JRS has meant more to me than I can say. The studio and its community saved my relationship to auditioning when I was starting to feel cynical and, god forbid, bored.
John cultivates a truly encouraging environment for his students; one where I’ve felt
safe to take risks, make mistakes, and find my voice as an artist. I’m so grateful for the community I’ve found in JRS. Class with John has completely transformed how I approach auditioning by helping me identify and strengthen tools I didn’t know I possessed. I can’t recommend John Rosenfeld Studios enough.
JRS has given me the knowledge, energy, and confidence to gauge an audition room and audition material. The studio gave me a work ethic I was able to implement seamlessly in an audition room, under the pressure of tests, etc. I was ready because I felt the same pressure and energy every night we worked material at the studio. JRS has given me a community that anchored me when I first moved to Los Angeles to stay motivated and focused. It’s been so helpful to be able to bounce ideas around with like-minded people when I felt a bit overwhelmed with learning the industry. JRS is a not only an outlet to stay curious and sharp with material and create your own material, but also a community to hold you accountable to have a life outside of this industry. Most importantly JRS gave me my best friend (shout out Kelly Walker). Sooooooo – go go go and try JRS! It will push you and cultivate your abilities in this industry so by the time you are testing for a job and on set you really do feel comfortable and knowledgeable and if you don’t you have a whole community at JRS to pull from.
I was struggling to get a callback before I came to JRS. I left a working actor. John creates a wonderful community of coaches and artists, focusing on the tools you need to book jobs in an ever-changing marketplace. JRS took my acting to new heights and gave me the skills and confidence to compete at some of the highest levels in this industry. There’s no better feeling than booking a big role, one that can change your life or jumpstart a career, and John will help you get there.
John made acting fun for me again. I’d consistently leave his classes buzzing with joy, vibrating with excitement like a kid at camp. So rare to find a teacher give so much and care so deeply. And the community he fosters here at JRS reflect the same heart. It’s a really special place.
I often joke that John’s class is “How Lynn got her groove back,” but it’s true. Before taking his class, I was burnt out from decades of auditioning and acting classes that made me feel like I wasn’t enough. Even though I was working, I still felt like my life was at the whim of others’ opinions and decisions. It didn’t happen overnight, but I was able to find self-validation through my work, which gave me not only the confidence to be proud of my decisions in the audition room and on set, but also behind the camera. This past year, I directed my first feature film – which I also wrote, produced, and starred in – and I don’t think I could have done that without the new foundation that John helped me build.
John has made the world of self-taping so much more approachable! He creates a safe space to help you discover, play and connect to what’s on the page. He’s compassionate and meets you wherever you are at emotionally and mentally. I leave every session feeling confident about what we taped. Working with John is a joy!
John is a really special teacher for a lot of reasons. For one, he truly loves the work. He’s crazy about it. That’s not really easy to find. Two, he genuinely loves actors and wants to see you be your unique best as an artist and a person. And then third, he’s got a very sharp eye, not just for genuine, truthful moments but also for the current state and trends of the medium and the industry. I can honestly say starting at JRS was a milestone moment in my career in terms of understanding how to bring myself to the marketplace and show the buyers what I could give to the story they were trying to tell. And then finally… he’s such a love-able weirdo! I mean really – go meet him real quick and tell me I’m wrong. I’ll wait.
“John will push you. I repeat, John Rosenfeld will push you. If learning or growing or working on the things you aren’t so good at doesn’t sound appealing, then I would say he isn’t the right coach for you. When I got to John’s I was focused on working on what I wanted to work on. Which, if I’m being honest, was mainly the stuff I was already good at. John quickly changed the course of that ship. The moment John got me to stop looking at myself as an actor, but as a storyteller, is when it all changed for me. That shift changed how I approached material, my confidence level and most importantly, my ability to be consistently present in my work. All the things that were holding me back from doing the type of work I knew I was capable of seemed to start to fade.
One of the things I love about John, after been at the studio for seven plus years, is he’ll still shoot me a random text once a year at like 1am to tell me how far I have come. I wish he would do it during business hours, but other than that, you gotta love how much he cares.”
What I find so unique about JRS and in particular John, is his ability to meet you exactly where you’re at on your path, and make you better.
