Led by Dr. Budi Miller
with Dr. Taylor Barfield
May 31 – June 6
This workshop combines maskwork, scene study, and spiritual practice to transform your approach to acting. Throughout the week, you will elevate your craft through exercises that explore the fundamental aspects of performance, including movement, physical awareness, improvisation, ensemble building, and more. At the center of this comprehensive training is the mask, which acts as a gateway to greater artistry and deeper spirituality. As the week progresses, you will apply your enriched skill set to the work of fully embodying a character in scene work. Ultimately, the actor’s goal is to welcome what the Balinese call taksu, the manifestation of divinity through performance. This workshop offers actors a unique opportunity, in a supportive and immersive environment, to experience, artistically and spiritually, the transformative power of their calling.
Unlocking Taksu
Balinese Wisdom
Explore the Balinese concept of taksu, a performance energy that marks the presence of the divine. Understand its universal presence, transcending cultures and becoming a source of inspiration for your craft.
Maskwork
Masks strip away personality and reveal the raw circuitry connecting body, breath, voice, and imagination. The Latin persona, that through which sound passes, points to an ancient understanding of performance as vibration, resonance, and transmission, not surface behavior. In maskwork, actors are trained to access a deeper creative engine: the physical, emotional, and intuitive body where impulse precedes thought and image precedes language. This is the terrain of taksu, the animating force of presence that shifts performance from effort to inevitability. When taksu is activated, the imagination is freed from ego-driven storytelling and enters a field of archetypal, energetic intelligence. This workshop invites participants into Budi’s distinct mask training pedagogy, combining rigorous ensemble practice with techniques influenced by Michael Chekhov, whose work draws from Eastern spiritual traditions that treat imagination as a living, somatic force rather than a mental construct.
Scene Study
This workshop offers a unique opportunity to work from the intersection of one’s own culture, with a strong emphasis on scene study. Drawing on ancient and modern approaches to acting, including Balinese Performing Arts Training, the program provides a rich foundation for delving into character and narrative. Working as an ensemble, actors will discover renewed energy in their performances through dynamic movement, expressive mask work, and the powerful experience of performing scenes from plays from around the world. This fusion of diverse techniques and traditions enables actors to explore and celebrate their cultural heritage while honing their craft and creating original, impactful pieces.
Key Components of the Workshop
Practical Embodiment
Gain practical insights into what it means to embody a character. This workshop provides hands-on experience, allowing you to feel the transformative power of character exploration.
Holistic Training
Dive into essential aspects of actor training, from movement and improvisation to physical awareness and ensemble work. Develop a well-rounded skill set that goes beyond surface-level techniques.
Freedom from Judgment
Create within a safe space, free from judgment, guilt, shame, or punishment. This environment encourages you to explore and express without constraints, fostering genuine artistic and spiritual growth.
Cost
Workshop with standard double-occupancy room: $850
Workshop with single-occupancy room: $1,200
Note: A $400 deposit is required when you register for a double occupancy room. A $600 deposit is required for a single occupancy room. The remainder of your balance will be due prior to your arrival at Celebration Barn.
Registration
We use Humanitix for you to register for the workshop and submit your deposit.
- Head to Humanitix and select your reservation type.
- Fill out the check-out questions.
- Complete your purchase.
After completing your purchase, a member of our team will be in touch to confirm your registration within five to seven business days.
See our General Info Page and Student Life for more information about the workshops and learn more about
- Housing
- Travel
- Refund and cancellation policy
- What to bring
Dr. Budi Miller
Dr. Budi Miller is the former head of acting at the Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne (UoM), Australia (the first black person to hold this position at one of the top three drama schools in Australia). He is the co-artistic director of The Theatre of Others; a lead teacher of Fitzmaurice Voicework, a certified integrative studies practitioner; and an UNESCO designated master teacher of mask work. He teaches acting through Balinese Performing Art Training (BPAT) with Mask Work, Fitzmaurice Voicework, Michael Chekhov, clown, PEM, viewpoints, and Grotowski. He holds a BFA. in theatre from NYU Tisch School of the Arts and a PhD in practice-as-research from the University of Melbourne.
He has been an actor-director-writer-teacher in the United States, Australia, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Taipei, Vietnam, Malaysia, India, and Indonesia since 1992. He is a Balinese mask dancer and the first teacher to bring Fitzmaurice Voicework to Denmark, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei, Malaysia, China, and Indonesia.
He coached Michelle Williams for her Academy Award-nominated performance in Ang Lee’s movie Brokeback Mountain; Yao (Sinners: Warner Bros); Jonathan Majors (Lovecraft Country: HBO, The Harder They Fall: Netflix, Ant-Man III: Marvel, Creed III: MGM, Magazine Dreams: Tall Street Productions); and works extensively with Julian Elijah Martinez (Wu-Tang: An American Saga: Hulu). He has had the privilege of coaching and inspiring actors in many mediums: Broadway, HBO, Marvel Films, Warner Bros, Netflix, Showtime, major international film markets, and theaters around the world.
He has been on the faculties of the Victorian College of the Arts UoM (2017–2023), the Chautauqua Theater Company (2004–2018), and LASALLE College of the Arts, Singapore (2009–2017). He has taught at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale, the Juilliard School, NYU Tisch School of the Arts, the Actors Center, Wayne State (MFA), the New School (MFA), SUNY Purchase College, University of Southern California, the Bill Esper Studio, Rutgers Mason Gross School of the Arts, the National Theatre Institute, Howard University, Western Michigan University, the National University of Singapore, the Queensland Theatre Company (Brisbane), Curtin University (Perth), and the Michael Chekhov Conference 2002.
He was the executive director of the International Antonin Artaud Fringe Theatre Festival 2008. He was a featured presenter at the International VASTA conference in Mexico City in 2010 and London in 2014. He was the conference director for the first VASTA conference in Asia (Singapore) in 2017.
Website: budimiller.com
Dr. Taylor Barfield
Dr. Taylor Barfield is a dramaturg, writer, and theater artist from Baltimore, MD. He served as the acting literary manager at Yale Repertory Theatre in New Haven, CT and the literary manager at Two River Theater in Red Bank, NJ. Taylor currently works as a freelance dramaturg and consultant working with organizations such as the Guthrie, BMG, Portland Center Stage, the August Wilson African American Cultural Center, and Yale Repertory Theatre.
Taylor received his BA in molecular/cellular biology and English literature from Johns Hopkins University and is a graduate of the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale, where he earned his MFA and DFA in dramaturgy and dramatic criticism. His scholarly work explores how contemporary Black American playwrights re-imagine and re-stage Black theater history. His writing has been published in Vulture, TDF Stages, and The Marginalia Review of Books. He is currently an adjunct professor at NYU Tisch. taylorjamalbarfield.com