Deirdre McLaughlin
Personal Details
Abstract
Emotional Memory: An Exploration of the Actor’s Inner Life On the Stage and In the Mind investigates the following questions:
- How are actor training methods influenced by cognitive science and neurophysiology?
- Do our current methodologies for acting emotions pull from old science? How might we update them to incorporate new discoveries in neuroscientific investigation of subjective mental states?
Profile
Deirdre is a trained actor, director and dramaturg from the United States. She has completed nationally recognized apprenticeships at theatres throughout Pennsylvania, New York and Massachusetts and worked with companies including Williamstown Theatre Festival, New York Stage and Film, Powerhouse Theatre, Pittsburgh Playhouse, Quantum Theatre, New Voices for the Theatre and SPARC.
She is also the Artistic Director of Well-in-Hand and co-creator of their premiere work Laughter Clinic, a participation-based installation experience that explores the role of laughter in our personal health and daily lives.
Research interests include: interdisciplinary research methods for actor training, neurological theories of aesthetic experience, participatory art, new methodologies for creating devised and collaborative theatre, and the translation of Stanislavsky across cultural borders.
Publications
2009 REMIX: Re-Defining the ‘Original Play’, Postgraduate Conference, Central School of Speech & Drama