Paper Mill Playhouse Opens Senior Acting Workshop Today

A new Senior Players Acting Workshop, emphasizing creation of one person plays, will be offered from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon for 20 weeks beginning today, September 10 at Paper Mill Playhouse under the guidance of stage, television and movie veteran Ed Schiff.

Paper Mill Playhouse Theatre School Director Mickey McNany will reserve space for actors 55 years of age and up for Mr. Schiff's acting workshop. To register and for information, call Ms. McNany at (973) 379 3636, extension 1669. The cost for the 20-week session is $285.

"The Senior Players is one of our most exciting acting workshops and Paper Mill Playhouse is proud and honored to welcome to our family Ed Schiff, a long-time favorite on stage, screen and television," said Ms. McNany.

Mr. Schiff is a show business veteran with over 200 professional credits in film, television and movies as an actor, director, playwright and producer. He has also taught acting, directing and theater history in conservatories and universities, most recently as the Resident Professional Theatre Associate at Cornell and as the Distinguished Artist at Bergen Community College.

The Senior Players Workshop will see the actors work through basic acting exercises and evolve into one person plays through positive guidance from Mr. Schiff.

"The 'reality of doing' is one of the basic tenets of truthful acting and the participants in the Senior Players Workshop will find great fun and stimulus in the 20 weeks of 'doing' stage presentations," said Mr. Schiff.

Mr. Schiff's professional acting credits range from Broadway (The Black Picture Show) to major motion pictures (War of the Worlds) to daytime television (One Life to Live) to primetime TV (Grapevine) and most recently to documentary work as Andrew Carnegie on the History Channel's The Men Who Built America and the Biography Channel's Ernest Hemingway.

He has directed more than 50 professional productions on stages from ranging from Off-Broadway (I Hate Hamlet) to regional theater (The Redwood Curtain) to university theater (The Good Doctor) to local professional productions featuring the likes of Tovah Feldshuh, Broderick Crawford and Robert Morse.

Mr. Schiff has been artistic director of five Actors Equity Association professional theaters including the Robert Morse Theater in Point Pleasant Beach and Hollywood Performing Arts in Hollywood, Florida.

In the regional theaters, Mr. Schiff also taught acting for student workshops ranging from young people to teens to seniors.

He also created "First Stage: The Playwriting Incubator" for aspiring playwrights, Seminars on Shakespeare, Seminars on Modern Drama, "Auditioning for Professionals and Aspirants" and "The Director's Lab" for hopeful stage directors.

Mr. Schiff's philosophy of teaching, directing and acting is "always stay positive. The good director and acting teacher never says anything negative - he has to find a positive way of improving things or just keeping his mouth shut until he finds a way to improve the elements."

"There is no room for negativity in our business," Mr. Schiff noted.

There will be limited enrollment, so students are urged to reserve spaces in the Senior Players Acting Workshop as soon as possible. To register and for information, call Ms. McNany at (973) 379 3636, extension 1669.