Ronald Rand is an American stage and film actor, educator, director, playwright, poet, librettist, producer, and newspaper publisher. An International Cultural Goodwill Ambassador, founder and publisher of the newspaper, The Soul of the American Actor, he is also the author of Create: How Extraordinary People Live to Create and Create to Live, Acting Teachers of America, "The Marsh in May and 30 Poems with 29 Paintings by Ronald Rand, and Solo Transformation on Stage: A Journey into the Organic Process of the Art of Transformation.
Early life and education Rand was born and raised in Coral Gables, Florida, and began performing at the Merry-Go-Round Playhouse in Coral Gables at age six, appearing in over 200 children's theatre plays over ten years. Rand graduated from Coral Gables Senior High School. A graduate of New York University Tisch School of the Arts in New York City, he received a Bachelor of Fine Arts, studying with Stella Adler. Two of Rand's classmates were Bill Paxton, for whom Rand wrote monologues to perform in class, and Kate Valk. Subsequently, Rand also studied with Harold Clurman, Robert Lewis, Joseph Chaikin, with Jerzy Grotowski at Columbia University, and at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art's summer program in London. Rand began developing his one-man show in 2000, for which he is best known, called "Let It Be Art!"
Career Rand's odyssey as Harold Clurman began with his first performance of his play, "Let It Be Art!" directed by Gregory Abels, at the Sande Shurin Theatre in New York City in 2001. Rand performed his play in three productions Off-Broadway, first at the Sande Shurin Theatre, at the Century Center Theatre under the play's previous title, Clurman, produced by J.C. Compton, the second wife of Harold Clurman, and then by the Mirror Repertory Company at the ArcLight Theatre. Rand made his New York debut in 1978 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music as a member of the cast of Julius Caesar with Richard Dreyfuss, George Rose, Austin Pendleton, René Auberjonois, and Tom Hulce, directed by Frank Dunlop.
Rand's transformation into a 79-year-old Harold Clurman in his play, "Let It Be Art!" comes through a two-hour transformation process in his dressing room, based on Konstantin Stanislavski's Method of Physical Actions.
Rand has performed in "Let It Be Art!" in 29 countries and represented the United States in the 8th Theatre Olympics performing in his solo play at the Kamani Auditorium in New Delhi, and Tagore Theatre in Thiruvananthapuram. Rand received the Best Actor Award from the Jury at the 26th International Monodrama Festival representing the US in Bitola, North Macedonia in 2025. Rand performed in his solo play as a Guest of Honor at the 1st KRAKOW FEST International Monodrama Festival representing the US in Krakow, Poland in 2026. Rand is the first American to perform in a solo play at the International Bafa Arts Festival in Harare, Zimbabwe, Kenya International Theatre Festival at Nairobi's National Theatre, Voices of History International Theatre Festival in Vologda, Russia, MerCoSur Interior Althuapua De Cioppo International Festival in Paysandú, Uruguay, Bareilly International Theatre Festival, India, Baptizer International Theatre Festival in Bangalore, India, San Vicente del Caguán Cultural Arts Center in northern Colombia, Patravadi Theatre in Bangkok, Trade Unions Palace of Culture in Minsk, Belarus, Palace Dar el-Makhzen in the Kasbah, Tangier, Morocco, and Cayman National Cultural Foundation Harquail National Theatre, Grand Cayman in the British West Indies. Rand has performed his solo play in the International Theatre Festival for Peace in Barrancabermeja, Colombia, Kathmandu International Theatre Festival in Nepal, Act Alone Festival in Suðureyri, Iceland, International Intermediality Theatre Conference in Tangier, Morocco, performed and was a Festival judge in the M.E.S.S. International Theatre Festival at the Chamber 55 Theatre, Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina, WAAE Global Arts Education Summit Athens 2024Colombo International Theater Festival in Sri Lanka, HIGH FEST International Performing Arts Festival in Yerevan, Armenia, International Winter Festival in Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Chevolek International Theatre Festival in Chelyabinsk, Russia, Georgia International Theatre Festival in Tbilisi, Georgia, Slavija International Theatre Festival in Belgrade, Serbia, Lithographeion Theatre, Patras, Greece, and in the Inaugural Harold Clurman Festival of Arts in New York City. Rand has completed five goodwill tours across India, performing his solo play and teaching his master acting workshop at universities and festivals including Rangayana Theatre in Mysore, Manipal University in Jaipur, at Christ University as a Festival judge and performed in Baptizer International Theatre Festival in Bangalore, AddLife Caring Minds Wellness Centre in Kolkata, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Chilsag Chilies Acting Academy, and R.K. Film and TV Media Academy in New Delhi, Anupam Kher's Actor Prepares Academy in Mumbai, University of Calicut, Pondicherry University, Sri Aurobindo Auditorium in Auroville, and appeared in Great Mind at Work, a play by the India playwright, Sachin Gupta, at L'Alliance française de Delhi, performing in Hindi, a language he does not speak.
