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Reflections

Laura Hicks is a native New Yorker whose first professional job was at the age of 10 in a production of Macbeth for Joseph Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. Ms. Hicks began honing her craft at New York's High School of Performing Arts and later at Juilliard, where she graduated with a degree in drama in 1978. She then spent two years performing with the prestigious Acting Company, a group founded in 1972 by John Houseman and Margot Harley with members of the Drama Division's first graduating class. While on tour, Ms. Hicks performed classic works as well as presented master classes, student matinees, and performance-based workshops of Shakespeare for younger audiences. Since then, she has worked in regional theater, Broadway, Off-Broadway, film, and television. Ms. Hicks won a 1986-87 Obie award for her performance in On the Verge, directed by the late Garland Wright. Between appearances on the stage, she narrates and directs Audiobooks for BBCAmerica. She is also the proud mother of two children.

Ms. Hicks graciously took a few moments to answer questions about her time at Juilliard.

Laura Hicks

When you were at Juilliard, what were your plans for the future? How have they turned out?

My plans when I graduated Juilliard were very clear and very simple: Work as an actress in classical repertory for the rest of my life. That's what I was trained for, and that's what I wanted. After a brief hiatus, I joined the Acting Company for two years, touring the United States and Australia, and did just that. All the training I had had for the past four years suddenly and concretely came together for me. I understood for the first time why we performed certain exercises for long hours in a room at school, once I stood on stages of varying sizes on tour. Because of those endless hours of exercises, I was able to fill every house we played, vocally and physically. I have remained an actress, and continued to be employed over the years, but the dream I had of doing the classics all the time simply isn't a reality in this country.
One of the oddest experiences for me professionally has been working with living playwrights! Having a playwright change words to accommodate me is so strange. I never get used to it. When I went to Juilliard back in the 1970s, there were no directing or playwriting programs. Almost every play we worked on was by a deceased playwright.

What Juilliard teacher made the largest impact on you and what was that impact?

All the teachers I had at Juilliard had a profound influence on me, and the thing that I think is unique about many of the faculty then was that they were employed professionally outside the School as well, so the things they taught were being put into practice on a daily basis. Favorite teachers were: Robert Williams, who taught me how to "suit the action to the word, the word to the action" in a no-nonsense, clear, businesslike manner; Elizabeth Smith, who taught me how to breathe (I thought I knew how!), and showed me how to never hurt my voice. (In all my professional life, I have never had a vocal problem); Pierre Lefèvre, who taught mask work, and showed me how to lose myself in the physical expression of character without worrying about anything from the neck up; Marian Seldes, who taught me clearly and beautifully how to serve the play (a lesson I think is sadly lacking in many young actors today), and how to stay engaged in a scene and to play off my fellow actors and give them what they need in return; B.H. Barry, who taught me all the secrets of rapier and dagger work, which I (sadly) have never had to use ... but what I have used from that class is the physical confidence that he patiently, and with great humor, guided us toward.

If you could go back in time and change one thing that you did or that happened during your years at Juilliard, what would it be?

I think if I could change one thing about my years at Juilliard it would be that I wouldn't have gone there straight out of high school. I was very luckily chosen out of the High School of Performing Arts in New York City to go to Juilliard, and I accepted gladly. But I was the youngest in my class and my fellow classmates had all been through four years of college and were more ready for this training. I still had a lot of playing to do, and I wasted a lot of time getting that out of my system, which I think ordinarily I would have done in my college years. Consequently, it took me a year or two to get focused, and I don't think I was really present until the end of my second year. My advice to others would be not to attend Juilliard until you are a little older, and really hungry for the training. Juilliard is not a good place to waste time.

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