If you venture to the depths of the Daley Building downtown on Tuesday evenings, you’ll find DePaul’s Directors for Actors club rehearsing, just past the hall of film posters and inside the auditorium.

The story of this student-led organization begins with Sam Aaberg, a junior majoring in film and television with a concentration in directing. His inspiration came from his Directing III class, which examines how individual scenes are performed. Rachel Bass, an assistant professor of cinema production who teaches Directing III, is the group’s faculty adviser.

Aaberg says the class opened the world of directing to him, showing him that it was possible to direct without being the overly demanding stereotype. Aaberg said the course’s textbook, “Directing Actors” by Judith Weston, focuses on practice and encourages directors to “make sure they are finding opportunities to work with actors and learn through doing in addition to reading the theory and knowing the theory of it.”

So Aaberg thought to himself, “What if we did a club where it was just consistent rehearsal every week with real actors?”

Thus Directors for Actors was born.

The club met for the first time in the spring of 2024, an invite-only event that led Aaberg to the rest of the club’s executive board: Olivia Salib, marketing manager; Andre Cecilio, treasurer; Liam Baldwin, actors’ liaison; and Renna Kisanuki, vice president. The club began advertising during fall quarter and officially launched Oct. 1.

Modeled after the Directing III class, Directors for Actors aims to strengthen and improve communication between directors and actors while allowing students to explore both roles. Students also share work and collaboration opportunities, rehearse and give each other feedback.

The average meeting hosts roughly 15 to 18 attendees, beginning with a question of the week to make students start thinking about their work. At the meeting on Feb. 4, the question was, “What is your favorite script you’ve read for a class?”

As the group is still new, its members are just starting to pursue ways to include other performance disciplines. The organization began “Writers for Actors” during their regular meeting on Feb. 4. The group broke into three smaller teams to rehearse scenes provided by student writers Valentin Sandoval, Ella Hardie and Isaac Niccum.

Directors for Actors strives for collaborative communication and judgment-free exploration. During initial readings on Feb. 4, each team started by questioning their writer about the scene and the context, as well as the tensions and dynamics of their characters.

If the first approach to the scene didn’t feel right, they talked through what each member felt could be improved upon, and they made the effort to get input from everyone on the team.

After 90 minutes, they performed each scene to the large group. Aaberg led discussions about the process of putting together each scene so the audience and performers could reflect on their interactions and what worked and what didn’t.

Adrian Pappas, one of the group’s acting contributors, has attended meetings for just over a month. While his background is mainly in theater, he said he saw an opportunity to learn how to adapt his skills for the screen and grabbed it.

He said he isn’t necessarily looking to direct or work on production soon but finds it “valuable to get input from people on all sides of the production.”

He also said he wants to have enough understanding of other people’s roles so he “can respect everybody’s work and have (his) equally be respected.”

Renna Kisanuki, the club’s vice president and film and television major, said she learns from working with theater students in particular.

“The rehearsal process is all about communication, and when you’re working with a peer that comes from an entirely different academic background,

that communication becomes all the more essential,” Kisanuki said.

Directors for Actors hopes to grow their reputation on campus, with marketing and an “On Camera” event sometime in the future.

Ultimately, the group would like to build relationships in Chicago’s professional film and theater community. When they come across DePaul film students, Aaberg said he wants professional actors and directors to think, “Oh, they know what they’re doing.”

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