Meet Founder, Kim Tobin
Kim has been teaching acting for the last 20 years. She is an accomplished and award-winning actor, director, producer and writer. Her list of mentors and teachers is extensive and includes some of the most prestigious and respected acting and director training this country has to offer. Currently she transitioned from Artistic Director to Resident Artist at 4th Wall Theatre Company, the Professional Equity theatre that she founded and built with her husband in Houston, TX based on her teachings and aesthetic of acting.
Kim was part of creating and/or running two other NYC theatre companies; The New Mercury Theatre and Blue Sphere Alliance East, the sister company to the highly acclaimed Los Angeles company Blue Sphere Alliance. Kim’s theatre degree is from the University of Houston where she worked with Edward Albee and Jose Quintero among others. She also has conservatory training from Stella Adler Conservatory and Circle in the Square in NYC amongst many other prestigious training programs including Gene Frankel and Seth Barrish at The Barrow Group. She began her Meisner training to become a teacher in Los Angeles, CA and has been teaching Meisner training ever since.
See Kim teaching and directing from the 4th Wall Theatre Company and Spring Street Studios below.
Studio Information
It is our goal to introduce you to as many approaches to the acting craft as we can. We can help you find the tools necessary to understand the difference between “pretending” to feel what the “character” feels and inhabiting that life with your own.
I have over 25 year’s experience training under or teaching for the most respected instructors in New York and Los Angeles. I also have 30+ years of acting and directing credits covering stage, film and television. My objective is to strengthen the essential skills of great acting. Some of these abilities include: living fully in the present, being led by instinct rather than our head, being responsive to our partner(s) in each moment, really doing rather than pretending to do what we are doing, being the expression of who we truly are rather than what we think others want us to be and bringing our own personal meaning to everything we do.
Keep an eye on the section below for a list of upcoming and current classes and to book your spot today!
CURRENT CLASS SCHEDULE
All Level Meisner/Adler Class with Kim Tobin-Lehl
Please email or call Kim to make arrangements to reserve a spot in the class. If there is availability, she will give you information about putting down a deposit to hold your spot and forward you the class policies.
Cost: $199
Saturdays: May 7, 21, 28 and June 7, 2022
Class is from 1:00 – 4:00 PM
This class is FULL - please watch for new class announcements soon!
Location:
1824 Spring Street, Studio 232
Houston, TX 77007
Ph: 832-265-5932
To hire Kim to teach Acting classes, to coach on set or schedule private training please reach out to her through the contact form on this website or by clicking the button below and we will get back to you.
TESTIMONIALS
“Kim’s class was exactly what I needed after I graduated from school. I had been out of a regular acting class for over a year. Her class refreshed what I had learned in college, but more importantly, she introduced me to new and better ways to think about being on stage. Acting became exciting again because of this class.”
“Kim Tobin is the best acting coach in the city. She can help a professional find ways to tweak his or her skills to perfection, or take a beginner to performance quality with extraordinary patience and an expert understanding of the craft. She has been instrumental in assisting three of our company actors to go from acceptable to outstanding in performance quality for our productions. I highly recommend her to anyone who desires to stretch to his full potential as an actor.”
“Kim’s class and teaching have given me such a release into the freedom of trust on the stage: learning to trust my instincts, to stop acting, stop the “song and dance” and go from the gut. I don’t want to be involved in any kind of art, or any human transaction for that matter, that is concerned with putting on a show; there are enough constraints of “supposed-to-be” in life without dragging them into the realm of play, of imagination, of unforced and spontaneous creativity. Kim has taught me surrender to the moment-by-moment discovery of myself, my acting partner, and the world of the play.”
“Kim creates a safe environment that allows me to feel exactly what I feel, at the exact moment I feel it, and to be able to express it out loud. She is a generous teacher who is passionate and full of knowledge of her craft. Her ability to read people, to challenge us to go where we have never had the courage to go before, helps us to be open and to expose the many layers that we have as human beings. It is not an easy class by any means. But if you are willing to listen and to learn and to trust that it is safe, you will be amazed at what you can do and how far you can go. I am forever grateful to have experienced what Kim has taught me and continue to teach me.”
