Although I’ve been teaching acting for over 30 years, there’s much more to my story. During that time, I’ve worked successfully as an actor as well as a director. I was the Artistic Director of the 65th Street Theater, Co-Founder of Performing Actor’s Studio. 

During my Seattle days, in addition to running a theater while teaching, I also had a casting company with Fern Orenstein (now VP of Casting for CBS).  We cast numerous commercials, theatrical,  V/O and print while co-leading several talent searches in the Northwest for ABC. 

When I returned to LA, I continued casting, acting and teaching. In lieu of opening my own casting company, I opted to worked as a session director for some of the busiest casting directors in town, such as Lisa Fields, Danielle Eskinazi, Ava Shevitt, Sheila Manning, Laray Mayfield to name a few.  It was the years I spent in casting that inspired my work in The Language of the Face.  It was then that I realized the hardest thing for the majority of actors to do was to come up with a real, recognizable reaction on demand.   

For over the past 14 years, I’ve dedicated my life to studying and understanding the science we now have on emotions and how it applies to artistic expression. I’ve done this by studying the work of  leading researchers in the field of emotions. This study, I believe, has given me great insight to not only how we express emotion, but the various reasons as to why some people may fail to to do so. 

Developing the Language of the Face and the classes that go along with it has been my quest and passion.  I have also kept busy, publishing several articles in trade papers as well as my blog on various topics including The Language of the Face, as well as the craft of acting, and self-esteem for actors...  

What I pride myself most for in my teaching process is that I give my students more than just tips and tricks, but the very real, applicable tools they need to increase their level of skill. This gives them the confidence to achieve their goals, which translates into having a successful acting career. 

My philosophy has always been to take in the whole actor in order to Educate, Inspire and Empower...

My holistic approach is not just for actors, but anyone who has a passion to go beyond what they think is possible. John is available as a speaker, guest lecturer and one-on-one consultant not just for people who want to be better actors, but those in the multiple “face-to-face” sectors of business who need and want to be better and more real and vibrant communicators.

When I have spare time,I can be found noodling on my guitar, piano and honing the world’s greatest recipe for pesto.