These women of the arts hail from different disciplines, but they all have an indomitable spirit and a luminescent spark that makes them amazing human beings who are out there every day, doing amazing work.

Today we continue our series with Diánna Martin.

Of course you’ve heard of Diánna Martin – she’s one of our contributors!  But her connection to The Happiest Medium started in a much different place … back with The Oath: I was a reviewer for Neighborbee, and I was left emotionally drained by her performance as Deck.  I later met her socially at a few of the Off Off Broadway industry events before I was lucky enough to snag her as one of our writers here.

Now she is a dear friend, but in terms of the acting community she is so much more … She is the name and the face behind Martin Acting Studios – a legacy handed down from her father, Ernie Martin.  Today, we celebrate Diánna the actress, and the acting coach who is carrying on the tradition she was born into.  Here is her story.

Talk to me about being a woman who does what you do- just overall.

I come from an entertainment family. I was always a little ham who had a gift of gab and an outgoing personality…and a very active imagination. My life was a series of acting classes; life lessons were told many times with a preface: “Ya see, Diánna, it’s like in acting…” and I learned about Strasberg and Meisner technique and was on film/television sets and theatre rehearsal techs before I learned how to swim or ride a bike. I intended to be a writer, winning creative writing awards in high school and doing poetry readings in college; but I was always coming back to performing or being involved in entertainment, and eventually realized I had a gift for teaching. This has led to a personal renaissance over the last few years with my putting up shows with other artists, becoming involved with three dynamic and vibrant theatre companies, writing for this brilliant site (after a wonderful period of writing for The Fab Marquee), and becoming a staff member and judge for the Innovative Theatre Foundation. It’s all been fantastic.

My mother, Ann Wedgeworth, is a Tony-award-winning actress of film, stage, and television who studied with Sandy Meisner; my father, Ernie Martin, was one of Lee Strasberg’s top teachers and has gone on to have a nearly 40 year career thus far in teaching with a roster of students that fill the front rows of the Oscars (Dad, now 80, still coaches professional name actors who take time off from shoots for a refresher).

I love what I do. It’s a passion that grows the more I teach, the more I talk about acting, the more I am involved in the creative process or watch others do so. I literally fell into my parents footsteps on all counts…my mother is blown away that I’m directing more and more  shows and readings now…(she wasn’t surprised about the acting or the teaching), and so is Dad. They come to everything I do. It wasn’t a choice for me…it was something that just became – it was an evolution, actually. Hey, I’m an artist, not a businessman, and I’m still learning how to get that part right…*laugh*…but it’s been brilliant the way that people have jumped on board. Whether it’s to offer advice on how to set up class packages, to help me set up my game plan for a school, to my buddy Michael Marwit designing my logo, Antonio Minino helping me figure out a PR strategy, or students (beginners to professional actors) contacting me to study. It’s a blast when people recognize that you are someone whose opinion is valuable, whose knowledge of the craft and eye for human behavior is matched with an ability to express it to others in a way that can make a significant contribution. When people ask what I do, and I list all the arts and entertainment I’m involved with, or have been involved with (for five years I worked in live television and was a radio DJ) they are interested; when I say I teach, they often seem surprised when I say acting is the subject (unless they are in the business). Even then, there is a quality of “you teach acting?” that makes me laugh; I suppose it’s because I’m such a kid…some people equate a teacher as a more stoic figure than what I think one should be. If you are teaching people a craft where they have to follow their impulses and express their emotions, then it should be a much looser, more freeing environment.
I joke that I’m like the Jack Black from School of Rock meets a helluva lot of experience in the field of acting. I can talk academic from here until next week, but I find that a less formal approach blended in heavily is the best way to bridge the gap between an actor trying to learn a craft who is stuck in their head, and one who is free with their work.

