Page "Willem Dafoe" Paragraph 3

Dafoe studied drama at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee, but left after a year-and-a-half to join the experimental theater company Theatre X in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, before moving to New York City in 1976.

There he apprenticed under Richard Schechner, director of the avant-garde theater troupe The Performance Group, and became romantically involved with the group's Elizabeth LeCompte, 11 years his senior and who, with her former romantic partner Spalding Gray and others, edged out Schechner and created the Wooster Group.

Within a year Dafoe was part of the company.