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In 1935, Sanford Meisner, one of the greatest acting teachers of the 20th Century, joined the acting faculty of the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre. In 1940, he became head of the acting program. It was here that the world-renowned Meisner Technique was born.
Acting School founded by Martin Barter and Sanford Meisner. Teaching the Meisner Acting Technique properly since 1995. Full Meisner Acting Technique training.
Sanford Meisner (August 31, 1905 – February 2, 1997) was an American actor and acting teacher who developed an approach to acting instruction that is now known as the Meisner technique. [1]
- Overview
- Early life, introduction to acting, and the Group Theatre
- Teaching, the “Meisner Technique,” and later work
Sanford Meisner (born August 31, 1905, Brooklyn, New York, U.S.—died February 2, 1997, Sherman Oaks, California) was an actor and one of the most influential teachers of acting in the United States after World War II (1939–45). His students acted on the screen and the stage across the United States using what had become known as the “Meisner Techni...
Sanford Meisner was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Hermann and Bertha Knoepfler Meisner, both immigrants from Hungary. He was the eldest of four children. Hermann Meisner was a furrier, and the family lived in the Bronx briefly before returning to Brooklyn. When Sanford was 5 years old, his younger brother died of bovine tuberculosis, contracted from drinking unpasteurized milk during a trip a couple of years earlier to the Catskill Mountains, which the family had taken in an attempt to improve Sanford’s health. His brother’s death, and the reaction of his parents, who believed it would not have happened if they had not needed to go to the Catskills for Sanford’s health, strongly influenced Sanford’s life, as he felt tremendous guilt and became withdrawn.
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Meisner wanted to be an actor from an early age, but as a child he also found comfort in playing the piano. He graduated from Erasmus Hall High School in 1923 and enrolled in the Damrosch Institute of Music (now part of the Juilliard School) to pursue additional musical studies. However, he also decided to try his hand as an actor and secured a scholarship to the Theatre Guild School of Acting. During his time there he met Lee Strasberg, Harold Clurman, and Cheryl Crawford. The four of them, along with Stella Adler, were among the original members who launched the famed Group Theatre.
In 1935 Meisner was recruited by the Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theater in Manhattan to teach, though he did not think of himself as a teacher. He built upon the method of acting popularized by Konstantin Stanislavsky, and Meisner became head of the acting department there by 1936.
Meisner encouraged his students to study their emotions, as Stanislavsky’s inward-looking method did. Meisner also insisted that actors need to react to other actors on stage in order for performances to be fresh and real. The director Elia Kazan reportedly said, “Take it from a director: if you get an actor that Sandy Meisner has trained, you’ve been blessed.”
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Among Meisner’s students were Robert Duvall, David Mamet, Jon Voight, Diane Keaton, Lee Grant, Gregory Peck, Grace Kelly, and Steve McQueen. While he was teaching full-time, Meisner continued to act and direct. In 1955 he directed a revival of William Saroyan’s Time of Your Life on Broadway that was critically acclaimed.
In 1958 Meisner moved to become the director of the new talent division of Twentieth Century–Fox studio. He appeared in films, including The Story on Page One (1959) and a film adaptation (1962) of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Tender Is the Night. He returned to New York in 1962, where he began teaching at the American Musical Theater Academy. Also that year, he met James Carville. The two began a relationship and remained together for the rest of Meisner’s life; they also adopted a son whom they met on the island of Bequia (in the West Indies country of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines), where they had established a second home.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Feb 2, 1997 · Sanford "Sandy" Meisner taught acting for over 60 years. He was one of the original members of the legendary Group Theatre. He continually innovated in his classroom as he searched for the most simple, direct, and effective way to train each individual actor in the difficult craft of acting.
Jul 17, 2024 · An in-depth guide to the Meisner technique—including famous Meisner actors, a history of Sanford Meisner, and how to use his repetition acting exercises.
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Born August 31, 1905 and raised in Brooklyn, New York, Sanford Meisner graduated from Erasmus Hall in 1923. He went on to attend The Damrash Institute of Music (now Juilliard). While there, he studied to become a concert pianist.