Rand has performed in "Let It Be Art!" across 21 states including at the Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts, North Coast Repertory Theatre, Cyrano's Theatre Company, Invisible Theatre, Cape May Stage, Black Mountain Center for the Arts, Norwich Arts Center, Last Frontier Theatre Conference, New England Theatre Comference, Southeastern Theatre Conference, Robert Wilson's Watermill Arts Center, and the two-week Logan Festival of Solo Performance at 1st Stage. His other Off-Broadway theater work includes Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom directed by Arthur French at the Classical Theatre of Harlem; all three male leads in Perfect Crime; The Servant of Two Masters directed by Stuart Vaughan, Full Circle by Erich Maria Remarque, and the premiere of an adaptation into a play of Pictures at an Exhibition by Anny Tangelder attended by Princess Christina. He starred as Harry in Luv at The Barnstormers Theatre in Tamworth, New Hampshire, as The Stage Manager in the 75th Anniversary production of Our Town (2013), as Captain Keller in The Miracle Worker (2014), and as Polonius in Hamlet (2015), in Vermont at the Greensboro Arts Alliance Summer Stock Theatre in Greensboro, Vermont. Rand brought to life Charles Dickens in "An Evening With Charles Dickens Reading A Christmas Carol at the 8th Annual Dickens Feast at the Tuscumbia Roundhouse in Tuscumbia, Alabama, acting as more than a dozen characters in a new adaptation he created and directed (2018). Rand performed in a new solo play he created, "The Tuscumbia I Know: A Talk by Captain Keller" playing Captain A.H. Keller at the Helen Keller Library as part of The Helen Keller Festival in Tuscumbia, Alabama, Helen Keller's birthplace (2017–2019). Rand's film appearances include Yoko Ono's film Homeless (1989), Family Business (1989), Reversal of Fortune (1990), "The Return of Superfly" (1990), The Hard Way (1991), The Super (1991), Six Degrees of Separation (1993) The Jerky Boys (1995), The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) and Garden State (2004). Rand was cast as an Executive in Another You (1991), as President Richard Nixon in Rude Awakening (1989), by Robert Redford in Quiz Show (1994), and as a business magnate in When in Rome (2010). Rand worked in television in the 1990s appearing on One Life to Live, Another World, As the World Turns, and Guiding Light. Rand portrayed Milton Sterns in A Marriage: Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz on PBS American Playhouse (1991). Rand appeared in several sketches on Saturday Night Live (1983–1993), and as the Judge in a KRS-One video (1987). From 2005 to 2014, Mr. Rand read poetry in Stan Tannen's “TIPA Literary Programs” across New York City reading alongside Ed Asner, Alan Bates, Kathleen Chalfant, Betsy von Furstenberg, Richard Griffiths, Tammy Grimes, Maria Gay Harden, Anne Jackson, Brian Murray, Marian Seldes, Frances Sternhagen, Eli Wallach and Fritz Weaver, in tributes to Abraham Lincoln, Herman Melville, Walt Whitman and sharing great American speeches.
Educator The J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board and The Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs chose Rand as a Fulbright Specialist Scholar during 2021–2025. Rand was also chosen as a Fulbright Specialist Scholar during 2013–2018. Rand has received four Fulbright Awards.