An Actor Performs

Integrating text analysis and techniques for using actor's experience and imagination to approach performance gives this first-edition text unique relevance. Equally useful to beginning, intermediate, and advanced students of acting, it addresses problems common to all actors: understanding the text, finding it a viable interpretation, dealing with the language of the play, and using one's body and mind and imagination to create a fully realized performance.

Mel Shapiro is a director, playwright, and a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles.. His directing credits include Broadway production of Two Gentleman of Verona (winner of a Tony and NY Drama Critics Award for Best Musical) original off-Broadway production of The House of Blue Leaves (winner of the NY Drama Critics Award for Best American Play), and Vaclav Havel�s The Increased Difficulty of Concentration for Lincoln Center Repertory (winner of an Obie for Best Foreign Play). His recent work includes direction of John Guare�s Marco Polo Sings a Solo at the Signature Theater and Taming of the Shrew for the New York Shakespeare Festival.