Throughout the year, the directors from REP's mainstage productions will each present a one-off masterclass. Topics will be chosen by each director with limited paid spots available for each session. So, if you see a masterclass you like below, best book in quick!
If you have any questions please email studio@canberrarep.org.au or call (02) 6257 1950 or (02) 6247 4222.
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UPCOMING MASTERCLASSES
Coming soon.
PRICING
Member — $38
Non-member — $50
All sales are subject to a $4 per transaction Telephone Booking Fee
Online Bookings available closer to the event date.
PAST MASTERCLASSES
Text Analysis with Karen Vickery — 6:30pm, Monday 8 May 2023 — CLICK FOR DETAILS
Elements of a Scene with Alexandra Pelvin — 11am, Sunday 2 July 2023 — CLICK FOR DETAILS
Learning from the Theatrical Past with Cate Clelland — 7pm, Monday 7 August 2023 — CLICK FOR DETAILS
Style & Genre with Aarne Neeme AM — 6:30pm, Thursday 31 August 2023 — CLICK FOR DETAILS
Text Analysis with Karen Vickery
Presented by REP Studio
DETAILS
Date: Monday, 8 May 2023
Time: 6:30—8:30pm
Location: Canberra REP Theatre
ABOUT THE CLASS
The enemy of fine acting is generalisation.
In this small-group masterclass, Karen will introduce concepts for how an actor can interrogate the script to find keys for a detailed performance. You will apply these concepts to work on a Shakespeare monologue and a piece of modern text.
ABOUT KAREN
Karen is an award-winning actor and director and the founder of Chaika Theatre, part of ACT Hub Canberra. She has a Bachelor of Arts with Honours and First Place from the University of Melbourne, a Bachelor of Dramatic Art in Acting from NIDA, and an MA in Theatre and Film Studies from the University of New South Wales. Karen graduated from NIDA in 1983. She has performed in all media and for a range of companies including Sydney Theatre Company, Belvoir, commercial theatre, independent theatre, ABC TV and radio, film and commercial television. Karen was a lecturer at NIDA from 1996–2011, becoming Head of Performance Practices in 2006.
Since coming to Canberra, Karen has won a number of awards for acting and directing. She has appeared for REP as M’Lynn in Steel Magnolias, Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest, Beatrice in A View from the Bridge, Anna Akhmatova in The Woman in the Window (CAT Award), and Ma Joad in The Grapes of Wrath. In 2020 she directed Brighton Beach Memoirs for REP which saw her receive a Canberra Critics Circle award. In November 2022, Karen was awarded the Helen Tsongas Award for Excellence in Acting at the Canberra Critics Circle 32nd Annual ACT Arts Awards.
Elements of a Scene with Alexandra Pelvin
Presented by REP Studio
DETAILS
Date: Sunday, 2 July 2023
Time: 11am – 1pm
Location: Canberra REP Theatre
ABOUT THE CLASS
Breaking down a scene into its key elements can help you deliver a focused and purposeful performance. In this two-hour small-group masterclass, Alexandra will cover scene analysis techniques actors can use when approaching auditions and rehearsals. You will have the opportunity to apply these techniques in an interactive and practical session.
ABOUT ALEXANDRA
Alexandra is an actor and emerging director and is directing the upcoming production of Home, I'm Darling. For REP, she directed Hotel Sorrento and was Associate Director on To Kill a Mockingbird and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. She also worked as Assistant Director for Mockingbird Theatre’s productions of The Judas Kiss, The Laramie Project, and The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later.
As an actor, recent appearances include: Urinetown: The Musical (Heart Strings Theatre Co); Our Country’s Good, A Christmas Carol, Così, The Art of Coarse Acting, A Doll’s House, One Man, Two Guvnors, and A View From The Bridge (REP); and The Art of Teaching Nothing (Budding Theatre). She has also performed in long-format improv productions, including Chez Colette and Rapt in Felt (Chrysalis Theatre). Short film credits include: Becoming Emma Braintree (Vorfreude Pictures), Sunday and Chuggers (Red Gadget Films).
Learning from the Theatrical Past with Cate Clelland
Presented by REP Studio
DETAILS
Date: Monday, 7 August 2023
Time: 7–9pm
Location: Canberra REP Theatre
ABOUT THE CLASS
We value new and original ideas and theatre techniques, contemporary plays and ways of doing things. And this is a very good thing. But sometimes we forget that theatre practice has a history of over 2,000 years, during which time many styles and methods and many traditions have been developed and explored.
Can a look at past traditions and practices teach us anything about our own theatre practice? Too much has happened in the past to waste all those good ideas, so let’s see how we can use the past to inform our theatre practice now.
In this intensive masterclass you’ll use a combination of text analysis and practical work to investigate example texts from Ancient Greek and Elizabethan theatre. You’ll test how they were performed in their original context to discover what works, before examining how this knowledge might help in staging and performing theatre today.
ABOUT CATE
Cate has qualifications in English and History, Drama, Education, Art History and has a PhD in Drama. She has taught at High School, College and Tech levels, but began to specialise in Drama after coming to Canberra in the late '80s. She began teaching Theatre Studies/Drama at the ANU, where she was for a time Head of Drama, specialising in the theory and practice of Theatre, Theatre History, and Design (Set and Costume).
Her theatre practice includes directing and designing: she is always interested in the way things — texts, performances, ideas — work. She loves all types of theatre and has directed and designed everything from one-act plays to Shakespeare and opera. If she were forced to choose, she would say that serious dramas that get down to the nitty-gritty of human existence are what she most enjoys working on.
She believes strongly in the importance of theatre in our culture and sees theatre as a way of examining our society, a way of holding ourselves up to the light to see what we are really made of.
Cate is the director for REP's 2023 production of Amadeus, playing 27 July to 12 August.
Style & Genre with Aarne Neeme AM
Presented by REP Studio
DETAILS
Date: Thursday, 31 August 2023
Time: 6:30–8:30pm
Location: Canberra REP Theatre
ABOUT THE CLASS
Style and genre underpin every creative choice in the theatre. In this two-hour small-group masterclass, Aarne will introduce the concepts of Style and Genre and their importance to theatre-practice. You will then work together to examine various styles (classic, romantic, realistic, non-realistic) and genres (tragedy, comedy, melodrama, farce, tragi-comedy) to understand how these can contribute to your own theatre-making practice.
Numbers are strictly limited. Early bookings are encouraged.
ABOUT AARNE
Aarne Neeme AM has been working in Theatre for the past 60 years. Mostly as a Theatre Director, but also in Television, and teaching in both Vocational and Academic Drama Schools. His Theatre work covers the whole range of periods and styles, with an emphasis on new writing. He has been associated with Canberra REP for some 30 years with productions including: A Doll’s House (Ibsen); Witness For The Prosecution (Christie); The Threepenny Opera (Brecht/Weill); Arcadia (Stoppard); Don Parties On (Williamson); The Pig Iron People (Doyle); Sly Fox (Gelbart); Black Comedy (Shaffer); Tom And Viv (Hastings); Gasping (Elton); Away (Gow); Tartuffe (Moliere); Just Between Ourselves (Ayckbourn); and Enter A Free Man (Stoppard). His recent production of The Gospel According To Paul (Biggins) has toured successfully around Australia. He has won various awards across the country over the years, and the Order of Australia (AM) in 2013.
Aarne is the director for REP's 2023 production of Mr Bennet's Bride, playing 7–23 September.
