March 10th Joanna Gleason Musical Theatre Performance Master Class

Tony Award-Winner Comes to Teach at

Riverside Theatre Works March 10, 2007

Recent star and Tony-nominee of Broadway's musical hit, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and winner of the Tony AWard for her role of the Baker's Wife in the original Broadway production of Into the Woods, Joanna Gleason appeared at Riverside Theatre Works. Ms. Gleason taught a 4-hour musical theatre performance master class with students of Riverside March 10th, 2007.

"Please know right now that this class will not be about performing," said Gleason to open the master class, "this will be about connecting." Gleason went on to answer questions from the audience which was made up of performers, theatre producers, cabaret artists and scriptwriters. She discussed her life on Broadway as well as her philosophies on how performers whould have as rich a life as possible in order to make their performances rich enough on stage. "We care too much about ourselves these days, we need to make this about other people."

Joanna Gleason has been a long-time star of Broadway and has had countless roles in television and film (The West Wing, Boogie Nights, Friends, Mr. Holland's Opus). "She is such a gift for Riverside, "said artistic director Tara Brooke Watkins who met Ms. Gleason back in November and subsequently arrange the master class. Gleason worked with each student for approximately 20 minutes, listening to them sign a ballad, asking them questions about their character, then giving them tasks to do to bring out the honest feelings inside them.

"It was one of the most exciting things that could have ever happened to us," said student performer Kevin Joyce.

"It was so impressive to see her work to intentionally with each of these students," said a parent. "She could have just come in with an attitude of 'you're lucky to be in my presence,' but she wasn't that way at all."

Joanna Gleason also spoke about how important it is that these students learn about the support system of the theatre world. "We need costume designers, stage managers, sound technicians, scriptwriters, lighting designers much more than we need more actors." RTW trains all of their teenagers in each of the above fields, then creates apprenticeships for those who truly show promise in these areas. "That is so important for this field and for them," said Gleason.

Ms. Gleason remarked as she left on Saturday, "[Riverside] really has some talent coming out o f[their] doors."