Michael Wilson's 2024 Actor Workshops
Following an enthusiastic response to director Michael Wilson’s summer and fall workshops (Acting Tennessee & Acting Modern Masters), Wild Geese Gallery is thrilled to welcome Michael back for two unique evening workshops this spring.
The first workshop, Long Day’s Journey into Night (May 14th - 18th) will be an exploration of the intensely autobiographical masterwork by America’s only Nobel-Prize winning playwright, Eugene O’Neill.
(photo by Charlie Erikson)
Ellen Burstyn as Mary Tyrone in
Michael Wilson's Alley Theatre / Hartford Stage production of Long Day's Journey Into Night
The second workshop, Talking Pictures (June 11th - 15th), centers around Michael's longtime collaborator, Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Horton Foote, with his poetic human comedy.
(Photo by Bruce Glikas/FilmMagic)
Michael Wilson & Horton Foote at the Broadway opening for Dividing The Estate November 20, 2008
Each workshop culminates in a script-in-hand Open Rehearsal Presentation before an invited audience. An Observer Track ($100/ workshop) is also offered for each session — highly recommended for writers, directors, and actors considering the class.
Workshops are limited to 12 Actors and 10 Observers
Workshop Schedule
May 14 - 18
Eugene O'Neill's - Long Day's Journey Into Night
EVENINGS: Tuesday - Friday: 6pm—10pm
SATURDAY: Noon - 10pm
Open Rehearsal Presentation: Saturday May 18th, at 7:30pm
June 11 - 15
Horton Foote's - Talking Pictures
EVENINGS: Tuesday - Friday: 6pm—10pm
SATURDAY: Noon - 10pm
Open Rehearsal Presentation: Saturday May 18th, at 7:30pm
Michael Wilson
Artistic Director, Theatre
MICHAEL WILSON (SDC, DGA) is a Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle award-winning director working on Broadway, off-Broadway, and at major theaters across the country.
On Broadway, he directed the 2013 revival of Horton Foote's The Trip to Bountiful starring Cuba Gooding Jr., Condola Rashad, Vanessa Williams and Cicely Tyson, who won the Tony Award for Best Actress. Other Broadway productions include the 2012 Tony Award nominated revival of Gore Vidal's The Best Man (starring Candice Bergen, James Earl Jones, John Larroquette, Angela Lansbury, Eric McCormack, Michael McKean and John Stamos); the Tony nominated Best Plays Dividing the Estate (starring Elizabeth Ashley, Hallie Foote and Gerald McRaney); and Enchanted April (starring Jayne Atkinson and Molly Ringwald), for which he earned his first of two Outer Critics Circle nominations.
Wilson made his screen directoral debut with the 2014 Lifetime/Ostar television film adaptation of The Trip to Bountiful, which was nominated for two 2014 Emmy Awards -- including Outstanding Television Movie - as well as a DGA Award for Outstanding Direction of a Movie or Mini-Series for Television. Among the film's many awards are the 2015 NAACP/Image Awards for Outstanding Actor (Blair Underwood) and Outstanding TV Movie, and the Gracie Allen Award for Outstanding Ensemble Cast, which included Keke Palmer and Clancy Brown.
His first indie film, the award-winning Showing Roots (produced by Michael Mailer Films in association with Bill Haber, starring Uzo Aduba, Maggie Grace, and Elizabeth McGovern) was acquired by Lifetime where it had its television premiere in 2016.
Off-Broadway, his production include Signature Theater Company's revival of Arthur Miller's Incident at Vichy starring Richard Thomas, which was subsequently filmed by BroadwayHD (2015); Desire, the Acting Company's premiere bill of plays by Elizabeth Egloff, Marcus Gardley, Rebecca Gilman, David Grimm, John Guare, and Beth Henley based on short stories by Tennessee Williams; Roundabout's revivals of Landford Wilson's Talley's Folly starring Danny Burstein and Sarah Paulson (2013) and Tennessee Williams' The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore starring Olympia Dukakis (2011); and the epic three-part, nine-hour Orphans' Home Cycle.
Internationally, he directed both parts of Tony Kushner's Angels in America for the 1995 Venice Biennale.
Recent projects including the American Repertory Theatre revival of The Night of the Iguana starring Bill Heck, Dana Delaney, James Earl Jones, and Amanda Plummer (2017); CTG/Ahmanson Theater's Los Angeles premiere of Grey Gardens: The Musical starring Betty Buckley and Rachel York (2016); and the Alley Theatre workshop of the new musical Tender Mercies (2018).
Treasurer of SDC since 2015, Wilson was Artistic Director from 1998-2011 of Hartford Stage, where he commissioned and developed the Pulitzer Prize winning Water by the Spoonful by Quiara Alegria Hudes.
