Stanislavski

Lesson: 25th September 2017

Emotional Memory Work

We started off today's session by talking about the play that we will be performing as a group in the style of the practitioner, Stanislavski. The play that we will be studying is "Anatomy of a Suicide" by Alice Birch where the main themes are inherited suicide and what it takes to be a woman. I will be going further into this in later blogs when we begin to work on the play itself.

We then did a Stanislavski type 'workshop' where we looked at one of his main ideas; emotional memory (or affective memory). This is where actors to call on the memory of details from a similar situation (or more recently a situation with similar emotions) and import those feelings to those of their characters. Instead of applying this to a character, we simply thought of a memory that had a strong emotion attached to it. I thought of a memory that made me feel quite sad but also panicky; most of the other people within the class also chose a sad memory that gave them a strong physical reaction, for example, I started crying. If this was done during a piece of Stanislavski inspired theatre, it would have allowed the audience to see how upset the character would be.

After a while of simply thinking about the memory laid in a space of our own in the dark in the semi-supine position so that we could concentrate on our own feelings/breathing and not another persons, we were told to sit up and write a letter that voiced our feelings about the situation that we had chosen. At this, I began to grow more emotional as I got more invested in the emotion and situation that I was remembering. At this point, other people began to become so upset that they had to leave the room in order to reign their emotion in.

After 'writing' our letter, we were old to reread it and then fold it up and continue to sit in the dark. This made me feel quite isolated even though I was in a room with a group of people that I feel fairly comfortable with. Additionally, my emotions were become more and more physicalized as was, I suspect, the remainder of the class.

Chipp then used lighting in order to create a sort of scene whereby he would 'read' the letter that we had 'written' describing how we felt in that moment of the memory that we had remembered. As he didn't know what was 'written' on the letter, his reactions, although fairly similar, meant different things for each person. The light that was used, pictured to the right, made me feel quite isolated and on the spot as Chipp 'read' my letter. The lighting also made me feel quite exposed to the rest of the class. Chipp's reaction to the letter made my emotions even more physicalized due to the nature of what was 'written' on the letter as he reacted with disgust. This section was the section of the lesson that seemed most fake because it was the most that was similar to a scene within a play.

I felt that I could express my emotion well more during the part where we were laid in the dark in the semi supine position. This is because I was able to focus more on the memory rather than on what Chipp's response was to the letter and was able to immerse myself more fully into the memory.

After, we all comforted each other as most of us were distraught by the memory that we had used.

 Stanislavski and His Method

Stanislavski was a Russian actor who developed the drama that we recognise today by using realism. This was introduced by him in the early 20th century and included the aforementioned emotional memory. He said that an actor's entrance on stage should be a continuation that precedes the situation presented on stage. He also said that an actor should train his senses so that he can respond freely in the stage environment which would create a wide emotional range. He said that the stage should be an addition to the real world which contrasts heavily with the style of Brecht.

Three core Elements
Stanislavski said that there were three core elements that an actor should use to understand their character. First the actor would go over the script carefully to, secondly, find out what the character wants. They would then determine the given circumstance of the scene such as the setting from subtext within the script.

Objective
The objective for a character is what they want to achieve from any given line/scene/from the entire play. This can be done by breaking a scene into beats that end with the change of subject which could be based on a change of emotion. The actor must also work out the key motivation between each line.

Magic "If"
The Magic If enables actors to get in the mind set of their character at a point within the script which enables an actor to ask "What if this situation happened to me?". This enables an actor to think like their character.

Obstacles
Obstacles are things which prevent a character from their objective. This can be dealt with through:
1) The character gives up their objective.
2) The character finds a way to go around the obstacle.
3) The character plunges along regardless.
This can give an actor an insight into how the character behaves at any given situation.

Internal Monologue
Stanislavski said that people have a semi constant flow of thoughts which would mean that the character and therefore the actor would have a stream of thoughts. This helps the actor as it makes them believe that each action is happening spontaneously. This also prevents the scene from becoming dull after a while.