Andy Crook

Andy Crook trained at the internationally renowned Ecole Jacques Lecoq in Paris for which he won a two-year scholarship from the French Government. After his studies, he worked in several physical theatre companies in France,   England and the USA, as well as working as a freelance actor for touring and   repertory theatre companies. In England,  he co-founded I Gelati, an international theatre company combining commedia dell’arte with contemporary theatre, which successfully toured Britain and Europe for more  than four years.                                                                                         

Andy started directing in the early nineties; he trained at The Crucible Theatre, Sheffield, where he assisted on and directed several productions. He has directed over fifty productions for theatre companies, colleges and drama schools. In Ireland, where he has been resident for the last thirteen years, he co-directed Swans, Boots and Boxes at the Abbey Peacock Theatre; he taught classes and was movement director for several productions at the Abbey. 

With over 20 years experience in teaching acting and movement, Andy has taught in various accredited drama schools in the UK, most recently at the Birmingham School of Acting where he was Senior Acting Tutor and Director of the Community & Applied Theatre Programme and Physical Theatre Programme, both of which he designed and established. Andy has also taught for NYU Tisch and Steinhardt schools in Dublin, Queens College Belfast, Dublin City Council and at the University of Wisconsin. He is an Associate lecturer on the Drama Theatre Studies programme at University College Cork where he regularly teaches and directs. Andy still performs—most recently, in various Beckett projects with director Phillip Zarrilli in Ireland and USA. In 2004 Andy was named Best Male Performer at the Dublin Fringe Festival for his work with Articulate Anatomy Theatre Company, a physical theatre company he founded in 2003 and which has created several original productions. 

Andy taught for eight years on the Professional Acting Programme at Trinity College Dublin, where he was both Associated Course Co-ordinator and later Course Co-ordinator.

Paul Keenan

Paul Keenan is a director, musical director, composer and teacher. He was born in the United States, where he trained at the University of Michigan. Most of his career and further training was in Montreal, Quebec, where he was Director of Music at the National Theatre School of Canada and Singing Tutor at the Conservatoire d’art dramatique de Montréal. 

Directing credits include: Not Afraid? (Samuel Beckett Theatre and Arezzo Festival) Berliner Songspiel and Le Petit Mahagonny (Les Productions de la lune verte), Vie et mort du roi boiteux (Centre national des arts du Canada—Robert Lepage’s Compagnie française), Il n’y a nulle part en Amérique (Zeitgeist), The Voice in the Mirror: the Strange Experiments of Doctor Frank (National Theatre School of Canada) Marry Me a Little, and Neues Songspiel. 

Composition and arrangement for the theatre include: Sons and Daughters and The Wolf in Winter (at the Peacock Theatre), Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme (Abbey), The Company of Wolves (Samuel Beckett Theatre and Arezzo Festival),  The Caucasian Chalk Circle (B. Brecht), The Cat (Edward Bond), Lysistrata (Aristophanes), Récital gala de Mme Célinyre Campeau (René-Daniel Dubois).

Musical direction includes The Threepenny Opera, Glorious Mud, The Pirates of Penzance, Guys and Dolls, Anything Goes, Chopin sur les ondes, The Cradle Will Rock and many others.

Paul has led many singing and voice workshops for both professional and non-professional actors and singers at Queen’s University Belfast, the Abbey Theatre, Dublin Corporation, the Drama League of Ireland, and has coached for the RTE series You’re A Star and Ballet Chancers. 

From 2001 to 2008 he was a fulltime lecturer on the Professional Actor Training Programme (BAS) and the Drama and Theatre Studies Course (BA) at Trinity College, Dublin, where he taught Singing, Text, and Theatre Practice.

In 2004 he was invited to become an associate artist at the Accademia dell’arte in Arezzo, Italy. There he gives master classes and summer workshops and is a teacher and advisor on their new MFA programme.  He also teaches regularly at the Berliner Schule für Schauspiel.

Helena Walsh 

Helena Walsh is an Actor, Singer and Voice Coach. Some of her most
significant roles as an actress have included Kalliope in The Orpheus Myth (Actors Touring Company), Beatrice Joanna in The Changeling, Anna in The Fire Raisers, Eurydice in Antigone and Cassandra in Troilus and Cressida.

She has taught voice for New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts Overseas Programme in Dublin and has also worked in the B.A. in Theatre Studies at University College Cork. She taught internationally in France, Italy and New York and has worked as a voice coach on many professional productions including Amadeus (Oroboros) and The Alice Trilogy (Abbey Peacock). She assisted Andrea Ainsworth at the Abbey on The Plough and the Stars and Henry IV. Some of her Trinity and N.Y.U work includes Waiting for Godot, Twelfth Night, Double Cross, Yerma, Carthaginians, By the Bog of Cats and many more. Helena recently taught voice in the Academia dell‘arte in Arezzo, Italy.

Helena was Artistic Director of the N.Y.U Summer Programme Abroad from 2006 to 2008. She and Paul Keenan are founding members of Songspiel.

Helena was a voice coach for several years on the Professional Actor Training Programme in Trinity College Dublin.