starting next Saturday
Online seminar
The Actor as Storyteller
5 meetings
Sat 31 Jan + Sun 01 Feb at 15:00 – 17:30 UTC+1
Sat 07 Feb + Sun 08 Feb at 15:00 – 17:30
Sat 28 Feb 2026 at 15:00 – 17:30
plus 3 individual consultation session
Rediscover a well-known art form
The concept of narrative is omnipresent today. Let’s just call it storytelling and get back to the core of our profession. Sometimes we forget the power and the impact. It is the very simplicity that holds surprises in how storytelling can be used in the creative process.
Firstly, this course looks at storytelling as a basis for approaching a role, creating a character and as a rehearsal method or play development. In the next step, we will explore storytelling as a most beautiful art form. So many interesting approaches and techniques. So many acting challenges! So many possibilities for wordplay and mind games. A feast for every actor!
Explore the Power of Words and Images
Storytelling is the uninhibited freedom of the fantasy. However, we need experience and know-how to allow it to flourish and find its way to the listener, where it in turn triggers multiple fantasies. We will explore and try out different principles of storytelling; in monologue, in dialogue, as an ensemble.
In this context we will also talk about “myth”. How do we discover modern or ancient myths in the texts in front of us? How do we invent and tell new ones? How do we transform myths into stage language?
Another topic cannot be ignored in this context: the significance of the “image”. No story and no stage action can work without the inner image of the storyteller. What does that mean in practical terms? Can I train the ability to imagine? Yes. But then there is another step: how do I arrive at my personal artistic image as an all-encompassing guide?
Take your own way to your story
The course is designed so that we first discuss the many fundamental questions together, learn new approaches and innovative techniques, and undertake numerous practical exercises and experiments together. Two weekends, four sessions in total, are planned for this.
Then everyone will embark on their own journey, exploring the various possibilities, implementing them artistically, developing them further, combining them freely and thus finding their own story. This process will be accompanied by three individual sessions.
After a month, we will meet for a finale, where we will tell each other our stories and reflect on the work.
and share this story in an intensive artistic encounter with colleagues from all over the world.
See you!
Christine Schmalor
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World Theatre Training Institute AKT-ZENT
Research Centre of the International Theatre Institute
+49 30 612 87 274 | akt.zent@berlin.de
World Theatre Training Institute AKT-ZENT / ITI