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Michael Warner

Artistic Director

 

Michael Warner is a Professor of Acting at Pace University where he specializes in Shakespeare and Early Realism in the Musical Theater BFA and at Stonestreet Studios/NYU where he specializes in Film Acting. He is the Artistic Director of The Michael Warner Studio in New York City. He has taught at The University of the Arts, Rutgers, The New York Conservatory of the Dramatic Arts and has taught Master Classes with several different organizations.. He has numerous appearances in Film and Television including Wu Tang:An American Saga,House of Cards, If Beale Street Could Talk,  Forever, Law and Order, Law and Order-Criminal Intent, Boardwalk Empire, As the World Turns, among others.  Theater credits include the Broadway revival of Machinal, The Language of Trees, The Marriage of Bette and Boo, Distracted (Roundabout), Wings (Second Stage), Scarcity (Rattlestick), Monstrosity (13p), Missed Connections (Ars Nova), Almost an Evening, Arrangements (Atlantic), among many others. Directing Credits include Love/Sick by John Cariani, Marie Antoinette by David Adjmi, The Chekov Project, An Evening of Ten Minute Plays, as well dozens of Scene Nights and Workshops. His Solo play, How. What. Now., was Workshopped at The Williamstown Theater Festival and at the Project Y New Works Festival. He holds an MFA from Rutgers University. Proud member of SAG/AFTRA and AEA.  Professional Affiliations: MTEA.



 

Former & Associated Faculty Members

 
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Lawrence Ballard

Acting Faculty

Lawrence Ballard received an BA from the University of Minnesota and an MFA from Rutgers University. He has performed on Broadway, TV and Film for the past 16 years and has 2 decades of stage experience. He has written, directed and taught in NYC for the past 6 years. 

Lawrence has extensive knowledge in the commercial world of acting having shot nearly 20 national spots and numerous industrial projects. He also has an excellent understanding of green screen and motion capture work having worked on numerous video games particularly with Rockstar on some of their most popular and ground breaking works. Titles such as Grand Theft Auto, Red Dead Revolver, Midnight Club, Bully, Manhunt, The Warriors showcased his physicality and vocal talents with a starring turn as the physical body for the basis of Max Payne in the second game of the series. Lawrence continues his career as an actor with a recent highlight having worked with Ava DuVernay.  

Television & Film credits include: The Big Sick, The Affair, Royal Pains, Law & Order, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Law & Order: SVU, Blue Bloods, Billions, Unforgettable, Forever, All My Children, Guiding Light and more.

Broadway: A Raisin in the Sun; Off-Broadway: A Soldiers Play, MacBeth/The B Cam, In Security, and more.

 


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Matthew Freeman

Writing Faculty

 

Matthew Freeman is a Brooklyn-based playwright and director. He is a MacDowell Colony Fellow and a current resident playwright at New Dramatists.

In New York City, he has been produced at The Brick Theater, HERE Arts Center, House of Yes, FPAC/The Assemblage in Boston, St. Mark's Church, Dixon Place, Access Theater, East 4th Street Theater, The Metropolitan Playhouse, Manhattan Theatre Source, The New Ohio, and 80WSE Gallery.  His audio work has been a part of the HearNow Festival and Atlanta Fringe Radio.

His plays and monologues have been published by Samuel French, Applause, Smith & Kraus, NYTE, and Playscripts. Plays include The Conversation, A Long Trip By Sea, The Hollow, That Which Isn't, The Language, Bluebeard, When is a Clock, The Listeners (Nominee: Best Production - Performance Art: New York Innovative Theatre Awards 2015), Why We Left Brooklyn, The Starving Dress, The Most Wonderful Love, Glee Club, The Death of King Arthur, Confess Your Bubble, Cloud Cuckooland (with Djahari Clark) and Brandywine Distillery Fire

As a director, Freeman has staged his evening of short plays The Hollow (Brick Theater 2018), The Zebra Shirt of Lonely Children by Matthew Trumbull at the NY International Fringe Festival 2012 (Encore Series; Award, Overall Excellence in Solo Performance) and the Minnesota Fringe Festival 2013, his adaptation of the mystery plays, Genesis, with Handcart Ensemble.

