Meet Our Program Faculty
The NYPAA Experience is led by accomplished working professionals from Broadway, film, television, and the world’s leading conservatories. Our faculty mentor each student with industry-tested technique and individual care.
Acting Dept.
Karina Arroyave
Acting Instructor / Acting Intensive Faculty
Karina Arroyave is a Colombian-American actress and playwright with a career spanning nearly four decades on screen and stage. Trained at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts and at The Groundlings in Los Angeles, she made her Broadway debut in Jane Bowles’ In the Summer House and her screen debut in the film Lean On Me. Her television credits include recurring roles on 24, Orange Is the New Black, and The Blacklist, with recent work on FBI: Most Wanted. As NYPAA’s senior acting instructor, Karina brings a working professional’s honesty to every session — guiding students through advanced scene study, monologue, and audition preparation with technique rooted in real industry experience. Whether you are stepping into a scene for the first time or refining a polished performance, her classroom is a space where truthful, specific work is always the goal.
Acting Dept.
Maury Ginsberg
On-Camera Acting Instructor
Maury Ginsberg is a New York-based actor and educator with over 30 years of professional stage, film, and television experience. A graduate of Bard College, he has built a rich body of work that spans iconic television series — including Friends, Law & Order, Manifest, and The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey — as well as films with casts that include Morgan Freeman, Diane Keaton, Drew Barrymore, and Adam Sandler. Maury has spent 25 years teaching on-camera acting in New York and Los Angeles. He is equally celebrated for his deep roots in regional and Off-Broadway theater, including many seasons at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. At The NYPAA Experience, Maury teaches the on-camera technique that working actors rely on every day: how to locate stillness in front of the lens, make an audition self-tape feel alive, and bring the same honesty to a close-up that you’d bring to the stage.
Dance Dept.
Mikael Pasini
Ballet & Contemporary Instructor
Mikael Pasini is a luminary in the world of dance at The NYPAA, bringing international experience from Rome to New York City. He specializes in Ballet and Contemporary Dance, bridging the precision of classical training with innovative, emotive contemporary movement. His teaching philosophy emphasizes fundamental technique while fostering personal creativity and self-expression. Known as a mentor and immersive educator, Pasini encourages students to push beyond their creative limits and develop a deep connection to the art of movement.
Musical Theatre Dept.
Olivia Russell-Botto
Private Voice Classes
Olivia Russell-Botto is a versatile belter-soprano and voice educator whose artistry spans musical theatre and classical technique. With a Master’s in Vocal Performance and Pedagogy and international training in Germany and Italy, she brings academic rigor and real performance experience into every private lesson. Comfortable across a wide range of styles, she works with each student to develop vocal health, expressive freedom, and a repertoire that is genuinely their own — whether a contemporary pop-influenced sound, a classical aria, or the kind of belt that fills a Broadway house. Voice study with Olivia is a place to take risks, ask hard questions about your instrument, and build lasting technique that serves you for years to come.
Acting Dept.
Caris Vujcec
Acting & Audition Technique Instructor
Caris Vujcec is an award-winning actor, director, writer, and producer — a true multihyphenate artist. She holds an MFA in Acting and Directing from the University of Missouri-Kansas City and a B.S. from Syracuse University’s renowned Newhouse School and Department of Drama. On Broadway she understudied Uma Thurman and Blair Brown in The Parisian Woman, and her television work includes a long-running recurring role as Detective Louise Campesi on Law & Order: Criminal Intent and SVU. She created, wrote, directed, and stars in the internationally award-winning digital series The Pepper Project, ranked the #1 U.S. digital series at the 2017 Web Series World Cup. In the studio, Caris teaches foundational acting and audition technique with an emphasis on tools you can trust under pressure — practical, repeatable, and ready for the room.
Voice Dept.
Mike Walsh
Voice, Speech & Dialect Instructor
Mike Walsh is one of New York City’s most in-demand dialect and voice coaches, working across film, television, theater, and commercial performance. He holds a Master’s from Columbia University’s MFA Acting program — where he trained with the Linklater Voice Center and in Alexander Technique — and an undergraduate degree from NYU with concentrations in Linguistics and Classics, giving his work both technical depth and genuine versatility. Mike serves as Voice Instructor at The New York Performing Arts Academy and as adjunct faculty at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and the Institute of American Musical Theatre, with private coaching clients drawn from shows including Shameless, Big Sky, and Mixed-ish. His method is direct and practical: he makes the technical approachable, helping every student — whether navigating a dialect for a specific role or simply learning to speak with more presence and clarity — find their voice and use it with confidence.