre, above all, through its actors. Like his master, Stan-islavsky, Chekhov studied art and gained his knowledge of it from the standpoint of the actor and not, the case of Myer-hold, as that of the director.

At fi rst Chekhov applied Stanislavsky’s “system” of actor’s training which was practiced in the First Studio from 1912 onwards. But Chekhov sought something different in his lab-oratory and immersed himself in the complexity of the cre-ative process of the actor. Chekhov conducted classes in his private studios and at rehearsals. “I will never permit my-self to say that I taught Stanislavsky’s system. That would be too bold an assertion,” Chekhov stated when describing his approach. “I taught what I had experienced myself from my contact with Stanislavsky and what Sulerzhitsky and Vakhtangov had imparted to me. Much of what Stanislavsky gave us was assimilated by me on a permanent basis and formed the foundation for my subsequent, to a certain extent independent, experiments in the art of theatre.”

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 10

By Liisa Byckling

Chekhov aimed at creating feeling of truth and inspiring actor’s fantasy. As in the First Studio, Chekhov’s teaching was based on etudes. “Etudes” (Stanislavsky’s term) refers to a non-scripted scene performed by actors (in American usage it is called improvisation). Let us examine those ideas of Chekhov’s for the theatre and how they found their refl ec-tion in the methods employed during rehearsals for Hamlet, certain aspects of which were set out by Chekhov in his au-tobiographical memoirs.

Chekhov had experienced a feeling of dissatisfaction with the customary methods of working with the word and gesture. In this Chekhov adopted Steiner’s method in his approach to speech and movement, so-called eurythmy. This new art of movement envisages that every sound has an inherent gesture, which may be reproduced in movements of the hu-man body. In speech eurythmy (“visible speech”), speech is interpreted not as a means of communication, but as sound and rhythm that can be expressed using the language of the body. Thanks to eurythmy and speech formation, Chekhov found an approach to the word and the expressiveness of movement which corresponded to his own way of acting and the principles of Evgeny Vakhtangov’s theatricality, based on rhythmic movement.

Later, Chekhov set out his method of acting in his Ameri-can book To the Actor (1953). One of the main professional requirements is complete obedience of both body and psy-chology to the actor. In the fi rst nine exercises (Chapter One) Chekhov laid the foundation for the attainment of the four requirements which are basic to the actors technique. “By means of the suggested psychophysical exercises the actor can increase his inner strength, develop his abilities to radiate and receive, acquire a fi ne sense of form, enhance his feelings of freedom, ease, calm and beauty, experience the signifi cance of his inner being, and learn to see things and processes in their entirety.”

It was Chekhov’s aim that the actors should acquire a grasp in the practical sense of the profound connection that move-ment has to words on the one hand, and to the emotions on the other. This exercise served as an expression of Stan-islavsky’s demand: not to utter the author’s words until the inner stimulus to do so arises. The principles of Chekhov’s rehearsal work had something in common with the experi-ment of Meyerhold in a number of details (e.g. in the way that the actors went from movement to feeling), and in some respects they anticipated Stanislavsky’s “method of physical actions” in the 1930s.

Together with all other mystical and occult groups RAS was offi cially liquidated in 1923. The center of Anthroposophical activity shifted to the Second Moscow Art Theatre until 1928. Chekhov’s activity increased from 1923 onwards, he applied Steiner’s methods in practical theatre work, his aim being the spiritualization of culture and all professions and studies in the theatre. Chekhov wrote that it became known in the

theatre that “I had derived my spiritual knowledge and, in particular, my technique for applying it specifi cally to art from the Anthroposophy and Eurythmy of Rudolf Steiner and his teachings on artistic speech etc.”

In Moscow, Chekhov succeeded in implementing his ideas for the theatre and his new approach to aesthetics during the fi rst few years of his directorship: “spiritual insights were applied in a specifi c and practical way in the form that I had succeeded in manifesting them in my exercises and produc-tions.” However, in Communist Russia these ideas were condemned as alien and reactionary. Chekhov was under a threat of being arrested. In 1928 he resigned from his the-atre and got a leave for one year to travel to Berlin with his wife Xenya. Chekhov did not intend to leave Soviet Russia for good.

