Inside A.C.T.

by Livian Yeh

Led by our Community Programs Manager Stephanie Wilborn, A.C.T. has started a brand-new partnership with Community Works, an Oakland-based nonprofit that provides programs for people impacted by incarceration throughout the Bay Area, both in-custody and in the community.

“I’ve always wanted to collaborate with them,” says Wilborn. So when a colleague forwarded an email from the organization, she leapt at the opportunity to connect. The admiration turned out to be mutual. Her counterpart at Community Works, Lynn Aylward, happens to be a longtime A.C.T. fan. The two met for coffee, and Stephanie offered A.C.T.’s support of their theater program.

Rising Voices, the initiative managed by Aylward, is the brainchild of CW Founder and Executive Director Ruth Morgan. It focuses on young women (ages 18 to 25) who are currently or recently incarcerated, and fits within the nonprofit’s broader program for transitional age youth who are at risk of incarceration or in the process of …

By Claire L. Wong and Alejandra Maria Rivas
Summer Brown comes from a loud family in Richmond, Virginia. “Growing up the youngest of four, it made me a big observer in how people operate,” says Brown. “My family members were definitely my first scene studies.” Brown is a third-year student in A.C.T.’s MFA Program and is nearing graduation. While studying theater at University of Maryland, College Park, one of her professors told her about A.C.T.’s Summer Training Congress, which she completed the summer before her senior year. “I remember during that summer was the first time that I called my mom and said, ‘Mom, I’m gonna be an actor.’” Since she had decided to purse acting as a career, Brown auditioned for graduate schools, and came to A.C.T. after undergrad.

Summer Brown. Photo by Deborah Lopez.
What has your last year in the Program been like? Starting this third year with Top Girls [A.C.T.’s season opener at the Geary Theater], I was figuring out what it is to be in a professional r…

By Claire L. Wong
For nearly two months, A.C.T. MFA students have been learning from home, an adjustment that takes mental energy and creativity. The faculty and staff members have been adapting to digital teaching and rehearsing, while maintaining as much normalcy as possible. “It’s meaningful to have structure and to create during this uncertainty,” says A.C.T. Conservatory Director Melissa Smith. “The need to connect is fundamental to being human and through connection we evolve and become more empathetic.”

The cast and creative team of A.C.T.'s MFA production of Rough Magic, directed by M. Graham Smith, rehearse over Zoom.
Many MFA students have returned home or are living with family while sheltering in place, which poses challenges—and opportunities—to rehearsing. “I moved home to Utah for the quarantine,” says Grace Fojtik. “I’m returning to the place of play where I’d spend hours in my backyard pretending to be a spy or an explorer. Tapping into that kid-like imagination ha…

By Claire L. Wong and Alejandra Maria Rivas
Sarah Traisman (she/they) loves running. She loves its goal-oriented training and its meditative quality. And she loves hosting a dinner party. Traisman, a third-year student in A.C.T.’s MFA Program, is weeks from graduation. She grew up in Chicago and attended undergrad at Vassar College. For two years afterward, Traisman lived in New York, trying the audition circuit. Then she decided she wanted more training under her belt.

One of her best friends was already at A.C.T., and when Traisman learned about A.C.T.’s emphasis on citizen artistry, she was drawn to the MFA Program. “There’s something to be said about a community that is interested in you,” says Traisman. “A.C.T. showed a lot of interest in who I was.” Now, three years later, Traisman has recently performed her senior solo show (over the video conferencing platform Zoom). We spoke with her about her experience in A.C.T.’s MFA Program.


Sarah Traisman. Photo by Deborah Lopez. 
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