STORY OF UTAH CONSERVATORY

Utah Conservatory

Our Story

    It began in upstate New York where Dr. Fredric Cook was born, and his mother named him after a famous actor, Fredric March. For seventeen years his father used him, his eldest son, to establish disciplinary standards for his siblings, by beating him almost every day of his teenage life. He discovered drama in High School as a means of escaping the punishment, as he was respected and admired for his performances. He joined the Navy after graduation and spent four years exposed to criticism, hostilities, and jealousies. His solution was to study history and philosophy, which played an important role in his life. He knew as a young man, that the way out of bad situations could be handled by having a definitive philosophy that would provide options from which he could make choices before responding or acting. By the time he went to college, he thought he would major in history/philosophy, again offering solutions to the many problems confronting him. However, the Lord had presented him with the opportunity to act in a play in his freshman year. As a sophomore, he played Mr. Doolittle in My Fair Lady, and the applause in that spacious theatre questioned his decision to become a history or philosophy teacher. He changed his major to theatre and went on to do several plays and musicals before he graduated. He approached one of his revered professors at the University of North Carolina, asking if he thought he was good enough to become a professional actor. The instructor said no. Shocked, amazed, angry and in tears he went back to confront his professor, asking why he had that opinion. Smiling, he said, “If you don’t know yourself, the answer is always no.” That was the first time he realized that a performer must be aware of his ability, not dwelling on it or prideful, but humble, grateful and dedicated to the mission of a performer, which, discovered later in life, is to experience joy in the work, and share it with colleagues, teachers, and audiences. He also realized that his mother’s postulate for him to take on the responsibility to be a professional actor came with the name he was given. After graduation, he went to Europe, watched student artists at the Louvre in Paris, studied improvisation as well, toured London, and watched British actors perform with ease and clarity, much of which he put together years later. Returning to California, he was a founding member of the Berkeley Repertory Theatre and performed in several productions, where a young director saw him and offered the lead role in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest at the Little Fox Theatre in San Francisco.
     That was his first professional role as he joined Actors Equity Association in 1970 and later performed in the Off-Broadway production, while studying with Uta Hagen, Mira Rostova from the Moscow Arts Theatre, and Bobby Lewis from Yale Drama School. He attended Hunter College studying under Harold Clurman, Joseph Anthony, Lillian Hellman, and playwright, Arthur Miller, completing his master’s degree in directing, while continuing to perform in film, theatre and television. He had joined Screen Actors Guild and The American Federation of TV and Radio Artists. After that, he worked at the Long Wharf Theatre with E.G. Marshall in Ibsen’s Masterbuilder. After that he auditioned for the London Academy of Music & Dramatic Art.
     He went up to the Headmaster at the Academy, explaining he had been a professional actor for four years, was a member of all three unions, and had performed over two dozen roles in theatre, film and television, yet did not know the basic fundamentals of acting. That was why he accepted their invitation. He asked; “Please tell me, what the essential truth about acting is?” The headmaster smiled and replied, “It’s simple actually, it’s knowing what your attention is on, moment to moment, from the viewpoint of the character.” He said that none of his mentors in New York ever said anything like that, and wanted to know why? The Headmaster again smiled, and said; “They probably don’t know.” At that moment he recalled seeing and understanding what he had seen on his first visit to London, after college. It all came together. It transformed his ability, gave him higher self-esteem, and awareness of what he needed to know, which helped him in later years to formulate his own special technique-a patterned approach in sequence which produces a definitive, unique, and desirable result. When he returned to the states, he flipped a coin; “New York or LA?” Three weeks after arriving in Hollywood, he secured his first agent, and within three months had his first lead role in a film, with Yvette Mimieux and Tommy Lee Jones (his first film). When he had shared what he had learned in London, actors wanted to study with him, and the Los Angeles Academy of Dramatic Art was created in 1975. It took him eight years to understand how to approach actors through the perils of navigating toward a character’s viewpoint, seeing images through his/her eyes, and the proper gradients he had to use to maintain the actor’s self-esteem and confidence.
     It wasn’t until Dr. Cook and his wife, Debra Cook moved to Park City, Utah in 1997 that he realized that he needed to research educational methods to teach performers what they need to focus on without offering his personal opinions, or criticism, because he knew that a performer’s natural self-esteem is reduced when subjected to criticism. He began a seven year program in Educational Studies, before completing his PhD in 2004. He had studied, and recalled what he saw at the Louvre many years earlier. He realized that, as an instructor, his attention must be 100% on the student, and as Socrates’ philosophy dictated, only questions are viable in discovering the truth from the student. Statements and opinions of others are outside the realm of a student’s reality and understanding. Also, he had witnessed several teachers over the years that had too much attention on themselves, almost justifying why they were teaching, rather than guiding and leading the student to having his/her own recognition of what they liked about what they did, and subsequently, what they would like to change! That was what he witnessed in Paris, looking at the artists’ eyes that had not an ounce of criticism, only evaluation of what they liked and what they wanted to change.
This is the solution! This is how a student can appear to be natural, effortless, and passionate from the viewpoint of the character. We have one of our students, Talon Ackerman, who has been in three Broadway musicals, for which the Director of Mary Poppins remarked in a newspaper interview, that his “Focus is beyond his years.” Talon is 12 years old. Another reviewer from his most recent performance of Leap of Faith said he’s a natural talent, yet “Just a kid” without the pretensions of being an actor. What appears to be an “Inborn talent” is actually the result of a non-critical pedagogy and years of being asked those two important questions; “What did you like about what you did?” and “What would you like to change?” This philosophy pervades Utah Conservatory, and several students have received major scholarships, paid performance work, invitations to perform in regional theatre and opera productions, and received kudos in the Classical Singers Competitions. Comments at the recent competitions were extremely positive, although they assumed that the students were all born talented, which removes the tribute that should be paid to them for years of dedicated work acquiring their abilities to perform effortlessly, all the while appearing to be “Natural.” It is the goal of the performer to have audiences assume that, but is disappointing to have professionals, who know how difficult the preparation can be, to assume they were born talented, discounting the countless hours of monologuing, rehearsing, singing and performing.
So, in conclusion, artists need to develop early a collaborative approach with colleagues, performers, directors, instructors and others. Asking questions with a positive intention engenders more artistic collaboration than do opinions, criticisms, evaluations and negative assessments. Positive questions which search for solutions increase the performer’s ability to be responsible for their condition and their original creations. This philosophy protects and prepares the student against any abuse, from often well-meaning instructors and colleagues. We also encourage our students to be gracious, and acknowledge well-meaning contributors with a simple “Thank you.” Thus, the student maintains the right to accept or let go of another’s evaluation of their work, which strengthens their ability to make choices and decisions on their own.
     Over these past twelve years, our students have become more compassionate and understanding of how a person’s viewpoint directs their decisions and choices. Most of all, students become non-critical, non-judgmental, and are devoid of cynicism. Basically, they improve their abilities to confront and handle any situation they are presented with, which is very important in their later years. It has been said that, when a person can master his/her attention over the distractions presented, their employers, producers, and decision makers will pay much more money to them, than to those who are unable to focus their attention completely on the tasks they perform.