Classes and Workshops
Steve Nallon offers classes and workshops for drama schools and colleges across various aspects of performance. ‘Finding Your Voices’ is a particularly popular workshop, demonstrating how to discover and then develop the full dynamic range of the actor’s voice. Other acting and drama coaching classes include comedy of manners and storytelling. For writers, Steve offers a workshop on the techniques of exposition, plus classes on story craft and structure. Steve has also worked as a theatre director and script editor.
Theatre Talks
As well as his classes and workshops, Steve offers a series of theatre talks on theatre history, comedy performance, myth and story, and musical theatre. These are by title ‘Farce Comedy and the Plays of Plautus’, ‘What Makes an Audience Laugh?’, ‘The British Musical’, ‘The Restoration Actor’, ‘The Broadway Musical’, ‘The Stand-up Comedian’, ‘Myth and Story: PETER PAN’, ‘The Musical Theatre of George Gershwin’, and ‘The Musical Theatre of Stephen Sondheim’, . Summaries of each can be found in Theatre Talks.
Individual Voice Coaching
Steve works as a one-to-one voice coach with performers on productions where they have been asked to play real-life characters. Credits here include Harrogate Theatre, Foursight Theatre/Warwick Arts Centre, and Catherine Bailey Limited/Michael Grandage Company (MGC) for their production of WHEN MAGGIE MET LARRY broadcast on BBC Radio Four.
Broadcasting
As well as his classes and workshops, Steve offers a series of theatre talks on theatre history, comedy performance, myth and story, and musical theatre. These are by title ‘Farce Comedy and the Plays of Plautus’, ‘What Makes an Audience Laugh?’, ‘The British Musical’, ‘The Restoration Actor’, ‘The Broadway Musical’, ‘The Stand-up Comedian’, ‘Myth and Story: PETER PAN’, ‘The Musical Theatre of George Gershwin’, and ‘The Musical Theatre of Stephen Sondheim’, . Summaries of each can be found in Theatre Talks.
Visiting Lecturer
For many years, Steve was a Visiting Lecturer at the highly respected Drama Department of the University of Birmingham. The Birmingham drama course was especially noted for its belief in understanding the acting craft through practical work with professional performers. During his time at the department, Steve ran numerous workshops and sessions as part of the undergraduate programme, as well as offering a wide variety of lectures and seminars. He also directed plays as part of the undergraduate programme. Former students who went on to have successful film and television careers include the actors Tom Riley and Matthew Goode.
Steve’s specialist teaching areas while at the drama department included voice, storytelling, stand-up comedy, musical theatre, Greek drama, and comedy of manners. The comedy-of-manners acting style module led to the research article ‘Fun and Games with Noël Coward: A Practical Way into the Coward Style for Young Actors’, which includes summaries of the various classes and exercises, as well as extracts from post-class diaries written by students. ‘Fun and Games with Noël Coward: A Practical Way into the Coward Style for Young Actors’ is now downloadable as a PDF.
