4 July : Now the country’s finest school for actors, Anupam Kher’s Actor Prepares is all set to launch in Ahmedabad on July 20. This is the third branch of Mr Kher’s school, after Chandigarh and London. Mr Kher auditioned the applicants of the inaugural three-month long batch on July 4, and he will be taking classes when the course commences. Apart from Mr Kher, the school has a trained full-time faculty of teachers to teach the craft of Acting. Other subjects which will be taught, reflecting the holistic approach of the Actor Prepares programme, are Yoga, Dance, Martial Arts, Voice and Diction etc.
This school has produced many of the finest actors of the Indian Film Industry, including the youth and gorgeous actress- Deepika Padukone. “In the 3 months I have spent at Actor Prepares I feel I have learnt a lot. I have not only improved as an actor but also as an individual / human being. All I can say is that a lot of knowledge has been given to us about acting, which will show only with time and experience. It is not something that can happen over night. But the finer details about me as a person and the changes in me are more visible. The classes at Actor Prepares have not only taught me the details of acting, but groomed me overall and has made me a more confident person." Says Deepika firmly.
Not just Deepika Padukone, but internationally acclaimed directors such as Slumdog Millionaire’s Danny Boyle and Shekar Kapur of Elizabeth fame have lavished accolades on Anupam Kher’s acting school Actor Prepares.
“I believe that acting, like any craft, can be taught, learnt and perfected,” says Mr Kher, who has won innumerable awards in a career spanning 25 years encompassing almost 400 films. Mr Kher is the only actor in the world who has become a teacher while still actively pursuing his career. “My interactions with the current crop of international directors, be they Danny Boyle or Ang Lee or Gurinder Chaddha, keeps me abreast of global trends that are emerging in world cinema and I pass on such knowledge to my students,” he adds.
Such inputs have been a key factor in the training of students produced at Actor Prepares. Indeed Shekhar Kapur was candid enough to confess that the teaching practices at Actor Prepares was “worldclass, without a doubt.”
Actor Prepares Ahmedabad is sited on a landscaped 2.5 acre campus on the Ahmedabad-Gandhinagar highway opposite Nirma University. It has several modern facilities such as a swimming pool, a fully-equipped auditorium for rehearsals plus an open-air performing area. Students can also avail of the services of a state-of-the-art gymnasium and a horse-riding school.
The school also has a sizeable collection of films and books/journals to facilitate the learning of cinema. Actor Prepares also has a Talent Placement agency, which is constantly called upon by major film and television production companies to refer actors and actresses for their projects.