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Artistic Director Ron Biegnski pioneered a unique process for developing creative, emotional flow. His work at Free Street Theater earned international recognition. Free Street developed employment programs for teens in 1992 and consistently employed teens in theater making jobs throughout his tenor. The process developed skills for virtuous artist while also instilling habits for healthy, happy, bold lives. As Ron's work with teens grew, he also shared his philosophy with other directors and encouraged them to use his philosophical structure to make it their own as they added their individual skills and passions to their work.
Developing virtuoso actors doesn't start with acting exercises -- it starts with virtuoso creative humans.
Our acting training starts with this idea: Focus on your breath and whatever physical activity you are doing. As you focus on the breath and the activity, stillness emerges in your mind. No thought, negative or positive. As you focus on breath and activity, your heart opens and your body fills with emotion like a vase filling with water. Your breath is alive. Your body resonates like a violin with emotional breath. And yet there is stillness in your mind. Stillness is not nothing- it is an opening.
In other acting classes, talent was always that thing some people had when they walked into the class. If you didn't have it when you walked in, you didn't have it when you walked out. Artistic Director Ron Bieganski has developed a physical way of working that develops talent as a natural physiological process.
We define talent as the ability to react intimately (emotionally open), immediately (reacting instantly, both emotionally and physically) and spontaneously (reacting in your own unique way) within an imaginary situation. Understanding talent in this way means that these are skills that can be developed. By developing these skills which lead to deeply creative virtuoso performers, we are also developing as awake, joyful, whole human beings.
Developing Talent
Talent was always the thing some actors brought with them when they walked into class. I also noticed that if you didn’t show talent when you walked in you didn’t have it when you walked out. I wanted to work with students in a way that would develop every one’s “talent” each and everyday they came into class.
Our idea of talent comes from distilling many concepts into an essential form. Talent is the ability to react intimately (emotionally open), immediately (instantly, both emotionally and physically), and spontaneously (in your own naturally unique way) within an imaginary situation. By this definition, talent can be developed. And by developing this talent, we are also developing the skills to become a vibrant, happy human being.
With this definition of talent, I can work with youth and be very clear about what we are going to work on.
If you approach talent for an actor as Intimate, Immediate and Spontaneous you will notice that the students who thought of themselves as better than others are now coming down a little and the students who thought of themselves as inferior can see that they have the ability to develop. Working in this way gives the ego less room to get in the way.
Our initial work approaches the idea of acting from a non-performance place. We do a lot of physical work that develops the concept of release within our student's bodies. Release is a letting go of your muscles, while energizing yourself with breath. While developing release, we also work on stillness of the mind.
This stillness is not zoning out or an inner focus. This stillness is a simple clarity, where your awareness is outward, where worded thought is quieted and the ego is diminished. This allows the student to explore performance as a natural by-product of being alive in the moment.
Emotional work is not introduced until students have a grip on the ideas of stillness, what it is like to be non-judgmental, and what it means to be simply living in the moment.
-Ron Bieganski, Free Street Artistic Director
Developing virtuoso actors doesn't start with acting exercises -- it starts with virtuoso creative humans.
Our acting training starts with this idea: Focus on your breath and whatever physical activity you are doing. As you focus on the breath and the activity, stillness emerges in your mind. No thought, negative or positive. As you focus on breath and activity, your heart opens and your body fills with emotion like a vase filling with water. Your breath is alive. Your body resonates like a violin with emotional breath. And yet there is stillness in your mind. Stillness is not nothing- it is an opening.
In other acting classes, talent was always that thing some people had when they walked into the class. If you didn't have it when you walked in, you didn't have it when you walked out. Artistic Director Ron Bieganski has developed a physical way of working that develops talent as a natural physiological process.
We define talent as the ability to react intimately (emotionally open), immediately (reacting instantly, both emotionally and physically) and spontaneously (reacting in your own unique way) within an imaginary situation. Understanding talent in this way means that these are skills that can be developed. By developing these skills which lead to deeply creative virtuoso performers, we are also developing as awake, joyful, whole human beings.
Developing Talent
Talent was always the thing some actors brought with them when they walked into class. I also noticed that if you didn’t show talent when you walked in you didn’t have it when you walked out. I wanted to work with students in a way that would develop every one’s “talent” each and everyday they came into class.
Our idea of talent comes from distilling many concepts into an essential form. Talent is the ability to react intimately (emotionally open), immediately (instantly, both emotionally and physically), and spontaneously (in your own naturally unique way) within an imaginary situation. By this definition, talent can be developed. And by developing this talent, we are also developing the skills to become a vibrant, happy human being.
With this definition of talent, I can work with youth and be very clear about what we are going to work on.
If you approach talent for an actor as Intimate, Immediate and Spontaneous you will notice that the students who thought of themselves as better than others are now coming down a little and the students who thought of themselves as inferior can see that they have the ability to develop. Working in this way gives the ego less room to get in the way.
Our initial work approaches the idea of acting from a non-performance place. We do a lot of physical work that develops the concept of release within our student's bodies. Release is a letting go of your muscles, while energizing yourself with breath. While developing release, we also work on stillness of the mind.
This stillness is not zoning out or an inner focus. This stillness is a simple clarity, where your awareness is outward, where worded thought is quieted and the ego is diminished. This allows the student to explore performance as a natural by-product of being alive in the moment.
Emotional work is not introduced until students have a grip on the ideas of stillness, what it is like to be non-judgmental, and what it means to be simply living in the moment.