As an actor, he appeared in various productions with Gorilla Repertory Theater and Frog & Peach Theater, and his own An Interview with the Author at the Brick Theater’s “Pretentious Festival.”

As a freelance writer, he has been published by Maxim, Complex, Premiere and Samuel French’s Breaking Character.

Along with Kyle Ancowitz, Freeman is Artistic Director of Theater Accident.

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Jenna Worsham

Directing Faculty

Jenna Worsham Stage Director, Activist. BroadwayThe Parisian WomanPicnicThe Heidi Chronicles (Associate Director). Off-Broadway/RegionalThe Climb by C.A. Johnson (Cherry Lane); Agnes by Catya McMullen (59E59, 2018 NY Times Critics’ Pick); Belleville by Amy Herzog (Pasadena Playhouse); Wonder Boi by Jacob Jarrett (NYMF); Dear by Lily Houghton (MCC); Blue Ridge by Abby Rosebrock (Williamstown); The Siblings Play by Ren Dara Santiago (Rattlestick, Cherry Lane); Street Children by Pia Scala-Zankel (New Ohio, NY Times Critics’ Pick); Gun Country (A.R.T/New York); The First Immigrant by Martyna Majok (Williamstown); East Coast  Curriculum by Lucy Thurber (Lee Strasberg Institute); Invincible Ones by Samantha Cooper (Signature Center); Have You Been There by Emily Zemba (Rattlestick); Here to Be Seen (featuring a cast of formerly incarcerated women, Commissioned by the Brooklyn DA); The Vagina Monologues for Taconic Correctional Facility. Jenna has developed new work at The Public, Labyrinth, ACT, Playwrights Horizons, The Women’s Project, MTC, EST/Youngblood, MCC, Primary Stages, among others. She is a 2019 National Directing Fellow at The O’Neill Theater Center, as well as the recipient of a Jonathan Alper Award (MTC), two SDCF Observerships and the Drama League/Williamstown Sagal Directing Fellowship. Jenna is the Co-Founder of Creative Solutions at SPACE on Ryder Farm, and a proud member of The Actors Studio Directors Unit, the Lincoln Center Directors Lab, and an Affiliated Artist of New Georges.  

 
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Kelly McAndrew

Acting Faculty

 

Kelly McAndrew has been acting and teaching in New York for almost twenty years. This fall she can be seen in Novenas for a Lost Hospital by Cusi Cram at Rattlestick Theatre and Lucas Hnath’s new play The Thin Place at Playwright’s Horizons. Other recent NYC theatre includes Men on Boats (Playwrights Horizons/Clubbed Thumb), Perfect Arrangement (Primary Stages), Abundance (TACT), Almost, Maine (Transport Group) and Good Television (Atlantic Theatre Company). Kelly made her Broadway debut in 2004 as Maggie in ‪Cat on a Hot Tin Roof starring Ned Beatty and Margo Martindale. Other New York theatre includes: Still Life (MCC), The Cataract (The Women’s Project), Book of Days (Signature Theatre). Regional theatres includes: The Humana Festival of New Plays (2016, 2017 and 2019), Yale Rep, ART, The Guthrie, The Old Globe, Arena Stage, City Theatre, Dorset Theatre Festival, Pittsburgh Public. TV: “Daredevil” (recurring), “The Sinner”, “New Amsterdam”, “The Good Fight”, "Orange is the New Black" (recurring), "House of Cards", "Elementary", "SVU", “Smash,” “Law & Order,” “Gossip Girl.” Film: When the Moon Was Twice as Big (out 2020), Island Zero, Appropriate Behavior (Sundance 2014), In the Family (2011 SPIRIT nomination), Everybody’s Fine (with Robert DeNiro). Kelly received her MFA from the University of Missouri, Kansas City. She is currently an adjunct professor at The New School and a teaching artist at Primary Stage’s Einhorn School.