TECHNIQUE Some consider method acting difficult to teach. Par tially this is because of a common misconception that there is a single “method.” “The Method” (versus “the method” with a lowercase m ) usually refers to Lee Strasbergs teachings, but really no one method has been laid down. Stanislavski himself changed his method const antly and dramatically over the course of his career. This plurality and ambiguity can make it ha rd to teach a single method. It is also partially because sometimes method acting is characterized by outsiders as lacking in any specific or technical approach to acting, while the abundance o f training schools, syllabi, and years spent learning contradict this. In general, however, meth od acting combines a careful consideration of the psychological motives of the character, and some so rt of personal identification with, and possibly the reproduction of the characters emotional state in a realistic way. It usually forms an antithesis to clichéd, unrealistic, so-called “rubber stamp” or i ndicated acting. Mostly, however, the surmising done about the character and the elusive, capriciou s or sensitive nature of emotions combine to make method acting difficult to teach. Depending on the exact version taught by the numero us directors and teachers who claim to propagate the fundamentals of this technique, the p rocess can include various ideologies and practices such as “as if,” “substitution,” “emotion al memory,” and “preparation.” Sanford Meisner, another Group Theatre pioneer, cha mpioned a separate, though closely related school of acting, which came to be called the Meisn er technique. Meisner broke from Strasberg on the subject of “sense memory” or “emotional memory, ” one of the basic tenets of the American Method at the time. Those trained by Strasberg ofte n tried to experience all sensations as the character would, and often used personal experience on stage to identify with the emotional life of the character and portray it. Meisner found that to o cerebral, and advocated fully immersing oneself in the moment of a character and gaining spontaneit y through an understanding of the characters objectives, and through exercises he designed to he lp the actor gain emotional investment in the scene and then free him or her to react as the char acter. Stella Adler, the coach whose fame was cemented by the success of her students Marlon Brando and Robert DeNiro, as well as the only teacher from the Group Theatre to have studied Acting Technique with Stanislavski himself, also broke wit h Strasberg and developed yet another form of acting. Her technique is founded in the idea that o ne must not use memories from their own past to conjure up emotion, but rather using the “Given Cir cumstances.” Stella Adlers technique relies on the carrying through of tasks, wants, needs, and ob jectives. It also seeks to stimulate the actors imagination with the use of as-ifs. As she often p reached, “We are what we do, not what we say.”
Posted on: Mon, 07 Apr 2014 18:27:15 +0000