ACCUSED: Actress and acting teach Gloria Gifford labeled as manipulative and abusive by students

This reminds me of the Candace Silver story from 2021, also published by the Hollywood Reporter.

[quote]Gifford boasts that her alumni list includes Jenna Elfman, Bianca Lawson and Efren Ramirez.

Boasts?

[quote]An entourage of a half-dozen male students escorted her from her car to her throne-like chair, ornately carved in dark wood, cushioned in red velvet and positioned near the front row.

Once I read this sentence, I knew I was in for a ride. And it didn't disappoint.

This bitch is CRAZY.

And spoiler alert: Scientology appears to play a role.

[quote]Gifford denies or disputes her critics’ claims. In an interview with THR, she portrays these former conservatory members as a tiny number of stalled actors, led by “white privileged entitled girls,” waging a spiteful attack on “a school run by a Black senior citizen and all the Black and Latino students who are carving out their paths.” (Half of the individuals who spoke to THR about concerns are people of color.

She didn't even hesitate to go there lol

[quote]Explaining that she’s weakened from a recent bout of COVID-19, Gifford says, “My blood pressure’s going to go through the roof with these people, and I hope that I’m not going to be dead and they’re going to be laughing because they got [THR] to help them kill me.” She adds, “All actors are dramatic. So naturally, you’re going to get all the drama.”

This sensitive, I'm a victim mentality will be the downfall of our culture. Well if we don't all get shot the fuck up first.

It was an interesting-ish article, but ultimately, it was the same story repeated 10 times with no resolution.

The Silvers story has lots of parallels.

These classes do seem to have a whiff of self help/new age/Scieno about them.

Acting can be pretty raw emotionally, for people who do it well. Most of the people who do it now are vapid and disconnected from it, just mannequins reciting lines.

Is this the one Colton did where they had to get naked on the stage to lower their inhibitions?

Taking an acting class and expecting a normal professor is...something. These kids need to not ever do anything that might make them feel bad about themselves, god forbid.

This would NEVER happen at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts!

Gloria Gifford played Chris Burke (Life Goes On) school advisor on that show

Wonder if he has any stories to tell

r10 You didn't bother reading the article, did you?

Clearly, none of these pussies went to Catholic school.

This bitch has nothing on Sister Anthony.

I remember her from Halloween 2. Her character got a rather shitty ending,

Surprised she was in her late 30's at the time.

If Ryan Murphy wasn’t creatively dead, he might be able to have wrung out a pitch black comedy about this.

She sounds like a horror. Even if only half of it is true. It's not like they aren't countless other acting coaches that are just as good if not better, and where you wouldn't have to deal with that.

I'm sure DL's would like to observe this part of Gifford's classes, though.

[quote]prodded to answer intrusive questions: if they’d engaged in anal sex, the size of their penises

[quote]These kids need to not ever do anything that might make them feel bad about themselves, god forbid.

I looked up the names of all of the people who complained about Gifford on IMDb. The youngest was born in 1993. The rest with ages listed were born in the eighties, and the ones without birthdates played adult roles in the early 2000s, so are clearly pushing forty if not older than that.

Patty Jenkins, the Wonder Woman director who was quoted in the article, is fifty years old, which is definitely not a child, even by DataLounge standards.

Blaming this on the hypersensitivity of the Zoomers with their TikToks or whatever youth cliché people like to mindlessly spout isn't just stupid and reductive. In this case, it is flat-out factually wrong.

She’s no Uta Hagen, that’s for sure!

Her Method is very messy.

I audited one of her classes. I left at the break. I love acting but there is a lot of this cult-like bullshit with many of these teachers and classes. It was an icky feeling I got from the students. There was one that just kept 'uh humming' every thing she said and then you had the two to three people frantically trying to scribble down everything she said in their Daily Affirmations and Positivity Only notebooks. Nothing the woman said was groundbreaking or revelatory so I felt like there was just a bunch of adequate criticisms about acting I could have gotten at a Community College course.

The mixed/latina looking nurse from Halloween 2 became an acting coach??

I also remember her as Mrs. Alves in Halloween II.

This shit would never happen if Ana Alicia were the teacher! And that goes double for Pamela Susan Shoop!

I think she was also a victim of Bill Cosby. I remember Bill Maher telling a story that a woman he did a movie with in the early 80's mentioned that Cosby had drugged her when they did a movie together. Maher was in D.C. Cab with Gloria and she was in California Suite with Cosby

Those who can't act, direct.

Those who can't act or direct, teach!

Just sayin'.

She was a protege of Milton Kaetlas (Spelling?) who used this school to recruit for the Scientology cult. Here’s a good video.

R26, and she was in advance class with Dominique Dunne ,and she and Dominique were at a restaurant where Dominique met her killer, John Sweeney

Now I don't feel so bad for her when Michael Myers drains her blood

She's going on the defense

Welp, after I audited Gloria's class I audited the Beverly Hills Playhouse which is where her mentor Milton Katselas taught. Again, more of the same sort of weird cult worship bullshit. You were encouraged to give a standing ovation to the teacher when they entered. Big, fucking turnoff. The Beverly Hills Playhouse is no longer Scientologist based (Many of the people there broke away) but I found out the teacher left Scieno to become a fucking MAGA which is totally weird for the LA acting scene. I didn't join and like a year or so later the pandemic happened and the guy who runs the Playhouse was anti-mask and BLM so, yeah. I heard they got busted for meeting during lockdowns. Sometimes it feels like California is way too susceptible for cult bullshit.

R30 who’s the teacher?

My husband knew her son in LA, back in the day. Supposedly a nice guy, but very, very fucked up.

I can't believe she's 75. SHOULD HAVE RETIRED, BITCH!

Mrs. Alves should be a DL icon.

Many acting teachers are fucking insane

R35 I've heard stories about bitter formerly successful or failed actors turn acting teachers that can lash out at their trainees. Nothing quite as bad as the stories about Gifford though.

R30, that’s sad and scary

Allan Barton teaches at the Beverly Hills Playhouse. I think they mention Free Speech on their website, which is new.