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ABOUT ATG

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Meet the Creative Director and Founder

Classes are taught by Tanner Lagasca, a member of SAG-AFTRA and represented by Talent One Talent Agency in Raleigh, NC. Tanner has been involved in the acting field throughout his life. He is also a director, acting coach, former professor of theatre at Louisburg College, and author of "The Portable Acting Coach". In 2020, he produced the short film "The Portraits of Lillian Gray". He believes the connection between actor and character should be organic and uses the combined techniques of Stanislavsky, Uta Hagan, Sanford Meisner, Stella Adler, and Strasberg to teach his classes.

 

He studied acting in California, received his B.F.A. in Chicago, and his M.F.A. in New York. He has performed throughout the country as well as internationally in South Korea where he was the Artistic Director for the theatre program at English Village. He produced over 20 shows including gameshows and activities and created a three-week acting training program for Korean middle and high school teachers which still remains successful to this day. 

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His film credits include Iron Man 3, You Are Here, several independent web episodes including: The Super Femmes, Doctor Who: The Ginger Chronicles, Southern Discomfort, and the local independent film Remnants. His directing credits include: I Never Saw Another Butterfly, I Hate Hamlet, Wizard of Oz, Cinderella, Little Shop of Horrors, Sure Thing, Andre's Mother, Heartland, Safe, and A View from Here. He has appeared in commercials for Toyota, GE, and Nationwide, and the Duke Cancer Center.

The Mission Behind
Actors Training Ground

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Since we started training actors in 2014, our mission has remained consistent for Actors Training Ground: provide in-depth training, hire passionate, insightful teachers, and offer affordable pricing. 11 years later we still stand behind those beliefs. Contrary to popular belief, theatre-trained actors are better equipped to act on film, then film actors who are only trained in film. While our classes are based in theatre, the principles and techniques of acting we teach can be applied to both theatre and film. 

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Great acting comes from the understanding of character, text, voice, and movement. Our acting should stem from organic choices that we make as we delve into character through script analysis, vocal dynamics, connection to voice, speech, and movement, our own emotional life, and most important discipline.

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We use principles and techniques from many acting masters of their time: Stanislavsky, Hagan, Meisner, Strasberg, and Adler. These techniques include but are not limited to: goals and tactics, emotional memory, sense memory, outside influences, subtext, and more. In addition, we also stress the importance of being connected to body using techniques from Feldenkrais and Alexander,, including relaxation and releasing tension and freeing our voice to produce sound correctly using the techniques from Linklater, and enunciate correctly using the International Phonetic Alphabet. Overall, we want to provide graduate-level training to all actors at community theatre prices. 

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Here's my analogy:

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Community Theatre = Basic on-site training (experience)

Actors Training Ground = Beginning, Intermediate, and Graduate-level classes (training)

Local Acting Studios Training in Film only = Undergrad (specific training)

 

We want you to be the best at what you do. When looking to train as an actor know what you want to achieve and find the acting school or studio that will train you to grow as an actor and a person.

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Actors Training Ground is ready to get you started.

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Tanner Lagasca
Creative Director/Founder 

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