The Stanislavski System by John Gielgud & Joshua Logan & Sonia Moore

Author:John Gielgud & Joshua Logan & Sonia Moore
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 1984-10-02T00:00:00+00:00

* In 1931 Charlie Chaplin wrote in an article that he was using the “magic if” for all his creative work.

* Some distort public solitude into “private moments,” which would have shocked Stanislavski.

ANALYSIS THROUGH

EVENTS AND ACTIONS

Actors must project the main idea of the play. Since it is much easier to understand an immediate purpose than a distant one, the long-range aim will be discovered through important events, the consecutive actions revealing each event. By determining the actions, the actor is able to build a logical, consecutive performance and to assimilate his role—and this practice will also be exceptionally helpful to him in memorizing the part.

Every human action has a definite aim, and answers the question, “What do I do?” “Why do I do it?” and “How do I do it?” An actor must remember that his reason for being on stage is to convey what he does and why he does it at a given moment.

Stanislavski recommended beginning the analysis of a play with the determination of events, or, as he said, the “active facts,” which dictate the actions. It is essential to understand the important events and not to dwell on secondary ones. Important events lie at the root of a good play and move its action as well as that of each character. Determination of those events involves the circumstances and is the shortest way to the understanding of the play.

Each event has a main action; for example, a friend comes to help a married couple to settle a difference. His main action is to help. In trying to help he may want to persuade the husband to pay more attention to his wife, he may reproach the woman for not being serious enough about her duties, and so on. By striving energetically to carry out these actions, which are really adaptations or means to achieve the aim, the actor reveals the event on stage.

While searching for a method of analysis which would fully disclose the essence of a play, Stanislavski for many years taught and applied the process of breaking up the play into its various episodes, analyzing and discovering the actions by having the director and the actors sit around a table with their scripts and pencils. He loved this preparatory period, which preceded rehearsals and which lasted a long time. In the last years of his directorial and pedagogical career, Stanislavski changed this practice. He said that these long sessions around the table led to serious errors because they divided spiritual and physical behavior. So Stanislavski started rehearsals almost immediately after discussing the main idea. Actors analyzed the events and investigated the psychophysical behavior of the characters on stage, in action.

In order to understand what his action is at a given moment, an actor must analyze the essence of an event. Actions must be strongly related to the idea of the play. Everything an actor does on stage must contribute to this. If the actor fulfills his action, he will convey it to his audience;

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