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Acting I - First Year Meisner Technique
Acting I is the foundation of Maggie Flanigan Studio and the beginning of a profound artistic transformation. Over nine months, actors develop the habits, discipline, imagination, and truthful responsiveness that become the foundation of a professional creative life. Through Sanford Meisner's extraordinary progression, students learn to stop performing and begin behaving truthfully under imaginary circumstances. The goal is not simply to become a better actor, but to develop a reliable artistic process that can sustain a lifetime of creative work.
Acting I comprises the complete first year of the Sanford Meisner Technique. Beginning with the simple Repetition Exercise, Meisner's brilliant progression evolves over nine months into a deep, rich, and sophisticated improvisational process. Every exercise builds upon the previous one, training the actor to listen deeply, respond truthfully, trust impulse, and create vivid human behavior rather than manufactured performance. By the end of the year, the fundamentals of truthful acting become second nature.
Most untrained actors struggle with the same fundamental problems. Their attention is on themselves instead of their partner. They anticipate instead of listening. They manufacture emotion instead of allowing experience. They indicate behavior rather than living truthfully. Physical and vocal tension restrict spontaneity, while a lack of process leads to conventional, predictable performances.
The first year of Meisner training systematically replaces these habits with a disciplined artistic process rooted in concentration, imagination, spontaneity, emotional truth, and genuine human connection.
Returning to the Artist
Picasso famously said, "All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once you grow up."
Every one of us has been parented, socialized, and educated. These experiences are necessary for functioning in the world, but they often distance us from the qualities essential to artistic expression.
Fear of conflict. Difficulty expressing anger. Feeling undeserving of joy. The need to please others. A reluctance to take up space. Years of self-consciousness and insecurity become obstacles to truthful behavior.
The first year of Meisner training gently and systematically chips away at these defenses in a safe, demanding, and supportive environment. Students learn to listen deeply, respond personally, return their concentration to the other person, reconnect with imagination and impulse, and function freely from every aspect of their temperament.
The work is not therapy. It is artistic training. The goal is to develop an actor capable of living truthfully and courageously under imaginary circumstances.
Applying the Work to Text
Meisner understood that improvisational exercises have little value unless they can be applied to dramatic literature.
At three different points throughout the first year, students transition from the exercise work into scene study, applying everything they have developed directly to text. Through three increasingly demanding rounds of scenes, actors discover how truthful improvisation breathes life into written dialogue.
Rather than delivering line readings or predetermined interpretations, students learn to improvise freely within the structure of the script, allowing behavior to emerge organically from truthful moment-to-moment experience.
Text ultimately becomes the actor's playground.
Learning to Craft
A cornerstone of the Meisner Technique is learning how to craft.
Throughout Acting I, students develop a clear, practical process for creating previous circumstances, acting relationships, shared circumstances, and emotional preparation that is simple, specific, and deeply personal.
Craft is what gives life to imagination.
Without specific crafting, behavior becomes generalized and predictable. With it, actors create rich inner lives that fuel vivid, spontaneous behavior. This fundamental process becomes the foundation for all future work at Maggie Flanigan Studio and throughout an actor's professional career.
The Foundation of a Professional Actor
The first year of Meisner training transforms not only how actors perform, but how they observe, imagine, listen, collaborate, and engage with the world.
Acting I is more than an introduction to acting technique. It is the beginning of learning how to think, imagine, observe, and live as an artist. The habits developed during these nine months become the foundation for every class, rehearsal, audition, and professional opportunity that follows.
For actors seeking serious conservatory training rooted in discipline, truth, imagination, and artistic excellence, Acting I is where that journey begins.
STUDENT TESTIMONIALS
“This school has completely changed me, as an actor and as a person. Charlie will make you dig down deep inside yourself and find things you didn’t know were there. I wouldn’t give this experience back for anything.”
Marco Bettencourt Urbina
“Charlie and Maggie are in my opinion, two of the top Meisner teachers in the country. I’m proud to be an alum of MFS and I consider the studio home.”
John Bermudez
“Rarely does a day go by that I do not take note of how far my classmates and I have come in our short time at the studio. This program has transformed me as an actor and overall person.”
Charlie Westfal
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ACTING STUDIO NEW YORK NY
The Maggie Flanigan Studio is the leading acting studio in New York City where professional actors train for long careers. The acting programs at the drama school are based on the Meisner Technique and the work of Sanford Meisner. The two year acting program includes acting classes, movement classes, voice and speech for actors, commercial acting classes, on camera classes, cold reading, monologue, playwriting, script analysis and the Meisner Summer Intensive.
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OUR CLASSES
Acting I
Acting I is the foundation of Maggie Flanigan Studio and the beginning of a profound artistic transformation.
CHARLIE SANDLAN
Charlie’s unique relationship with Maggie Flanigan began over twenty-five years ago. He received his MFA in acting from Rutgers University, Mason Gross School Of The Arts where Maggie and Bill Esper trained him in the Meisner Technique. Over the past 30 years Charlie has also studied and collaborated with many artists including Ben Kingsley, Fiona Shaw, Mark Wing-Davey, and Ellen Stewart.