The situation changed dramatically in 1929, when the Bol-sheviks, spurred on by Stalin, launched a new campaign against the “remnants of the bourgeois intelligentsia”, ar-resting members of occult groups on a large scale. In Paris, Chekhov learned of the arrest of the anthroposophists in Russia; his feelings of guilt towards the friends who had been subjected to persecution is expressed in the Paris chapters of Life and Encounters. Arrest for “occult propaganda” after 1933 inevitably meant exile and frequently meant execution. The destruction of the occult societies by decree, arrest, ex-ile, and execution did not destroy the Russians’ interest in occultism.

It was clear that for Chekhov there was no return to Soviet Russia. The years of emigration followed. Chekhov under-went three separate developments: the period of directing, acting and teaching in Berlin, Paris, Riga and Kaunas (1928-34); the period of the Anglo-American Theatre Studio (1936-42); and, fi nally, the Hollywood career, working in cinema and teaching fi lm actors in Los Angeles (1943-55). Chekhov developed his projects with great vigor both in European and American theatres and acting studios. In America Chekhov was fi nally able to give one of his spiritual mentors his due in his Russian books, Life and Encounters and To the Actor: On the Technique of Acting. Anthroposophy was his private creed, and the art of movement and speech called euryth-my, “visible speech” gave new impulses on how to refi ne non-verbal acting and develop the harmony of the actor’s body. Chekhov remained devoted to this system of belief of Rudolf Steiner’s and the Russian theatre of Stanislavsky and Vakhtangov until his fi nal years in California.

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 11

Actor Mark Frankos

Book Review by Douglas Davidson

The Path of a Character: Michael Chekhov’s Inspired Acting and Theatre SemioticsBy Yana Meerzon (Peter Lang, 2005 $62.95)In the introduction to her erudite and thought-provoking book, Yana Meerzon writes that she intends to confront ‘the gap that separates the theatre and academia, the stage and audience’, a gap ‘that has been addressed only partially, if at all, by theoreticians, academics, and practitioners’. She proposes to undertake nothing less than ‘a reinterpretation of the work of the Russian émigré actor Michael Chekhov’ using the methodology of theatre semiotics developed by the Prague Linguistic Circle. She declares that Chekhov, in creating ‘one of the most challenging and inspiring acting theories of the 20th century’, developed techniques which are ‘ inextricably linked to a number of theatre theories of the time’ and to ‘modern semiotic theatre theories.’ As an Assis-tant Professor in the Department of Theatre at the University of Ottawa, Meerzon is clearly writing from the academic side of the gap; her prose style is uncompromisingly academic in tone and she assumes that her readers have a working familiarity with semiotic theory, the tenets of Russian mod-ernism, and the ideas of Victor Shklovsky, Mikhail Bakhtin, Konstantin Stanislavsky, Vsevolod Meyerhold, Gordon Craig and numerous other literary and theatrical luminaries. But the serious reader will be rewarded with a comprehensive and fascinating tour of the cultural milieu of Michael Chek-hov’s time.

Meerzon seems to have read everything available in Rus-sian and English by or about Chekhov. She draws on pub-lished works and archival sources that include the Moscow Art Theatre Archives, the Russian State Archive of Literature and Art, and the Dartington Hall Archive Trust and uses her material most effectively. She portrays Michael Chekhov as a quintessential man of his time, as ‘ a product of Russian Modernism’, whose personality ‘incorporated all of the con-troversy and the distorted consciousness of the epoch: from Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity to Saussure’s ideas on the dual nature of the linguistic sign, from Gordon Craig’s vision of the Uber- Marrionette to Bakhtin’s concept of dialogicity in literature, to Jacques Dalcroze’s ideas on the interconnection between human psychology and the body articulated through rhythmical movement’. That covers a lot of ground, but Meerzon traverses the intellectual terrain of the mid-twentieth century fearlessly. Along the way she ex-

plicates the similarities and differences between Chekhov’s idea of the Mask of the character and Craig’s ‘vision of the masked “depersonalized” actor’ and seeks to document and analyze the infl uence of Stanislavsky, Bely, Steiner, and Meyerhold on Chekhov’s acting.

The book is full of fascinating and revealing quotes from Chekhov’s contemporaries that describe the artist and the man. Much of this material is published in English for the fi rst time. Here is Karel Capek on Chekhov’s per-formance as Erik XIV:

His acting is impossible to describe… Two words: ‘physi-cal’ and ‘spiritual’ are the mystery behind this astonishing performance. The body may ‘represent’ that mystery, may ‘symbolize’ it and ‘express’ it. But then comes Chekhov and proves to you… that body is the soul. For Chekhov, there is no ‘inside’, everything is laid bare, nothing is hidden, every-thing is impulsively and sharply expressed in each move-ment, in the play of the entire body, of this most delicate and trembling tangle of nerves.

