Full-time Faculty
Richard Crawford studied with Jacques Lecoq, and also at Rose Bruford College, London. He is a founding member of the internationally-acclaimed New York physical theater ensemble The Flying Machine and is currently performing on Broadway in War Horse. He also played the lead in the off-Broadway hit show Slava's Snowshow from 2004-2006 and has directed clown work for Cirque du Soleil. He is an award-winning director whose projects have included a Commedia dell'Arte version of Petrushka at Carnegie Hall; The Bourgeois Gentlemen at the UMN/Guthrie and Comedy of Errors at TheatreWorks, Colorado Springs. He also performed in the 2002 OBIE Winning [Sic] at Soho Rep., NYC, and as the lead in La Jolla Playhouse's groundbreaking The Adding Machine in 2007. Richard has been teaching for the past twelve years in London, Paris, Santiago, Montreal and New York. In the U.S. he has taught Neutral Mask, Commedia dell'Arte and Lecoq Technique at NYU/Tisch, Yale School of Drama, Sarah Lawrence College, Bard College, The Actor's Center, Marymount Manhattan, Lee Strasberg Theater and Film Institute, Michael Howard Studios, The Stella Adler Studio, and the University of Minnesota. He is currently on the faculty at SUNY Purchase. richardcrawfordweb.com
Adrienne Kapstein is a director specializing in the creation of original, physically based work. She is currently the Movement Associate on War Horse (winner of 5 Tony Awards) at the Lincoln Center. She was the co-Artistic Director of award-winning international ensemble SaBooge Theatre for 9 years. New York directing & devising highlights include Crime Scene Cleaners, Inc. (Mabou Mines Resident Artist, New Georges' This Is Your Week), Every Day Above Ground (PS 122) and Fathom (Ice Factory Festival 2005 and winner of Best Production, Dublin Fringe Festival 2004). Adrienne's work has been presented internationally including the Tarragon Theatre in Toronto, The Centaur Theatre in Montreal, Project Arts Centre in Dublin and The University of Ireland, Galway. Adrienne is currently on faculty of Brooklyn College's BA Theater Program and LIU's BFA program. She has taught physical acting, mask and movement at Stella Adler Studio, NYU (ETW) and Marymount Manhattan College and has led workshops at the Lincoln Center, Sewanee: The University of the South, Swarthmore College, The Gaiety School of Acting (Dublin) and Queen's College (Ontario). A graduate of the University of Edinburgh and École Jacques Lecoq, she is currently in the MFA program in Directing at Brooklyn College. Adrienne has just begun work on an original adaptation of Boom! by Mark Haddon.
Sophie Amieva has taught Bouffon at the famed Experimental Theater Wing at Tisch School of the Arts, NYU, since 2004. She has performed internationally with Philip Genty and La Rumeur theater company as well as in New York with NTUSA, the International WOW company and Bindlestiff Family Circus. Born and raised in France, she trained in physical theater at L'Ecole International Jacques Lecoq and in clown with Philippe Gaulier. Sophie has also studied mime technique and mask with Carlo Boso from the Teatro Piccolo di Milano. After establishing her own critically acclaimed theater company, La Grappe De Bouffons, she came to the U.S where she continues to perform and teach and where the New York Times reviewed her one woman show Pessimist Moi? saying that "Sophie Amieva displays a fine talent for comedy".
Emmanuelle Delpech is an award-winning actor, teacher and director. She was classically trained at the École Superieur d'Art Dramatique de la ville de Paris, and then studied physical theatre at l'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq. She recently graduated from Temple University and earned an MFA in Directing. With Pig Iron Theatre Company, Emmanuelle has been a performer/co-creator of Gentlemen Volunteers, Flop!, Hell Meets Henry Halfway and James Joyce is Dead and So Is Paris (Barrymore Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Musical). She has created and performed in various self-devised pieces winning a Best of Philly 2011 Award by the Philadelphia Magazine as Best Theater Artist. She has worked at Second City in Chicago, Just For Laughs festival in Montreal and as a physical theater consultant with New York's acclaimed Civilians theater company.
