Alexis Black

Alexis Black received her BFA in Performance from Ohio University and her MFA in Theatre Performance Pedagogy with an emphasis in Movement from Virginia Commonwealth University. She is an educator, fight, movement and intimacy director, performer, and director.

As a movement specialist, Alexis is a certified Intimacy Director with Intimacy Directors and Coordinators (IDC), is a certified teacher in the Michael Chekhov Physical Acting Technique, and has a level one certification in the Margolis Method. She has trained with PUSH Physical Theatre and Anne Bogart’s SITI Company, and is a member of the Society of American Fight Directors, The Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, and the Association of Theatre Movement Educators.

As a fight and movement director she has choreographed in Europe, South Korea, and regionally in the US, including as assistant fight director for Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet for the Tony-award winning Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, DC. She has served as resident fight and intimacy director for Hope Summer Repertory Theatre, and Redtwist Theatre in Chicago. In NYC she has choreographed for the NY Fringe, Off-Off Broadway, and Off Broadway. She also served as assistant choreographer for Fool for Love on Broadway, starring Sam Rockwell and Nina Arianda.

As a professional actor and member of AEA, she has worked with regional theaters, on international tours and in numerous shows in NYC. Favorite credits include productions with The Dorset Theater Festival, The Vampire Cowboys Theatre Company and touring with TNT-Britain. On the small screen you can find her performing stunts on AMC and The Discovery Channel.

In other research, Alexis has explored the powerful combination of Meisner and Chekhov for years in the acting classroom, and wrote about it in the Routledge publication, Michael Chekhov and Sanford Meisner: Collisions and Convergence in Actor Training. She also co-authored a chapter on neurodiversity and the actor for an upcoming Routledge publication as a response to research on inclusive teaching methods. Additionally, Alexis and her MSU colleague Tina Newhauser have led an innovative collaboration with IDC, exploring the relationship between intimacy directors and teams that build live performances. A publication that details out practices and protocols for staging intimacy and the creative team is forthcoming, with a release date planned for 2022.