I teach a combination of Strasberg and Meisner technique that was handed down to me by my father, and tweaked with all the glorious information I gathered from the other brilliant teachers/coaches I’ve studied with…molded into my own way of sharing it and exercises I think are appropriate for the students individually. Topped off with a sprinkling of my own personality, of course. Every moment I learn something new is, for me, valuable; I look at it as “how can I incorporate this into my teaching” if I find it helpful. This applies to everything, including martial arts training I’ve started this year learning Muay Thai. A fellow teacher felt the same way when he started Jiu Jitsu…It’s not like I’m going to teach my students how to do Thai kickboxing, but how can I get them to free their mind and relax their body so their intrument can be free to work, while still being focused on their objective?

Sometimes I do have a maternal instinct with my students, no matter if I’m teaching teens or adults…a den mother, if you will. Other times it’s simply as a mentor. For me, being a woman has nothing to do with it…it’s just being a creative human. But I may be way off base.

Are there days it makes a difference – good or bad?

Only if I haven’t had my coffee.

Are there barriers you fought against in the past that are now becoming easier?

I think my barriers are different than for some other people…as well as the open roads. Any issue I have had to deal with wasn’t so much about my being a woman, but about the apprentice/journeyman manner in which I learned to follow as a teacher, my pedigree and people’s prejudice in comparing me with my father. If you have a Master Acting Teacher/director as a father and an incredibly successful and brilliant actress as a mother, the standards are rather high (which is a good thing). However, sometimes people assume that you have fallen into this profession due to contacts or simply due to an unrealistic view of how good you are at what you do. There are a few who either studied with my father or know my parents who were quick to say “well, you’re no Ernie!” in relation to my teaching. The irony is that I have never said I was – I am simply his daughter who absorbed his lessons from teaching my whole life whereas many others only learned them in the studio. Although I quote him constantly, as he quoted Lee, and relate stories of what both my parents experienced to illustrate situations and concepts to students, I have my own style and my own way of teaching that works. I have my own methods, but I have taken the best seeds of knowledge from who taught me, and in the manner of any other journeyman/disciple I utilize what I learned. I’ve learned from fellow teachers and students of my father’s (like my friend, teacher/actor David Robinette) or from friends in the business (such as playwright/directors Alex Dinelaris and David Stallings) as well as my experiences with my students. It’s all a process. It’s teaching a craft, and in doing so there are also exercises and ways to teach it that have been proven incredibly effective, if you have an understanding of how that knowledge works. Some facilities/institutions I have taught prefer a specific degree for their teachers, for they don’t recognize the passing of the torch that many successful teachers have learned from outside of academic institutions. I find that frustrating, but not an insurmountable obstacle.

I have been rather fortunate, however. These “barriers” or issues have usually not been the case. People recognize that I do know what I’m talking about, that I have successfully taken the torch my father gave me to teach, and that I do have a gift for teaching and getting ideas across to students that can improve their work tremendously. Way more often than not, my pedigree is anything BUT a barrier; it has opened doors and people’s acceptance to at least listening to what I have to say. Then, once I have established my way of teaching and the craft I have to share, they decide if it’s for them or not.

The men that you interact with – do they treat you as an equal?

Most of the men that I meet in this profession have been tremendously helpful. I think that it’s rather telling that all of the people I have mentioned (who are but a few of the wonderful people who have helped me grow) with exception of my Mother (who offered a wonderful amount of insight about Sandy’s approach as well) are men. I think I have been very fortunate to know such gifted and giving individuals.

I think that the profession of teaching acting lends itself to more open-mindedness amongst people than not. There have been many female acting teachers, and one of the main schools of thought that came out of the Group Theatre was Stella’s. Women acting teachers offering important contributions to actors working today is not a new or novel concept.

That said, like most other professions, it is a bit of a boy’s club. I don’t think so much in the sense that women have to prove themselves but that there are simply more men teaching acting/running acting schools than women. But that seems to be changing. I can’t speak to issues such as any discrimination in purchasing space, long-term facility rental etc, or business practices, for I rent my space out from other facilites such as Night Owl Studios and The Abingdon Theatre Complex to teach (unlike my father who had a 5,000 sq. ft theatre/studio complex).