Emmanuelle has taught at University of the Arts, PA, Swarthmore College and Temple University. She is also on the faculty at the Headlong Performance Institute and of the Pig Iron School of Advanced Training. Emmanuelle's recent production of Tartuffe was called "A production so meticulous, kinetic and aptly modern" by The Philadelphia Enquirer. www.emmanuelledr.squarespace.com
Trey Lyford is a New York-based theatre artist and Co-Artistic Director of rainpan 43 performance group. He has co-created and performed in all of their works to date. Following a world tour of rainpan 43's first piece all wear bowlers (Drama Desk Nomination, Innovative Theatre Award), r43 followed up with Amnesia Curiosa (2006) and the OBIE award-winning kinetic junk sculpture play machines, machines, machines, machines, machines, machines machines and most recently Elephant Room. In addition to his pieces with rainpan 43, Mr. Lyford develops and produces works as an individual artist and is an Associate Artist with the celebrated company The Civilians (Gone Missing, Paris Commune, Nobody's Lunch, The Great Immensity). Mr. Lyford has performed his original works in four continents as well as Philadelphia Live Arts Festival, LA's Center Theatre Group, La Jolla Playhouse, Berkeley Rep, Studio Theater, and theaters throughout NYC. He is a Princess Grace Award recipient as well as the Fabergé Theatre Excellence Award. His work has also received support from NYSCA, Princeton Atelier and Creative Capital. He is a professor at the SUNY Purchase Conservatory and lives in Brooklyn with his beautiful wife and their daughter. He also designed the shwag for Elephant Room. MFA: UCSD
Virginia was named by clown master Christopher Bayes (Head of Physical Acting at Yale School of Drama) as the first faculty member of his Funny School of Good Acting and is certified to teach his clown technique. She has served as Bayes' assistant for eight years and is working on a book with him, which will detail his approach to clown. Along the way, she assisted Bayes in the creation and direction of Clowns presented at the Public Theater and Ruzzante at the NYU Graduate Acting Program. Virginia has taught Clown in New York at the Actor's Center, Marymount Manhattan College, the Michael Howard Studios, CAP 21, the Glass Contraption Clown Theatre Company, the Leviathan Lab and Christopher Bayes' Funny School of Good Acting. She also directed the NYC Clown Lab; the first training environment in New York designed to bring together clowns of different backgrounds for exchange, experimentation, material development and training. As a director and deviser, Virginia is known for her fast-paced, comic and visually exciting style. Her work has been seen in New York at UCB, The Irish Repertory Theatre, Ars Nova, 59E59, The Barrow Group Theatre, Chasama's Palace of Variety, The New York Fringe Festival, The PIT and the International Clown Festival; regionally at The US Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen, The Comedy Central Theatre in Los Angeles, and UCB LA in Los Angeles; and internationally at The Guilded Balloon in Edinburgh, The Centaur Theatre in Montreal, the Grahamstown International Festival in South Africa and festivals throughout Canada.
Geoff Sobelle is a theatre artist dedicated to the "sublime ridiculous." He is the co-artistic director of rainpan 43, a renegade absurdist outfit devoted to creating original actor-driven performance works. Using illusion, film and out-dated mechanics, R43 creates surreal, poetic pieces that look for humanity where you least expect it and find grace where no one is looking. R43's shows include: all wear bowlers (Innovative Theatre Award, Drama Desk nomination), Amnesia Curiosa, machines machines machines machines machines machines machines (OBIE award design), and Elephant Room (commissioned by Center Theatre Group). His independent work includes Flesh and Blood & Fish and Fowl and the upcoming Object Lesson. He has been a company member of Philadelphia's Pig Iron Theatre Company since 2001. Pig Iron works include: Gentlemen Volunteers, Mission to Mercury, Shut Eye, James Joyce is Dead and so is Paris, Hell Meets Henry Halfway, Chekhov Lizardbrain and Welcome to Yuba City. All of his work to date has premiered at the Philadelphia Live Arts Festival. Geoff is a core teacher at the new Pig Iron school in Philadelphia. His work has been supported by the Independence Foundation, the Philadelphia Theatre Initiative, the Wyncote Foundation, US Arts International, the Princeton Atelier and the New England Foundation for the Arts. He is a 2006 Pew Fellow and is a 2009 Creative Capital grantee. He is a graduate of Stanford University, and trained in physical theatre at École Jacques Lecoq in Paris, France.
Norman Taylor taught at the École Internationale de Théâtre in Paris for 20 years. He teaches with MTS in New York each summer and all over the world giving Master Classes in Lecoq's approach. Prior to this, he was a student of Lecoq's himself, first as an actor and then as a student of his pedagogy. From 1998 - 1999, Norman was the Pedagogical Coordinator at the school. He now teaches Lecoq's techniques throughout Europe and Latin America and is on faculty at the renowned Lassaad International School Theatre in Belgium. www.lassaad.com