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Constantin Stanislavski
Lesson One:
To read and understand the beginning of Act
Two
To introduce the life and ideas of Konstantin
Stanislavski
To explore the importance of ‘Action’ in
Stanislavskian terms
Konstantin Stanislavski 1863-1938
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Theatre in Russia was in a really bad state at the time
Stanislavski started his work. Including drunkenness
back stage!
“Experienced actors would simply inhabit the stage as
they sought fit and deliver the lines of the text
downstage centre and out front. There was no accepted
convention that actors should address each other
directly.” (p. 232)
“Settings were usually drawn from stock, doors and
windows being placed conveniently with no reference to
reality.” (p. 232)
Stanislavski “embarked on a quest for truth is in art”
ACTION:
His legacy was a “System” – “He tried in a systemic way
to lay down ground rules for approaching a character
and for how an actor might employ his or her body voice
and mind in such a creation.”
 Stanislavski was concerned with:
 Theatre was to be a moral instrument
 Its function was to civilise
 It was to increase sensitivity
 It should heighten perception
 It should ennoble the mind and uplift the spirit
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Action:
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Action: This was one of the most important elements: he
conceived action to be concerned with the meaningful,
purposeful activity of an onstage actor.
Inner and Outer action – a thought could be an action –
concentrated stillness on stage – ‘inner intensity’
Acting with purpose: ‘Do not run for the sake of running,
or suffer for the sake of suffering. Don’t ‘act in general’,
for the sake of action, always act with a purpose.
“...all action in the theatre must have an inner
justification, be logical, coherent and real.
The ‘Magic’ IF:
IF: The ‘magic if’ it opens up possibilities
for the actor of ‘creating a whole new life’
of stimulating emotions. What would
happen if....?
 If it were a real place? If this really was
my brother, sister etc...
 The magic if can be sustained by the
given circumstances
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The Given Circumstances:
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The Given Circumstances: these are the basis for an actor and their role,
created by the playwright, director, and designer.
The circumstances are:
The story of the play
Its facts, events, epoch, time and place of action
Conditions of life
The actors and directors interpretation
The production, the sets, the costumes, the properties
Lighting and sound effects
“The actor must believe in the given circumstances; through this belief she
or he will be able to function at a high level of involvement. The goal
throughout is a quest for truth:
“... it is necessary for the actor to develop to the highest degree his
imagination, a childlike naiveté and trustfulness, an artistic sensitivity to
truth and to the truthful in his soul and body.”
The Imagination:
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“...when you begin to study each role you
should first gather all the materials that have a
bearing on it, and supplement them with more
and more imagination...”
You must use your imagination to discover:
When, where, why, how, who
What you say about yourself
What other people say about you
Character study from a photograph – create an
imaginary life
Circles of Attention:
Ripples in a pond:
 1st circle he calls Solitude in Public –
focuses the actor within him/herself
 Then whole stage gradually gets into
focus
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Units and Objectives:
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Units is common sense – a play can be broken down into units of
action
These units are dominated and controlled by the objectives within
them – while it is useful to work on small and manageable chunks
of text, each chunk will have its own in built objective. A unit ends
with the end of the objective.
Acts as a guide for the actors voyage
Consider what verb you would give to the objective
The Super objective and through line of action:
Identifying an overarching objective for the character
Through line is that which galvanises all the small units and
objectives
Emotion Memory:
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Controversial Stanislavski disavowed it
later. Looking at the reservoir of your
memory
Tempo - Rhythm
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Moves away from the emotion memory.
Actor finds his own rhythm (inner) whilst
being surrounded by other characters with
their own rhythm (outer)
The Method of physical action:
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More emphasis on improvisation around
the character – idea of doing that as he
moved towards at the end of his career.
Physical – work.