An Actor Prepares by Constantin Stanislavsky

Author:Constantin Stanislavsky [Stanislavsky, Constantin]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Read Books Ltd.
Published: 2015-06-28T16:00:00+00:00

10

Our lesson today was taken up by testing the sense of truth of various students. The first to be called on was Grisha. He was asked to play anything at all he liked. So he chose his usual partner, Sonya, and when they had finished the Director said: ‘What you have just done was correct and admirable from your own point of view, which is that of exceedingly clever technicians, interested only in the external perfection of a performance.

‘But my feelings could not go along with you, because what I look for in art is something natural, something organically creative, that can put human life into an inert role.

‘Your make-believe truth helps you to represent images and passions. My kind of truth helps to create the images themselves and to stir real passions. The difference between your art and mine is the same as between the two words seem and be. I must have real truth. You are satisfied with its appearance. I must have true belief. You are willing to be limited to the confidence your public has in you. As they look at you they are sure that you will execute all the established forms with perfection. They rely on your skill as they do on that of an expert acrobat. From your standpoint the spectator is merely an onlooker. For me he involuntarily becomes a witness of, and a party to, my creative work; he is drawn into the very thick of the life that he sees on the stage, and he believes in it.’

Instead of making any argument in reply, Grisha caustically quoted the poet Pushkin as having a different point of view about truth in art:

‘A host of lowly truths is dearer

Than fictions which lift us higher than ourselves.’

‘I agree with you and with Pushkin as well,’ said Tortsov, ‘because he is talking about fictions in which we can believe. It is our faith in them that lifts us. This is a strong confirmation of the point of view that on the stage everything must be real in the imaginary life of the actor. This I did not feel in your performance.’

Whereupon he began to go over the scene in detail and correct it just as he had done with me in the exercise of the burnt money. Then something happened which resulted in a long and most instructive harangue. Grisha suddenly stopped playing. His face was dark with anger, his lips and hands trembled. After wrestling with his emotions for some time, finally he blurted out:

‘For months we have been moving chairs around, shutting doors, lighting fires. That’s not art; the theatre is not a circus. There physical actions are in order. It is extremely important to be able to catch your trapeze or jump on a horse. Your life depends on your physical skill. But you cannot tell me that the great writers of the world produced their masterpieces so that their heroes would indulge in exercises of physical actions. Art is free! It needs space, and not your little physical truths.

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