I was teaching before I knew I was going to actually start a business, and since I’m coming at it from the artistic point of view, I admit that I’m still figuring out all the logistics. I am a bit of that nutty professor. But there comes a point when you look to the people who have done it before you (and most of them are men, at least the ones that I know) and say “Hey, man – how did you do this? How did you make it work so you teach a solid craft AND actually walk away covering your expenses?” Hey, it’s all a learning process. I marvel at the men and women who have been able to create an acting school and have it rise like a phoenix. I am just trying to find the happy medium of how to do it effectively as a business for a continuous long haul.

I find men sometimes don’t know what to make of me. They have I have ways of expressing myself artistically and to my students that are not conventional ways a woman is “supposed to talk”. There are expressions I use that make me sound sometimes like a younger version of my father from the 70s when he taught for Lee. Many times I have heard from people who studied with both of us, who said they could hear my father as I spoke. It’s not my intent to sound like wee Ernie, but “Can you dig it?” is as much a part of my vocabulary as “Does that make sense?” and since I’m in the moment and expounding on things that I’m passionate about, it comes across.

Between teaching, acting, directing … writing … volunteering!  So much!  Tell us what’s up next for you Diánna.

In regards to acting itself, I think it’s important for actors and actresses to realize that no matter how good they are, they can never watch themselves work…so it’s still important to check in and get advice if you trust the source of the information. Al Pacino still studied and was coached by Lee after he became “Al Pacino” and I think it’s important, the same way a musican practices their instrument or a singer scales, an actor has to be on top of their instrument. No matter who they study with, it’s always good to go over the basics. I find this as an actress myself.
And it doesn’t matter what school of thought, ultimately, you choose. We all have our favorites that we utilize, but it’s always good to have a well-rounded craft and to keep in mind that we never stop learning – quantity, quality – and variety. Even if it’s to say “okay, that’s groovy, but it doesn’t work for me.” As long as you are passionate and you make the most out of a craft – and work hard at a craft, if it works for you, then mazel tov – it won’t matter what it is if it gets you where you need to be.

In regards to my current work: I took some time off this past year from teaching my private classes to focus on acting, directing, and my health but still taught at Hunter College and did private coaching. During that time I performed and directed three shows and two readings. I am currently in a play that opens at the June Havoc Theatre April 14, The Family Shakespeare by David Stallings, and then immediately after that I am directing Jim Tierney’s Carry On in June for Planet Connections. I will be starting class again this Fall, though, regardless of my acting/directing commitments; I have been itching to open a new monologue/scene study class for some time, especially in response to many students’ requests. I’ve been asked to do a few seminars as well, and will have my Hunter classes again, and hopefully a reading series I have been looking at getting underway for a long time will finally come to fruition…so Spring and Fall are going to be busy…as usual! I am getting everything in gear to focus on my school again, and find a way to juggle it with all the other commitments in the field that I have…for I often feel like something is missing when I’m not teaching my own class. I look forward to this coming year as I learn how to balance all of it, just taking it moment to moment.

Related Posts:

• Delving Into DARK WATER With Diánna Martin
• Coyote On A Fence – FREE Staged Reading – 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• A Day In The Life … “The Family Shakespeare” By The Numbers
• Special Edition Giveaway – Fringe Edition
• An Interview With The Creative Team Behind “Banshee Of Bainbridge” (Fringe Festival 2010)

The final bow for The 2010 National NewBorn Festival was Sunday, and it was anything but uneventful. After reservations soared, the last two days of the festival were hosted in a different venue, giving the staff including myself extra work to schlep everything from one place to the other. The recipient of The Audience Favorite Award that received a second reading on Sunday was Carol Carpenter’s Good Lonely People. For those of you that don’t know about “NewBorn” it is the flagship program of the Off-Off Broadway theatre company MTWorks, showcasing new plays taking place and/or inspired by other regions of the US. I was honored to perform and be under the direction of The Happiest Medium collaborator Diánna Martin in A Home Across the Ocean, by Louisiana playwright Cody Daigle.

