Part of Elysian's Ensemble Series, training dedicated to collaboration, ensemble buidling, and collective creation
What becomes possible when we stop trying to be remarkable by ourselves?
Viewpoints—created by choreographer Mary Overlie and further developed by theatermakers Anne Bogart and Alexandra Billings—is an improvisational practice of listening, surrender, and possibility. It is a revolutionary call for performers to shed habits of control and allow themselves to both see and be seen—forming the basis of collaborative creation and artistic trust. In this class, we will use Viewpoints, mask work, and collaborative devising experiments to cultivate deep, full-bodied listening, kinesthetic responsiveness, risk, play, and the intimacy it takes to be changed by one another.
This is not a class about erasing the individual; instead, it is about bringing everything we are—our obsessions, histories, faults, instincts, and desires—and placing all of it into one shared bowl of ingredients. What becomes possible when highly individual artists begin to think, feel, and create as a living organism? When we shed the ego that keeps us contained and isolated, can we make room for something new? Perhaps the most radical thing any artist can do is surrender to something larger than themselves—and in doing so, discover parts of themselves they never could have reached alone. This is a class for actors, clowns, dancers, musicians, writers, performance makers, and anyone else longing to step beyond the limits of the solitary imagination and discover what an ensemble can become.
There is nothing more revolutionary than the ensemble. Because when we come together to make art, there is no telling what might happen.
Thursdays (please note, there will be no class on Thanksgiving, 11/26)
October 22nd, October 29th, November 5th, November 12th, November 19th, December 3rd
6pm-9pm
in the Skunk Room
About the instructor
Meera Rohit Kumbhani is an actor, clown, and teacher with over fifteen years of experience working across television, film, and theater. Her work as a clown has made her the actor she is and her work as an actor informs the clown she is. Her television credits include series regular and recurring roles on FOX’s Weird Loners and USA’s Donny!, and appearances on Julia, This Is Us, The Lincoln Lawyer, Shameless, Wonder Man, and more. Her film work includes The Best You Can opposite Judd Hirsch,, Uncorked, A Futile and Stupid Gesture, and indie cult favorite Dave Made a Maze. Onstage, she has originated roles in multiple world and Off-Broadway premieres and performed with companies including Classic Stage Company, Ensemble Studio Theater, Playwrights’ Horizons, Ma-Yi, La Jolla Playhouse, and American Conservatory Theater. She holds an MFA in Acting from Columbia University, where she trained with Kristin Linklater, Olympia Dukakis, Anne Bogart, and Larry Singer.
As a clown, Meera has trained for over 15 years under Christopher Bayes and John Gilkey and performs monthly at the Elysian in the ensemble show Cruel Babes.
As a teacher and private coach of nearly a decade, Meera is on faculty at The Last Acting Studio and The Idiot Workshop, teaching scene study, on-camera acting, viewpoints, and clown. A two-time graduate of the National Alliance of Acting Teachers’ Teacher Development Program and a self-professed “pedagogy nerd”, she brings a wide range of techniques—including Linklater, Meisner, Viewpoints, Michael Chekhov technique, Demidov, and Stanislavski—into her work, and has taught acting and clown in various communities including prisons, shelters, and migrant farmworker communities.
Class cancellation policy: No refunds, exchanges, or transfers.