OUR CLASSES

ALEXANDER TECHNIQUE

The greatest obstacle to truthful acting is often unnecessary effort.

A More Available Instrument

Every actor develops unconscious habits.

Physical tension. Restricted breathing. Poor alignment. Holding. Bracing. Trying too hard. Over time, these patterns become so familiar that they feel normal.

The Alexander Technique helps students recognize these habits and gradually replace them with greater awareness, coordination, and efficiency. As unnecessary effort falls away, the actor discovers an instrument that is more responsive, more expressive, and more available to spontaneous experience.

Presence Under Pressure

Professional performance places extraordinary demands on the actor.

Auditions. Rehearsals. Film sets. Live performance. These situations often activate tension that limits freedom and creativity.

Throughout the two-semester progression, students develop practical somatic tools that help regulate the nervous system while remaining grounded, present, and connected under pressure. Rather than fighting stress, actors learn how to work with it, allowing greater ease, confidence, and responsiveness in demanding creative environments.

Learning Through Experience

Alexander Technique is not an intellectual study. It is an embodied practice.

Working individually, in small groups, and through guided hands-on instruction, students explore movement, posture, breath, and coordination while developing greater awareness of how habitual patterns influence both everyday life and artistic performance. As the work progresses, students begin applying these principles directly to rehearsal and performance, discovering how physical freedom enhances concentration, imagination, emotional availability, and truthful behavior.

Freedom Without Force

At Maggie Flanigan Studio, we believe truthful acting cannot be forced.

The Alexander Technique reinforces this philosophy by helping actors trust that greater freedom comes not from working harder, but from interfering less.

Students learn how to:

Recognize unnecessary physical tension
Improve balance and alignment
Develop greater ease in movement
Deepen breath awareness
Increase physical coordination
Support nervous system regulation
Perform with greater freedom under pressure

These skills extend beyond acting, creating healthier patterns that support both artistic work and everyday life.

Part of the Complete Conservatory

Alexander Technique complements every aspect of the Maggie Flanigan Studio curriculum.

As actors simultaneously study Acting, Movement, Voice, Breathwork, and Self-Care for Actors, Alexander provides another pathway toward developing a fully integrated instrument. The work supports vocal freedom. It supports physical release. It supports emotional availability. Most importantly, it teaches actors to recognize when they are standing in the way of their own creative process. Sometimes the greatest artistic breakthrough comes not from adding something new. But from removing what no longer serves you.

The Art of Ease

The Alexander Technique is not about perfect posture. It is about living and working with greater awareness. When unnecessary effort falls away, the actor becomes more grounded, more present, and more capable of responding truthfully to imaginary circumstances. That freedom is not only valuable on stage and in front of the camera. It is valuable throughout a lifetime of artistic work.

Alexander Technique is a two-semester progression consisting of twenty-four classes offered across the Fall and Spring semesters.

Actors spend years trying to "do" more. This results in trying harder, pushing emotionally, forcing the voice, tightening the body, or attempting to manufacture experience. Ironically, these habits often create the very tension that prevents truthful behavior.

The Alexander Technique offers another approach. Rather than teaching actors what to do, it teaches them what to stop doing.

At Maggie Flanigan Studio, Alexander Technique is a two-semester progression designed to help actors cultivate greater ease, presence, balance, and freedom by releasing habitual patterns of physical and mental tension that interfere with truthful performance.

CONTACT

Address:

147 W 25th St 5th Floor
New York, NY 10001

Phone:

(917) 794-3878
(332) 262-7852
(917) 768-3852
(917) 606-0982

Email:

studio@maggieflaniganstudio.com

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ACTING STUDIO NEW YORK NY

The Maggie Flanigan Studio is the leading acting studio in New York City where professional actors train for long careers. The acting programs at the drama school are based on the Meisner Technique and the work of Sanford Meisner. The two year acting program includes acting classes, movement classes, voice and speech for actors, commercial acting classes, on camera classes, cold reading, monologue, playwriting, script analysis and the Meisner Summer Intensive.

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(917) 794-3878

STUDENT TESTIMONIALS

“I was placed in the intense reigns of Charlie Sandlan. I became a better artist, actor, friend, sibling and daughter because of the studio. Even now, I crave the studio every day. What I learned is present in my work every day. I truly believe in everything they stand for.”

Jes Macallan

“Maggie taught me that I could control my work, my acting, and to throw all of the bullshit out that I had in my head about ‘what I should be doing’ and to just listen and respond honestly, in the moment. She gave me a craft. She is, quite simply put, THE BEST.”

Leslie Bibb

“Maggie Flanigan taught me the true meaning of artistry, passion, and professionalism. I am certain that I continue to work as an actress because of my training with Maggie. At every audition and every performance, her guiding voice is with me. It is a gift beyond measure.”

Andrea Anders

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LANE KWERDIS

Lane Kwederis is an AmSAT-certified Alexander Technique Teacher and Somatic Experiencing Practitioner (SEP) whose work helps actors cultivate greater presence, ease, and freedom in both performance and everyday life.