Stanislavsky is easily one of the most recognisable of theatre practitioners and after reading this book I can finally understand why. He was a pioneer, experimenter, inventor and much more. During his life it was apparent that wasn’t he satisfied by normal theatrical convention of his time so he only went and lead an artistic revolution! I thoroughly enjoyed reading about his infamous “system” but what I loved even more is discovering insights into why he needed to create it. I can understand completely why he was sick of the unrealistic melodrama in Russia but it never completely dawned on me that there wasn’t an alternative. I genuinely feel like this is a very important book to read as a young actor and Bella Merlin has done a great job at making it interesting and accessible however I did find myself going back and having re-read sentences over and over again to try and comprehend as much as I possibly could. I had to look up quite a few words as well such as; pedagogic; esoteric ; percolate; despotism; maligned; triumvirate etc. Although this has help to enhance my theatrical dictionary and I am grateful for that. I am going to do a quick overview of what I learnt from each section and my personal feelings towards aspects of this book.
Biography in social and artistic context:
In my opinion having context is one of the most important things as an actor. It really helps you to understand the “Why” and then you can begin delving into all other areas. Surprisingly I found it fascinating to observe this man’s journey from inquisitive child to elderly adventurer. Konstantin luckily was born into a rich family which meant his childhood was filled with trips to the theatre that most likely set his imagination off. What I love about Stanislavsky most is his ability to never be satisfied. It wasn’t enough simply to be a character; he wanted to dig into the psychology of acting. I feel as if a lot of disillusioned actors do not have this passion and spirit any more. I am guilty of this too don’t get me wrong, sometimes I just want to give the audience a good show and have fun with a role and often leave behind the cerebral content behind. It was great to see his failures as well. He tried spending a night in a cold cellar to stimulate his imagination for his role in The Miserly Knight. Did it work? Nope! But this failure led him to develop observations into affective memory. I liked the way Merlin uses the political climate of 19th century to explain shifts in attitudes towards the arts. I remember in my previous training working with objectives and given circumstances but not understanding where they came from. I understood how objectives work but I didn’t really get why but now I get it. There was no clear upward correlation between his methods and his age. He’d go forwards, backwards, upsidedown and everything in between all in the name of delivering a more naturalistic and truthful method of acting/actor training. The last section of this chapter writes about his later life and how he could no longer experiment in the manner he used to because of his age so he found some prodigies and just tried to give the world the last of him. Active analysis was born was a result of this - Here, Today Now!
Summary and analysis of An Actor Prepares
As someone who hasn’t read “An Actor Prepares” yet I was quite worried when going into this chapter that I wouldn’t understand what was going on. Turns out Bella Merlin does a pretty good job at condensing the information whilst delivering quality commentary. Stanislavsky wrote that book with narratives and insights delivered through watching specifically written characters make mistakes and do exercises and études. Kostya’s constant messing up but constant improvement sends out a good message to me as a young actor. You can mess up but as long as you keep develop you can fine tune your instruments and get better. One chapter analysis that really intrigued me was the one that mentioned about “absorbing rays” and communicating without using an facial expressions, text or physical movements. I found that slightly ludicrous that two actors could simply sit opposite each other and just emit pure energy towards one another and have an effect on each other. I really want to try this out practically as I am kind of sceptical of whether it works or not. Also the chapter on “communion” really interested me. I feel as if I have had moments where I’ve been 100% in the grasp of another actor and they equally in me. This is has usually been achieved through improvisational work as that is truly when I am listening to their bodies; every nuance, every twitch, every subtle change you pick up and I think to be able to replicate that for the stage would be amazing. Emotion memory is another mystery that was solved for me. I used to think that using past experience to fuel your performance was just a lesser form of method acting. Turns out it is not! It’s more of a using remembered stimuli to paint the colours of your imagination. It doesn’t even have to be directly related to a plays given circumstances. This is useful to me as a young performer as I may not have as many heart-wrenching memories to call upon when I wish to get weepy for role.
Description and analysis of The Seagull
I found this chapter quite difficult if I’m perfectly honest. It was quite complex to imagine this play that I’d never seen, with characters I knew nothing about whilst being introduced to their inner motive forces and inner tempo-rhythms when I barely even knew the story with which they are contained. Regardless it was a brilliant observation into how to practically employ Stanislavsky's methods. It’s all well and good knowing that opposing objectives create interesting actions but what’s the use of knowing that if we can’t as actors implement it. We can see that through creating an naturalistic and real atmosphere we can trick an audience into believing that these characters that we present before them live their lives after they exit stage right and when they come back we are only seeing glimpses. It’s also interesting seeing how in a time period before the cinematic boom of the 1920’s that a production with such detail to eyes and facial expression could even exist. I mean it’s not like there’s an “extreme close-up button” on the audiences chair. The little nuance, energy levels, opposing temp rhythms, having background action to build an atmosphere; all this never existed and that blows my mind.
Practical Exercises
Strangely I found this chapter the least
useful (at the moment!). Exercises obviously work best when actually physically done thus just reading about how to create a sequence of actions to inspire truthful performances is slightly fruitless. Although I do think if we put some of these exercises into practice we will be able to strengthen ourselves as actors. An exercises that I really found interesting was exercise 4.13 (The one with finding a letter in a room). I find the concept of pure unadulterated reactionary acting brilliant so reacting to finding a letter in a room that’s only meant for you and actively reading it there and then is going to inspire a lot of emotions. The fact you are completely alone even though you obviously know you are being watched also adds a wholenother level to the exercise. How would I react if I just opened a letter and discovered I just won £2000? I guess it’s also about not being a fake and allowing your natural reaction to just flow out of you. This aided me in comprehending Stanislavsky’s “Method of Physical Actions” a little better as throughout the book I was quite confused about what that actually meant! “Active Analysis” was another concept I was failing to fully understand but exercise 4.15 helped me. You don’t have to fully memorise everything about a playscript to understand it. You can just get the bones of it and then move onto this exercise to unlock psycho-physical information hidden away inside these characters.
In conclusion I enjoyed this text and learnt a lot about how to create naturalistic action on stage. I feel this book will be seminal cornerstone in my acting training and am glad I read it.
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