“Since being out of school, I have taken classes focused on a specific medium and skill, but have often neglected training my body/instincts/reactions as an actor. Kim is such a positive enforcement in the discovery process. I’m free to make mistakes, fall on my face, be a mess, express whatever it is that I’m experiencing without ever walking away feeling like I didn’t gain something. She provides a safe place for the good, the bad, the beautiful, the ugly, the places in myself that I love, and the ones that I wish weren’t there but are just as much a vital part of being human as anything that I call “good”.”
“Kim Tobin is an amazing asset to the Houston theater community. This summer I studied at the Neighborhood Playhouse in New York, the home of Sandford Meisner. Kim Tobin’s class is as good as my acting class in New York. She gently pushes you to be truthful in the moment and connect with your scene partner. I attended her beginner’s class and sharpened my monologue skills as well as scene work. I recommend Kim Tobin’s acting class to any level actor. Whether you are a beginner or have been acting for years, Kim will help you become a genuine, more vulnerable actor on stage who is able to connect with your cast and the audience.”
“Kim’s classes were a great refresher of things that I had forgotten and a wonderful place to experiment and explore. Her approach as a teacher is so comfortable and non confrontational. I love that Kim reacts to questions without condescention and gets down on the same level as her students. She takes every question seriously and always gives real answers with blatant honesty. I always know that her feedback is current and true. So many other teachers will give feedback that is sugar-coated nonsense in hopes that the student will continue to sign up for classes. I go to Kim because I know that I will improve and learn and keep moving forward. I never hesitate to recommend Kim’s private coaching and classes and I always look forward to working with her. We’re lucky to have such a passionate and caring person working to enrich Houston’s theatre scene.”
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
How much are your sessions and when?
My group sessions are scheduled in month long increments when I am in town. I teach in both Houston, TX and Santa Fe, NM currently. I am available for hire in markets outside of these cities. The sessions are scheduled for 4 Monday nights and/or 4 Saturday afternoons consecutively for a month. The cost is $199 and the classes are 3 hours each class and you work in every class.
My private training session rate is $85 an hour. If you are looking to be taped for an audition, I am able to tape you in a session, but you are responsible for taking that taped session home and editing and uploading it for submission yourself.
Do you allow audits?
Yes. You are allowed one free audit of my classes. I also believe very deeply in teachers allowing audits of their classes in general. I do not think it is fair to ask someone to “buy something” without first seeing if they think it is a fit for them. I would be wary of teachers who do not allow you to audit a class before you pay to commit to an extended class with them.
How do I know if a teacher is a good teacher or not?
This is not an easy question to answer. There are lots of things that make good teachers. But, in regards to teaching you repeatable and usable acting skills a couple things are definitely red flags as wells a couple things that are good signs.
Red Flags:
- A potential instructor who does not know anything about the history or foundation of acting training and/or the various approaches to how acting technique works and cannot explain or reference any tools or a philosophy or approach to how they will teach you to be a better performer and develop a skill set you can take with you.
- A potential instructor who talks to you in only the world of “psychology and emotional recall” as foundational tools for actor training and substantiative building blocks for your work. These are not practical application tools and are not things you can bring to the table to be able to produce work. They are transitory results at best and can even end up being an approach to acting that is based in emotional abuse and be a means to berating an actor into submission and/or emotional breakdown through badgering and personal harassment of private emotional memories or trauma. This is not acting.
- A teacher with no personal training to teach. If a teacher has just picked up the “banner of teaching” as a means of income based on having been a performer for a number of years be sure to ask a number of questions about their approach to teaching acting and how they do it. Teaching and being an actor are very different skill sets. Just because you admire a great actor does not mean they are good teachers of that craft. They certainly can be! BUT, be sure you ask questions to see how and what they teach before you assume because they are a great actor they will be a great teacher.
Good signs someone is a good teacher:
- They have a direct line of training to be a teacher from an approach to acting from a teacher who is an already respected teaching artist in the field.
- They have been recommended to you by someone whom you trust who has already studied with them and you have seen results in their work.
- They do not use the success of their past students to “sell” you their services.
- They have been trained to teach the method they use and can explain to you clearly what you will do in the class and how it develops your abilities as a performing artist.
These are a few things that might help you as you interview teachers.
For a full list of research of acting teachers and what you should be looking for before choosing one, you can download Kim's free PDF here.