Biography

Students included Gates McFadden, Julie Taymor, Philippe Avron, Claude Evrard, Isaac Alvarez Elie Pressmann, Eduardo Manet, Ariane Mnouchkine, Luc Bondy, Christoph Marthaler, Toby Jones.

French acting teacher.

In 1956, he founded "L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq", situated in the 10th arrondissement of Paris.

In 1941, Lecoq attended a physical theatre college where he met Jean Marie Conty, a basketball player of international caliber, who was in charge of physical education in all of France. Conty's interest in the link between sport and theatre had come out of a friendship with Antonin Artaud and Jean-Louis Barrault, both well-known actors and directors and founders of Education par le Jeu Dramatique ("Education through the Dramatic Game"). While Lecoq still continued to teach physical education for several years, he soon found himself acting as a member of the Comediens de Grenoble. While Lecoq was a part of this company he learned a great deal about Jacques Copeau's techniques in training. One of these techniques that really influenced Lecoq's work was the concept of natural gymnastics. This company and his work with Commedia dell'arte in Italy (where he lived for eight years) introduced him to ideas surrounding mime, masks and the physicality of performance. During this time he also performed with the actor, playwright, and clown, Dario Fo.

Lecoq aimed at training his actors in ways that encouraged them to investigate ways of performance that suited them best. His training was aimed at nurturing the creativity of the performer, as opposed to giving them a codified set of skills. As students stayed with Lecoq's school longer, he accomplished this through teaching in the style of ''via negativa'', also known as the negative way. This teaching strategy basically consists of only focusing his critiques on the poorer or unacceptable aspects of a student's performance. Lecoq believed that this would allow students to discover on their own how to make their performances more acceptable. Lecoq did not want to ever tell a student how to do something "right." He believed that was supposed to be a part of the actor's own experience. The goal was to encourage the student to keep trying new avenues of creative expression. Many actors sought Lecoq's training initially because Lecoq provided methods for people who wished to create their own work and did not want to only work out of a playwright's text.