-Ron Bieganski, Free Street Artistic Director
develop the body and the mind will follow.
train the body to be the way you want your mind to be. instantly reacting, inspired. awake |
Fundamental Value of Non-autobiographical Work
Why is the creation of original material an essential part of all of Free Street's programs? • Respecting the "private" segments of our lives while empowering our youth with real skills • Youth Psychologists say one of the main problems when youth are confronting a difficult past is to move forward even a little bit, not to be stuck in a moment. To emphasize a single "victim" moment that a youth would "perform" over and over, even if a "positive conclusion is found within the performance" is not a healthy way of dealing. There is actually a beneficial element to doing this physco-drama work; we just feel that turning it into a performance is not beneficial to the participants. Psychodrama work like that should be done as group therapy is done, in a safe protected place without an audience... without lights and applause to confuse the issue. • The developmental age of the youth we work with (ages 11-19) begs to be creating original material. The ability to take what is your life at this moment and shape it into what you want it to be is essential in the development of the whole individual. Taking your own experiences, feelings, thoughts and shaping them into "new original stories" reinforces the skills that you need to become the person you wish to be. • As an adult working with youth it is our responsibility to make sure the work we are doing does not exploit our youth's private backgrounds for the sake of what the adults think funders want or what adults think the audience wants. We are leaders and must make decisions that are healthy for our youth. We must really re-think what "empowerment" is and that self-esteem is nothing but smoke up your butt if you are not teaching real skills with it. "I am somebody," means very little when you have few skills to become the kind of person you want to become. Note: As Ken Vandermark, MacArthur Genius award winner emphasized in his workshops with Free Street, the ability to create something never seen or heard before is a "language skill." And like any language, if you learn the process early enough in life it becomes automatic or instinctual. The creative skill becomes a 'first' language, not a 'second' language where you have to translate the unknown while you are in process. |
"Had she anything to engage her tremendous curiosity
and her gift for metaphor, she might have exchanged the restlessness and preoccupation with whim for an activity that provided her with all she yearned for. . . Like any artist with no art form, she became dangerous . . . " - Toni Morrison, Sula "Use your genius mind.
Settle for nothing less than that mad idea in the back of your brain." - Ron Bieganski |
Free Street offers a two-year training program that develops a creative foundation that enables the student to become a virtuoso artist. During the two years the student will experiment in-depth with emotional flow, character creation, contact improvisation, yoga, script development, vocal quaility, breath control, creative writing for live performance, and diving deeply into work to make quick bold choices.
"Free Street is unique--the leaders of Free Street are as dedicated a group of people working with young artists as I have witnessed. That they regard the teens with whom they work AS artists is central to the mission and the methodology of their work. " - Martha Lavey, Artistic Director Steppenwolf Theatre
“I decided to fly to Chicago and take a look at the group. I was not only surprised but I was amazed. I remember feeling a bit distraught in the beginning. I think what happened is that I've never seen such an organization at work. Everything at Free Street spoke about equality. Students are actually treated as artists. The staff at Free Street trusts its students. They have free access to all the rooms; they can even use the Director's computer to write their stuff- the feeling you do not get at Free Street is that it is free for all - or disorganized. We get the feeling that people care so much that they consider their youth part of a team. This is much more than just teaching acting - which they do in high standards. This is, actually, allowing the students to feel that they are fully accepted in this professional environment. This is not easy mission to accomplish. I know that these kids do not come fresh to Free Street ready to behave that way. Which means that this is part, an important part, of their training.
Observing one performance by Free Street I confess I was not amazed to see the naturalness of the kids' performance, the ease in their bodies and voices, the aliveness of everything they presented, and the excellent quality of their imagination and creativity. I was not surprised because of what I had seen it hanging around the offices. The standards are everywhere in Free Street. Nothing feels phony. There is no 'Do what I say and do not what I do.'
We are proud to have them as collaborators and we collaborate with them the same way they do with their students. Free Street is a source of magic inspiration, of wonderful creativity, and of real equal treatment.”
- Carlos Caldart. Director of the Stella Adler Acting Studio Teen Program. Carlos visited Free Street after reading the article in American Theater Magazine. This visit was sparked a partnership in with Stella Adler in which Ron and some of the Chicago teens taught NYU students, Ron became a program adviser as Stella Adler developed their teen programs, and the Stella Adler teens adapted and preformed a Free Street's "Mad Joy" in New York
Tom Copenhagen, President and Director Stella Adler Studio of Acting, NYC
“I first learned about Free Street through an article in American Theater Magazine profiling actor training programs around the country. The article began with a quote from Ron Bieganski, Free Street's artistic director, which read, "Developing virtuoso actors doesn't start with acting exercises -- it starts with virtuoso creative humans". The implications of this statement together with the rest of the article were so great to me I became an immediate admirer of Free Street, of their methodology and of the mission to train low-income high-risk youth. As Stella Adler's grandson I recognized, in Free Street's emphasis on an actor's humanity, an important element of my grandmother’s insight and spirit about acting theater and life. Having recently begun our own Stella Adler Outreach Program I reached out to Ron Bieganski for guidance and advise which he most willingly and generously gave. He has visited the Stella Adler Studio of Acting and he with the help of a few of his advanced students has taught at virtually every level of our Studio to the great benefit of our students.
The world of actor training is infinitely richer, deeper, and more humane with Free Street in it. Free Street is able to perform with great success the miracle of art education, to humanize through self-expression and craft. The fact that Free Street seeks to give this gift away for free to those who can't otherwise afford it at a time when the federal, state and city budgets for such education are corroding, makes Free Street all the more vital to America and to the world of actor training.”
Details of the work created can be seen on the Performance page
Articles about the process: