Tempo and Rhythm are useful to look out for when approaching a text, for instance when it comes to saying something difficult, you will notice that you sub consciously aim to control your voice and keep it as steady as possible as you never want to give into a difficult moment. We instinctively fight to keep ourselves from looking vulnerable, so bear in mind the tempo and rhythm you are using within a text, you never want the audience to know what is coming. Quite often, individuals approaching acting will set themselves comfortable and instantly into “sad tone”, you want to avoid this as much as possible as an actor as the audience should never know what is coming and you also should not know what is coming in the sense that acting should feel “in the moment” and spontaneous as for your characters that is exactly what it is. This helps to keep things fresh.
To sum up –
Look in depth at the scene and play around with tempo and rhythm, never get set into a tone that will lead the audience to knowing exactly what is about to arrive. Adjusting tempo and rhythm keeps things fluid but most importantly …… INTERESTING. Just have a read to yourself or record yourself and look for the consistencies in your voice and work on shaking this up, an actor who does not do the typical response to a text is far more interesting as one that does. You are creating a character (a human), none of us respond to situations in the same way.
Given circumstances is an important technique of Stanislavski’s were the environmental and situational conditions will influence your performance, for example my character Anya at the start of the play had just got back from a 4-day train journey (from Paris to Russia). This will affect the way I move and speak due to my character being tired and cold. Given circumstances are what Stanislavski believed we should do as soon as we have been given a script, given circumstances are what help you answer the six fundamental questions (who, when, where, why, for what reason and how). The facts and conditions of life are also covered, this being key to my role as Anya as she is someone from wealth, the key obstacle to the play “The Cherry Orchard” from which my character Anya is taken, is the severe loss of the wealth once owned. This obstacle being pivotal to promoting a change within the character throughout the play.
To sum up:
WHO? who is your character, but it is also helpful to sum up who the other characters are (acting is reacting, it is all about what your character “needs” from the other person). Where were they born, where did they live and until what age, who are their parents, who are their friends, what values does your character hold? Go as deep into each given circumstance as much as you can, this will pay dividends when you finally get up to do the work in rehearsals.
WHAT? what is going on within the scene, the key talking point/ potential obstacle. What is it that the characters wish to ascertain?
WHERE? where are you, describe the room or if outdoors, describe the area. Nothing is too specific – you are creating a world; the world is not basic.
WHEN? what time of day, what time of year – remember this will affect a change within your character no matter how slight that change may be. It is also good to know when it comes to costume should such decision become your own…. you would not put your character in a summer dress during winter.
WHY? why is this conversation taking place. It is increasingly rare for you to find a meaningless conversation within a play, everyone wants and needs something. There are exceptions of course but this would come from a certain stylistic play.
For what reason and HOW? This is where you become more specific with the why, think about the reason behind this conversation, did something happen in the scene before? and how – did your character instigate this moment in the play or was it someone else.
REMEMBER – the text is full of clues and ideas, given circumstances is a tool to root for these clues and ideas but on a more basic level to get you started. Once you have used this tool, there is no reason for you not to dig deeper. Look into the political/ social events that have happened during your characters life, for instance a character that grew up during the second world war would know what it is like to live with rationing until a certain age etc.
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Proxemics is the spacing between characters, it reflects how characters are
connected and how they feel about each other. Proxemics being a naturalistic
tool as if you do not like someone you tend to avoid them without
even noticing that you are doing so. I found Proxemics to
be particularly effective for me playing the character
of Beverley. I used Proxemics when Tony was not on stage
by purposely sitting in a chair away from Angela to show
how I am not interested in her, as soon as Tony had returned, I purposely
sat next to Angela so that when Tony sits down it is only
by me. This making Beverley split the characters and pronouncing her
control through mere spacing.
When it comes to using this technique, just have a little think about who the
other characters are and how your character feels about them, are they nervous
around these people or completely comfortable. Think about the atmosphere you
want to throw out, when you walk into an awkward situation you tend to know
through the vibe you are getting, Proxemics is a big part of creating an
atmosphere.
A practical way to use proxemics when approaching text on your is to
consider, is my character retreating on this line, staying put or advancing. By
switching this up it can give you different choices for the character and help
keep the work alive and fresh.
Emotion memory is a technique where the actor uses an emotion they once felt and applies it to how the character is feeling on the assumption it is applicable.
