JULIE NELSON

is an actor and teacher has been a member of the faculty at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst where she has taught acting since 1990. Nelson has also taught at Shakespeare & Company and the Lincoln Center Institute, Theater for a New Audience, and Smith College. She has studied physical comedy, especially theatrical clown, with Merry Conway. Further investigation of clown and comedy led her to study with Jaques Lecoq, Bill Irwin, Christopher Bayes, Vincent Rouche and in London with Philippe Gaulier. She's served as dialect coach at Capital Repertory Theatre in Albany for productions of To Kill A Mockingbird, Dracula, and A Christmas Carol, and at StageWest for Murder by Misadventure and Anna Christie, as well as for several University of Massachusetts productions. Roles played include Cory in Private Eyes, Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Celia in As You Like It, and Fabian in Twelfth Night at Shakespeare & Company. She's also performed in The House Not Touched By Death at the Boston Center for the Arts and at the Ko Festival of Performance, 2000; and co-directed an original clown performance for the Phantom Theater Company in Warren, Vermont.