THE DIRT UNDERNEATH ACTORS' SPACE

John creates a delightful atmosphere of trust and joy that inspires people to risk and reveal themselves to the camera and their scene partners. He has a multiplicity of ways he approaches cracking open scenes – through analysis, breath, useful secrets, physical points of focus, power games among many others. He finds a language and approach to stimulate each individual actor.
It is a truly joyful room. He is the anti-guru acting guru.

Credits: (Saving Hope, King Lear, Lars And The Real Girl, The English Patient, Unforgiven)

It’s really easy for actors to get bogged down with their bad habits, fears and demons, and nobody understands that more than John. One of the things I love most about him is that he always makes space for his students to acknowledge these parts of ourselves, without letting them run the show. He is incredibly intuitive and is able to assess an actor’s needs without calling attention to them. The morning of my callback for “Women Talking,” John delicately pulled me out of a negative spiral and placed me into a state of gratitude and trust… a state from which he knows I do my best work.

John has always been two steps ahead of me, offering scenes, exercises and words of wisdom that have pushed me in directions I didn’t know I needed to go.

Credits: (Women Talking, The Good Doctor, Murdoch Mysteries, Glass Houses)