Interviewee:
Heidi Duncan Murray (she/her)
In your own words, tell us about your business, organization, or initiative.
Come as you are. Strengthen your art. Find your voice. Heal your creative soul.
Duncan Murray Studios is a creative home for actors and artists who want to go deeper — into their craft, their creativity, and themselves.
Built around the Meisner Acting Technique, the studio is a place to practice your art, living truthfully and fully in the moment. It is a place to get out of your head, get connected to your instincts, take risks, and discover what happens when you stop trying to perform and begin to truly live in your art.
But this studio isn’t only for actors.
We believe the principles that make an actor come alive can help any artist come alive. Musicians, dancers, painters, writers, filmmakers, and other creatives are welcome here. Whatever your medium, you are an artist — and your unique creative voice deserves room to grow. Using the Meisner Technique, we help artists of all disciplines find their unique voice and heal their creative soul. Unlike traditional classes where you sit and watch, our members dive into intense 3-hour classes twice a week, and everyone works at least twice every single class. It’s a high-impact space designed to help you grow artistically strong, uninhibitedly creative, and find your true artistic tribe.
Tell us a bit about you and why you do what you do. Share your passions for your business, organization, or initiative.
For more than 30 years, I have been teaching, making art, and helping actors and artists discover and bring out the deeper, unique art inside them.
My creative life has never fit neatly into a single category. Over the years, I’ve worked as an actor, director, producer, writer, teacher, costumer, ceramic artist, musician and painter.
These disciplines are not separate worlds. They are different ways of learning how to see, listen, respond, imagine, and express myself, connect with community, tell the truth and make good art.
I’m crazily curious and love working with my hands. When I finally found the permission to call myself an artist, I discovered that that blew open the door to finding my passion, owning my health, framing how I see the world, bringing me rest and excitement, and allowing me to walk in the world as myself.
This is why I teach and coach and mentor other artists. I love creatives, I love their sensitivity, I love how they see themselves and the world around them. So many of them struggle with what that sensitivity has cost them. If I can be part of helping them find their true identity, coach their way through blocks to their art, and get to watch them bloom, even as artists who have been practicing their art for decades, that is pure joy to me.
What is the last thing you read, watched, or listened to that had an impact on you?
I just watched “East of Eden” on Netflix. I’m loving watching Florence Pugh develop her art and career and the choices she makes in her roles. Making film art off of written art is hard, so it is so interesting to me to see what they decide to put in or tweak (or leave out altogether!) from the book. And historical costume and set design harkens back to when I worked in that in the theater… I love it! What palate are they choosing for the film? What fabrics and textures? How are the actors adding to that (or not)? What seems to be directed and what has the feel of authentic improvisation? Mmm, mmm, yummy! I love it!
What’s the one thing people would be surprised to learn about you or your business?
Perhaps the thing that people would be surprised to learn is that I couldn’t have done this work in my twenties or thirties. It has taken the gift of a few decades of a variety of experiences, discovering my own loves and identity, and what looks like a weird smattering of degrees (English Literature, Spiritual Direction, Theater, Secondary Education), jobs (administration work, accounting, studio management, acting, costuming, etc.) and cross cultural living (Europe, Africa & North America) that has brought me to this place at this time.
What is Creative Collective?
Creative Collective delivers comprehensive business services – marketing promotion, technical assistance, business consulting, and advocacy at all levels – for Essex County entrepreneurs, creators, and innovators. We support the whole person, not just the business, through a collaborative community where members learn from each other, not just from us, because we know thriving businesses are built by thriving humans supporting each other. Learn more and join Creative Collective at www.creativecollectivema.com/join