If you missed “Part 1″ or need a refresher click here.  As promised, “Part 2″ is focused the directors of NewBorn: Dev Bondarin director of Slip/Shot, Annie G. Levy director of Good Lonely People, Hondo Weiss-Richmond director of The Faithkiller, and Diánna Martin director of A Home Across The Ocean.

Artistic Director David Stallings, Vice-Chair Ann Marie Yali & Antonio Miniño at the Opening Reception of "NewBorn" | photo credit: Robin Madel

AM- When did you know directing was your calling?

(Dev Bondarin – Slip/Shot) Once I started directing in college, I knew that it was the part of theater-making to which I was most drawn. If I had to pinpoint a moment when I knew it was “my calling”, it would have to be when I directed a production of Tom Stoppard’s Hapgood for my undergraduate senior thesis. It is a thrilling play and was the first time I remember being proud of my directing work.

(Annie G. Levy – Good Lonely People) I was in my first directing class in college and we were copying the spacial composition of famous paintings. Once we had recreated the painting using actors, we would spin the composition around and see how the emotional effect of the composition would change based on how it was oriented in space. This was possibly the coolest, most mind blowing thing I had ever seen. Space had meaning. Space told stories. I was hooked.

(Hondo Weiss-Richmond – The Faithkiller) I’ve known that I wanted to direct since college, but I had flashes of this awareness even earlier- when I discovered that the areas of the production I was interested in extended past the appropriate territory of whatever role I was playing.

(Diánna Martin – A Home Across the Ocean) I actually started off as an actress, and I still act; but over time I began to teach acting and direct as well. Although I took directing classes in college (both here and in London) as well as acting, I learned about directing from my father, acting teacher/director Ernie Martin, and from wonderful directors I worked with as an actor.  I enjoy working with other actors in a myriad of ways, and directing is, to me, another art form that allows me a symbiotic relationship with the work, with the actors, and with the audience.

AM- Describe your play in one sentence:

(Dev Bondarin – Slip/Shot) A senseless act forces a group of people from different backgrounds to reexamine their “place” in the world in an attempt to redefine their future.

(Annie G. Levy – Good Lonely People) On the eve of the 2008 presidential election in rural south eastern New Mexico, a handful of Democrats come together to try to collectively cheer on change.

(Hondo Weiss-Richmond – The Faithkiller) The friends, lovers and enemies of three versions of the same super-hero must decide what they believe in and whether or not to fight for it.

(Diánna Martin -  A Home Across the Ocean) The dynamics of family, love, and loss effect everyone as five people weave their way through the medium that is the human condition.

AM-What makes your point of view stand out from the rest?

(Dev Bondarin – Slip/Shot) I am interested in creating a meaningful theater experience, one that challenges audience members to rethink preconceived notions or assumptions, while also telling a good story. As a director I am empowered to find the truth in the characters’ relationships to serve as a mirror for audience members to see themselves in a new light.

(Annie G. Levy – Good Lonely People) As a New Yorker, I have always been surrounded by people who think the way I do, politically. So my point of reference seems out of place in the world of the play. I am trying to be aware of that distance in creating a world that is not so “other” for the audience.

(Hondo Weiss-Richmond – The Faithkiller) Since I mainly direct new work, serving the play, and its point of view, is usually my priority.

(Diánna Martin – A Home Across the Ocean) I just work with actors in a way that gives them as much freedom as possible to follow their impulses. I approach directing with the eyes of an actress and an acting teacher as well as the vision of a director. I focus on getting actors to really deal with each other as they would in real life – for what are characters in a play? They are people in a set of given circumstances trying to live their lives with what is going on around them. So I focus a great deal on organic behavior between actors so that the moments they have together are not forced but come from true impulses that they have in the given situation.

AM-Whose work do you admire-inspires you?

