The following are excerpts from Pentacle’s July 26, 2022 Newsletter
Jo created the Acting Workshop in 1981. She has trained and inspired, by conservative estimate, over 2,000 students. Her impact there has been profound, enhancing the lives of her individual students and growing the theater’s cadre of actors and directors. The number of shows, students and contributions tell only a small part of the story.
Jo’s most important gift lies in the intangibles. She helps us expand our sense of our collective humanity and the variety of the human condition. She does this by producing moving theater. She directs with insight and clarity, finding the subtext and human truth for each character on stage, which she also teaches in this Acting Workshop.
Jo insists that her students collaborate not compete. She makes the class a place of trust and growth. She helps her students act by finding the truth not relying on the gimmick and in so doing they discover truths about themselves. She insists they learn the script word for word, without paraphrasing. Most importantly she helps her students learn that most fundamental aspect of human connection, to trust and support each other.
