In 1945, he co-founded HB Studio (the Herbert Berghof Studio) in New York City, as a place where aspiring actors could train and practice. In 1948, Uta Hagen joined the Studio as Berghof's artistic partner, and they married in 1957. They ran the studio together until his death in 1990.[2] Notable alumni included Jack Lemmon, Al Pacino, Liza Minnelli, Robert De Niro, Geraldine Page, Fritz Weaver, Anne Bancroft, Donna McKechnie and Matthew Broderick.[4][5] Despite being a charter member of the Actors Studio, he differed "with those colleagues who expounded the Method technique when his approach shifted to an emphasis on actions rather than thoughts and reactions."[4]
Described by The New York Times as "one of the nation's most respected acting teachers and coaches", he died of a heart ailment on 5 November 1990 at his home in Manhattan.[4]
^ abcKennedy, Dennis. The Oxford Companion to Theatre and Performance, Oxford Univ. Press (2010) p. 61
^ abRosenfeld, Carol. Acting and Living in Discovery: A Workbook for the Actor, Hackett Publishing (2014) p. 120
^Robert Lewis (1996) [1984]. "Actors Studio, 1947". Slings and Arrows: Theater in My Life. New York: Applause Books. p. 183. ISBN1-55783-244-7. At the end of the summer, on Gadget's return from Hollywood, we settled the roster of actors for our two classes in what we called the Actors Studio – using the word 'studio' as we had when we named our workshop in the Group, the Group Theatre Studio... My group, meeting three times a week, consisted of Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, Maureen Stapleton, Eli Wallach, Mildred Dunnock, Jerome Robbins, Herbert Berghof, Tom Ewell, John Forsythe, Anne Jackson, Sidney Lumet, Kevin McCarthy, Karl Malden, E.G. Marshall, Patricia Neal, Beatrice Straight, David Wayne, and – well, I don't want to drop names, so I'll stop there. In all, there were about fifty.