(Dev Bondarin – Slip/Shot) I am always inspired by good writing: Tom Stoppard, John Guare, David Lindsay-Abaire, Itamar Moses. And a few of the directors I admire include: Kate Whoriskey, Diane Paulus, and Daniel Sullivan.

(Annie G. Levy – Good Lonely People) Caryl Churchill, Mary Zimmerman, Ariane Mnouchkine are all touchstones for inspiration.  But I am continuously inspired by work I see, either be artists I think I know or an out of left field who are these guys and where did they come from? companies.

(Hondo Weiss-Richmond – The Faithkiller) I recently worked with Daniel Aukin and Melissa James Gibson; I really admire them and their work together.

(Diánna Martin – A Home Across the Ocean) In regards to theatre there are many, but for one, Mike Nichols. I remember seeing the original Hurlyburly back in the 80’s, and the play had a profound effect on me.  Then there’s Sam Shepard -  over a period of a month got to see him direct  A Lie of the Mind because my mother was in it. Ernie Martin’s directing of Orpheus Descending at the Actors Studio in the 80’s was incredible. I also really love Alex Dinelaris – he directed me in Hello Out There .  Will Frears, who directed Alex’s Still Life is someone to keep an eye on.  Another would be Robert Falls, who blew me away with Talk Radio.

AM-What do you hope the audience will walk away with after this reading?

(Dev Bondarin – Slip/Shot) A sense of how we are all creators of our own stories and that we all have not only the ability but also the opportunity to make change.

(Annie G. Levy – Good Lonely People) A better understanding of who we consider the American “other.”

(Hondo Weiss-Richmond – The Faithkiller) It would be great if The Faithkiller audience left with compelling questions about the relationship between religion and media, as well as a sense that they’d spent an enjoyable evening at the NewBorn Festival.

(Diánna Martin – A Home Across the Ocean) I want them to feel that these characters share the same human condition with emotions and feelings about their lives and those around them. They deal with love, anger, humor, and sadness, all for different reasons and from different points of view. My hope is that the audience feels they were just given a glimpse into another world – and also one that they are a part of.

AM-What other projects do you have lined up in 2010?

(Dev Bondarin – Slip/Shot) I am currently directing a production called Snapshots with Prospect Theater Company. The piece is comprised of seven new short musicals, each by a different writing team and each written about a turning point in the life of a single character. I am also collaborating with a playwright on a one woman show called Letters to Clio which deals with the personal struggle of a mother coming to terms with the kidnapping of her daughter and her transformation into a member of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo who protested the Dirty War in Argentina.

(Annie G. Levy – Good Lonely People) I am directing Cloud Nine at Pace University, where I am an adjunct professor of Directing. I am also directing an adaptation of The Merchant of Venice and a new dramatic exploration about the Myth of Persephone.

(Hondo Weiss-Richmond - The Faithkiller) Next I’m directing a short play for Sticky, at the Bowery Poetry Club, and then I am assistant directing one more show at Playwrights Horizons: A Cool Dip in the Barren Saharan Crick, written by Kia Corthron and directed by Chay Yew.

(Diánna Martin – A Home Across The Ocean) Directing-wise, I have some projects in the pipeline going to do some readings of revivals that I adore: Kennedy’s Children, Coyote On a Fence, The Sign In Sidney Brustein’s Window, and Vieux Carré.  I’m also going to be working on my acting and building my acting school, Martin Acting Studios, while trying to support the theatre companies that I’m a member of. I’m just going to take it one day at a time and see what happens.

***

We shall see what next “NewBorn” bring and what shows MTWorks’ plans on including in their Season. We leave you with a clip of one of the directors inspirations, Mary Zimmerman as she discusses Arabian Nights.

Related Posts:

• Ever Seen A “NewBorn” Play? (Part 1)
• The Real Thing – Where Art Meets Life
• Women’s History Month: Celebrating Women In The Arts – Spotlight On Diánna Martin
• You’d Be A Fool To Miss “Fool For Love”