For example, if the character has just been left out by someone; the actor would think back to a point in their life where they felt left out. This allowing them to connect to the character and the emotion the character is feeling. However, emotion memory (although effective) needs to be controlled or an actor could lose themselves in their own emotions when they are supposed to be feeling the characters. This would take away the actual acting and it becomes about self-indulgence for the actor. I found emotion memory to be effective when playing Anya in “The Cherry Orchard”. The section I was doing was when Anya felt sorry for her mother, the pity essence being something I have felt before so I could use this when playing the character. This made my performance more believable. In comparison to the other Stanislavski techniques, I am talking about, I would consider this technique 3rd useful out of all the others.
Imagination is the key to Stanislavski’s system as it is essential to turn what is occurring on stage into theatrical reality, if the play is not turned into theatrical reality it is not realistic and not acting. If one does not use their imagination when acting, then the audience will feel none of the suspension of disbelief. The ability to imagine allows you to connect to your character and start to believe you are them and if you believe, your acting will appear to be realistic and naturalistic. Stanislavski shows the importance of imagination in the quote “art is a product of imagination”. For me I found my imagination helped my performance regarding “The Cherry Orchard” as due to the era I had to imagine I had a corset. This changed my posture and how I held myself. I consider imagination the most important of Stanislavski methods and the hardest to learn as I find teaching someone to imagine to be almost impossible.
Stanislavski considered the way acting was being done to be wrong. When he was an actor, he had to address everything to the audience and the audience would be able to affect what was occurring on stage. Stanislavski felt this ruined the whole point of acting and destroyed the naturalism entirely. Therefore, Stanislavski developed the fourth wall- it is an imaginary wall at the front of the stage separating the audience from the actors which allowed for Stanislavski’s method “The Suspension of Disbelief” to take place.
Units and objectives for me were the most effective of Stanislavski’s techniques. They narrow what you are thinking or what part of the scene you are in down to a sentence, ensuring you know instantly what you want from a scene/ section the play. Units are portions of a scene; they break down the scene allowing the text to be manageable for you to decide what your character is doing during the unit. This is most helpful because the action during a scene is always changing, like any conversation does. You can name a unit: unit 1 and unit 2 however I found it boring and that it held no relevance to what is going on within the section. By choosing a name such as “breaking the ice” I am better able to interpret that this is the first time the characters are meeting each other within this scene, so the actions (Actions are not covered on this blog) might be “to welcome” or “to brush off”.
With every unit there should be an objective- an objective being what your character wants psychologically to obtain. Your objective is usually accompanied by a physical action, for example an objective of mine during “Abigail’s party” was to persuade Tony to dance by playing music (the playing of music being my physical action which aided my objective). Overall units and objectives were most effective for me as it is to the point and sums up an entire scene with ease, an excellent foundation for basic character work from which detail can be built.
I previously had a post on here called magic if, I have removed this post and replaced it with the current one you are seeing.
What if –
what if is when you ask a question that only you know about. This is most useful when you have completed your given circumstances. What if is powerful as it helps to create the world within the world, for instance I know within my day to day life that there is a big bustling busy world outside of my own. What if does this for your character, you really need to grasp that you are a part of a world on stage and that everything should feel spontaneous, keeping your own what if will help you feel this on stage and give more layers to your character.
EXAMPLES:
WHAT IF THE WORLD IS ENDING
WHAT IF IM NOT ALIVE
WHAT IF THIS IS A GAME
WHAT IF IM SECRETLY ON MEDICATION
what if can be anything, it gives you an edge to play with, but also gives you room to play with particularly stylised pieces with no specificity to them.
Constantin Stanislavski is the most well-known theatre director and actor, his popularity coming from him developing the method. Constantin developed method acting as he believed there were easier way to improve one’s ability. the method includes a range of techniques such as (magic if, units and objectives, the fourth wall, imagination, emotion memory, proxemics, given circumstances and tempo/rhythm) these being the ones I shall discuss in my blog.
Constantin was born in Moscow, Russia on January 17th, 1863. When Stanislavski was an actor and theatre director, he believed the performances were too un-naturalistic and melodramatic. The method changed this as he wished to focus on realism by being disciplined and creating a groundwork from which actors can grow.
Constantin died august 7th 1938 in Moscow.
Stanislavski system 