Photo Credit: Evan Sigmund

As part of the Ringling College Digital Filmmaking Studio Lab’s ongoing commitment to bringing top-notch talent to its students, award-winning actor Jeffrey Wright (Boardwalk Empire, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1) is visiting the campus this week, touring the facilities and teaching a master class for a group of young filmmakers. In between teaching and sightseeing, the Tony and Emmy Award-winning performer made a little time to talk Ringling, his artistic process and what he learned from the world’s response to the recent Ebola outbreak.

“This is a very interesting space that students are allowed to explore,” said Wright after a tour of the college grounds. “There are two seemingly competing things happening.” On one hand he noted rigorous technical preparation equipping students with the proper skills to engage the industry side of the arts world. Whether it be graphic design, animation or computer modeling, there will be an industrial aspect, Wright noted. “But at the same time, there’s such a fascinating level of creativity, so that students are given an opportunity to express that imaginative process, the visual dreams that they generate.”

“It’s seemingly contradictory,” Wright continued. “It’s very exciting for that reason.”

In addition to a presentation and Q and A tonight in the Academic Center Auditorium, Wright will be leading a master class with a select group of young directors and filmmakers from Ringling, giving them the opportunity to collaborate with and learn from an experienced professional. “It’s great that there are young filmmakers who want to gain some understanding of what the process is for an actor,” said Wright. “Because most directors really don’t know what actors do.”

A director may work on five films in 10 years, but in that same time an actor could see as many as 30 roles, according to Wright, creating an entirely different mindset. This affects communication between collaborators, he says, and inhibits the director’s ability to get the best performance from the cast. He hopes to bridge that gap. “If I can share that, I will gladly” he said laughing, “so they don’t go through life torturing actors.”

Photo Credit: Evan Sigmund

To read the entire interview with Jeffrey Wright, go to SRQBacklot.com.