Robert Moyer – Improvisational Theatre Pioneer

Robert Moyer has devoted his life to playing and teaching Improvisational Theatre with Viola Spolin and Paul Sills. He tells his improv story about when he first met Paul Sills and later worked with Viola Spolin.

Robert and I met at Spolin workshops with Aretha Spolin Sills. His accomplishments are inspiring and after a long career of acting, directing, and teaching, he took up performance poetry in 1998 and has since won many poetry slams, including the 2011 and 2012 Poetry Slams conducted by the Poetry Council of North Carolina. He also won an honorable mention in the 2012 Free Verse(written) competition held by the Poetry Council. In 1999 he won a Head to Head Haiku Slam and began writing haiku in earnest.

Robert began publishing in 2005 and has since had hundreds of poems published in major haiku journals including Modern Haiku, Frogpond, Simply Haiku, Bottle Rockets, and many others. He has been anthologized widely, most notably in the tenth-anniversary collection of Acorn, and the seventh cycle. For the past 22 years, he has been the theater artist-in-residence, and resident poet at the Arts-Based School, a K-8 charter school that integrates the arts into the teaching of the standard course of study. He conducts projects in a variety of areas including, but not limited to, poetry, puppetry, history, Shakespeare, sequencing, stories, and, of course, theater.

Part 2. ROBERT MOYER – IMPROVISATIONAL THEATRE PIONEER

Our fascinating interview with internationally recognized artist Robert Moyer focuses on his relationship with Carol and Paul Sills and their gifted daughters. Bob shares Viola and Carol’s love of children and for the past 22 years, he has been the theater artist-in-residence, and resident poet at the Arts-Based School, a K-8 charter school that integrates the arts into the teaching of the standard course of study. He conducts projects in a variety of areas including, but not limited to, poetry, puppetry, history, Shakespeare, sequencing, stories, and, of course, theater.

Mr. Moyer founded and directed the United Stage, a participation story theater company, while teaching creative dramatics both undergraduate and graduate as well as theater at Grand Valley State University (MI). That company over the years has performed for audiences numbering over one million, including appearances at the Smithsonian Institution (6 times), the John F. Kennedy Center for the Arts, and the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Mr. Moyer has directed over 50 productions using the non-verbal, non-psychological approach developed by Spolin. He co-founded and served as chairman of the International Performing Arts for Youth for six years.

You might want to listen to my fascinating discussions with other improv teachers and innovators including Colin Mochrie and Anne Beatts *Improv Interviews podcast‘ is introduced by Susan L. Parker of yourinternationalvoice.com

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