And here is Andrei Bely describing Chekhov’s Hamlet:

Chekhov’s acting is derived from the pause, not from the word; other actors act from words, pause to them is psychological retouching, not the backbone of act-ing. In the middle of his character, Chekhov silently emerges from the center of it…. From pause – to word; but pause contains a burst of potential energy, which is transported by the kinetics of gesture into the next mo-ment, where his body is like lightning, like from a burst of energy – the word is the aftermath of everything.

When we read these accounts, gaps close between in-tellectual and artist, performer and audience, and, in-deed, between our time and Michael Chekhov’s time.

Douglas Davidson lives in Texas where he teaches acting, dramatic writing and fi lm making at several Dallas Fort Worth metroplex colleges.

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 12

Workshop Participants MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 13

Teacher’s Workshop in Long Beach, California - ParticipantsYoko Akashi, Meade Andrews, Kim Barrett, Judy Bauerline, Aldo Billingslea, Scott Burrell, Jessica Cerullo, Douglas Davidson, Anne Justine D’Zmura, Maaren Edvard, Daphne Field, Mark Frankos, Nick Gabriel, Leah Garland, Tom Glynn, Gavin Hawk, Jeanine Howe, Hadar Lily-Hellman, John Hugo, Sandelle Kinkaid, Lyudmilla Kizer, James Luse, Marjo-Rikka Makela, Joanna Merlin*,Guy William Molnar, Mark Monday, Chris O’Connor, Hugh O’Gorman, Janice Orlandi, Christopher Petit, Jonathan Phillips, Mala Powers*, Tom Provenzano, Ted Pugh*, Priscilla Regalado, Brandt Reiter, Deborah Robertson, Mark Shaw, Melissa Smith, Jack Shea, Liz Shipman, Peter Tedeschi, Jamie Winnick.

* Faculty

Arezzo Italy home to the Accademia dell’arte and host of MICHA’s 2006 European Teacher’s Workshop

Ragnar Freidank talks with workshop participants at the river in Windsor, Ontario.

Teacher’s Workshop in Arezzo Italy 2006 - ParticipantsCarlos Aladro, Marjolein Baars*, Flo Callens, Jessica Cerullo, Jerri Daboo, Enrica dal Zio, Riccardo Festa, Hanna Linde, Tammie McKenzie, Ulrich Meyer-Horsch, Jesper Michelsen, Tarja Nyberg, Janice Orlandi, Charo Amador Perez, Valentina Piserchia, Le-nard Petit*, Marian Gracia Rubio, Asa Salvesen, Michael Seyfried, Griet Spanhove, Glen Spearer, You-ri Yamanaka.

International Workshop in Windsor - ParticipantsCathy Albers,Yoko Akashi, Jim Armstrong, Cynthia Ashperger, Marjolain Baars*, Andrei Malaev-Babel*, Marie Baron, Judy Bau-erline, Lauren Boggio, Olga Brandin, Eugene Buica, Scott Burrell, Bethany Caputo, Francesco Carrill, D. Lynn Cartwright, Jessica Cerullo*,Peggy Coffey, Diana Cofi ni, George Contini, Douglas Davidson,Krista DeNio,William Edelman, Martha Elliott, Ijeoma Emesowum, Yolanda Ferrato, Scott Fielding*,Christina Flynn, Mark Frankos, Ragnar Freidank*, Nick Gabriel, Yvonne Gauthier, Tracey Ginder-Delventhal,Tyree Giroux, Sarah Greywitt, Lavinia Hart, Hadar Lily Hellman, David Ingram,Derek Johnson, Diana Madey Kelley, Lyudmilla Kizer, Katelin Kosoglad, Deborah Lazor, Hanna Linde, Katie MacTavish, Naoko Maeshiba, Phelim Mc-Dermott*, Tammie McKenzie, Adam McLean, Carolina Morones, Janet Morrison, Laura Jane Nelles, Lousie Nolan, Cathy O’Dell, Janice Orlandi, Christopher Petit, Jonathan Phillips, Rene Polley, Ted Pugh*, Christa Ray, Gina Lori-Riley, Brian Rintoul, Deborah Robertson, Wayne Robertson, Juan Ignacio Ceacero Ruiz, Deborah Sanchez, Jo-Anne Saare, Marc Shaw, Jack Shea, Liz Ship-man, Patricia Skarbinski, Fern Sloan*, Richard Stables, Marinka Stern, Lesley Ann Timlick, Victoria Velenosi, Lionel Walsh.

