VSA arts/Williamstown Theatre Festival Apprenticeship

Announcing the 2009 VSA arts Apprentices at the Williamstown Theatre Festival

VSA arts is happy to announce the 2009 VSA arts apprentices at the Williamstown Theatre Festival, Michael Randazzo and Anton Spivack! Michael and Anton are working and taking classes with over 60 other apprentices this summer, learning about the different aspects of running a professional theater company.

Michael Randazzo is a 22-year-old senior theater major at SUNY Potsdam. He began acting at age 13, and remained involved in theatrical productions both onstage and behind the scenes throughout high school and college. As part of his college’s One-Act Play Festival, Randazzo performed in the play Slave Ship which then went to the Cornerstone Festival at Liverpool Hope University in the UK. Randazzo, who is legally blind, found that show to be a pivotal experience in his theatrical career. “Through this show I realized how powerful theater can be. I learned that theater can take you anywhere…theater took me somewhere I had never dreamed of going.”

Anton Spivack, of New York City, made his theater debut at age 8 in Jerry Herman Tonight. He has a B.A. in Theatre from Bard College at Simon's Rock, where he studied under Karen Beaumont and Karen Allen. The 23-year-old aspiring actor and playwright was a member of the 2007 Theatre Askew Youth Performance Experience, where he began writing his first full-length play, Mixed Messages, based mostly on his own experience with Asperger's Syndrome. Spivack currently seeks to have his play produced, while taking Improvisational Comedy training at the People's Improv Theatre in New York City.