Inside A.C.T.

By Claire L. Wong The first teacher Radhika Rao encountered was her grandmother, and she saw how far a teacher’s love and influence can reach. “She loved education and her students so much,” says Rao. Growing up in New Delhi, India, Rao remembers being in an elementary school play. But it wasn’t until college that she sought out the drama club. Her first job out of college was teaching theater, and she’s continued acting, directing, and teaching theater ever since. For the past eight years, Rao has been working as a teaching artist and arts integrator in the Bay Area. She uses theater tools and techniques to further conversations about topics including family, the environment, vaping, and the Black Lives Matter Movement. Rao works with people of all ages to engage them creatively, emphasizing empowerment and happiness in their art and daily lives. Her local work has included A.C.T., San Francisco Shakespeare Festival, TheatreWorks, New Conservatory Theatre Center, Stanford Univer...

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. Rising Voices participants share a laugh on a writing project. Photo by Dameion King. “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 nonprofi...

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...

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 k...