Summer Arts in Fresno - ParticipantsJeremy Aluma, Dawn Arnold*, Jacquelyn Babb, Sada Bagdanoff, Jonathan Berman, Jessica Cerullo*, Maagic Collins, Maria Comi-nis, Alexander Dominitz, Marissa Duchowny, Rhiannon Fernandez, Scott Fielding*, Ragnar Freidank*, Desiree Hill, Tara Henry, Tinamarie Ivey, Katie B. Jarvis, Shameca Johnson, Cynthia Kay, Matt Larson, Maggie Lehman, Robin Lloyd, James McHale, Joanne Matulich, James Medeiros, Amanda Meek, Katy Merrill, Dena Mushcetto, Hugh O’Gorman*, Mala Powers*, Elisa Richter, Ferin Petrelli, Brooke Rafferty, Lis Roche, LeAnne Sharp, Erin Soto, Steve Sornbutnark, Maggie VandenBerghe, Miles Villanueva, David Zinder*.

Students talk at California State University’s Summer Arts education and celebration 2006 in Fresno, CA

MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 14

Join us!Friends of MichaJoin the Friends of MICHA and help MICHA in our mission to share Michael Chekhov’s artistic vision with the work of actors, directors, and teachers around the world, Friends of MICHA receive:

. First right of attendance at workshops

. Discounts on all US workshops and performances

. Discounts on books and merchandise

. All MICHA mailings

. The opportunity to post information about your Chekhov classes and events on MICHA’s website under Links.

Mail this form with a check to:MICHA PO Box 20168 New York, New York 10014

For information, contact us at info@michaelchekhov.org or call 202-841-5141

Individual $50.00 Organizations $100.00 Additional donation (optional but much appreciated) $_____

Total Enclosed $____________

Checks can be made payable in US dollars to MICHA. Credit card payments can be arranged by emailing MICHA at info@michaelchekhov.org. MICHA is a non-profi t organization. All donations are tax deductible. Friends of MICHA dues valid for one year term, from January to December.

MICHAnews Fall 2006 MICHAnews 2006 - Pg 15

MICHA EVENTS 2007

Teacher’s WorkshopCalifornia State University, Long Beach CaliforniaJanuary 3-7, 2007Faculty: Jessica Cerullo, Joanna Merlin, Lenard Petit, Mala PowersText: A Lie of the Mind, Sam ShepardCost: $475, $500

Weekend IntensiveNew York University, New York CityJune 8-10, 2007Faculty: TBACost: $350, $375

Weekend Intensive for DirectorsNew York University, New York CityJune 8-10, 2007Faculty: Ragnar FreidankCost: $350, $375

International Workshop and FestivalAmherst College, Amherst MassachusettsJuly 31 - August 10, 2007Faculty: TBACost: TBA

MICHA PO BOX 20168

New York, NY 10014 USA202.841.5141

www.michaelchekhov.org

Board of Directors

Joanna Merlin.......PresidentTed Pugh.......Vice President

Sims Wyeth.......Vice PresidentJessica Cerullo.......Secretary Treasurer

Marjolein Baars, Ragnar Freidank, Sarah Kane, Michael Mayer, Melvyn Zerman, Zelda Fichandler,

Andrei Malaev-Babel, Lenard Petit.

Advisory Board

Anne Bogart, William Elmhirst, Patricia Neal, Floyd Rumohr, Marian Seldes, Julie Taymor, Martha

Clarke, Deirdre Hurst du Prey, Margo Lion, Mala Powers, Tom Schumacher, Jimmy Smits.

MICHA News is designed by Asli Ayatawww.aacreativeservices.com

MICHA News is edited by Jessica Cerullo and Joanna Merlin.

Photos of Michael Chekhov courtesy of Mala Powers, executrix of Chekhov’s estate.

Amherst College in Massachusetts will host MICHA’s International Workshop and Festival in 2007.