Ingo Normet, Estonia
I studied directing from 1964 to 1969 in Lunacharsky Theater Institute in Moscow (GITIS) and from 1980 to 1984 MA level in Theatre Academy in St.Petersburg.
I staged more than 120 productions in theatres in Estonia and Finland as well as TV plays. (Shakespeare, Moliere, Miller, Beaumarchais, Williams, Ibsen, Vampilov, Horvath, Beckett etc)
I gave workshops in Finland, Greece (Olympia, with World-Wide Congress of I.U.T.A. 2003) Belgium, GB, Berlin.
From 1996 to 2011 I was head of the Drama school of Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, now professor emeritus. I am actually teaching acting and directing students in Bachelor and MA levels.
I wrote some books about theatre and methods of teaching. (Theories by Stanislavski, Brecht, Diderot, Anatoli Efros, Lee Strasberg, Augusto Boal etc)
Basic Acting
Activities with imaginary objects.
All students are divided into pairs and make the exercise of putting on and taking off their shoes. Half of them make the exercise; the others observe and call attention to imprecision. The exercise is repeated a number of times and then the students change their roles. It is more efficient when all the students work together. The ones, who are observers, train themselves to notice fine nuances.
At the beginning it is important to be aware of the mechanism of our muscles. We feel energy in this concentrated action, because objectively we can´t see anything, but with perfect movements and precise imagination there arises a feeling of truth.
Later, more complicated exercises with additional psychological tasks will come. (to whom he is writing the letter; is the letter about love or about leaving; she is sewing on a button and hears on the radio, that the correct time is an hour more than on her wrist-watch, now she must finish her job twice as fast etc.)
Drunkenness
This is a very effective exercise for balance, relaxation and coordination. Naturally our purpose is not to give prescriptions of how to play drunken people. We want to become aware how, by researching balance, coordination and relaxation we can perform different behaviors.