Musical/Technical Theatre Fall 2017 Acting Techniques I Musical/Technical Theatre Fall 2017

What is a Technique? A way of carrying out a particular task, especially the execution or performance of an artistic work or a scientific procedure.

In Theatre Acting is an extremely freeform art that utilizes many methods and techniques in order to be successful. The technique or method that guarantees a good performance depends entirely on the individual actor. In this lesson we will go over only a few of methods that are widely used today. Stanislavski’s System Lee Strasberg’s Method Meisner Technique Practical Aesthetics

Konstantin Stanislavski Widely recognized as an outstanding character actor and the many productions that he directed garnered him a reputation as one of the leading theatre directors of his generation. His principal fame and influence, however, rests on his 'system' of actor training, preparation, and rehearsal technique.

Stanislavski’s System The Seven Questions of Stanislavski: Who am I? Where am I? When is it? What do I want? Why do I want it? How will I get it? What do I need to overcome? The Stanislavski method or system is a set of techniques used by actors to portray emotions on stage by putting themselves in the place of the character.

How to use this method Read the script carefully to get good understanding of the characters motivations, needs and desires; by doing this you will get a better identify of the role you are playing.   Work out how the character would behave in situations and how they would react. Break the script down into bits or beats, these are individual objectives of your character and may be as simple as going into a room. Your character’s objective is what they want and obstacles are the things that stand in their way of achieving their objective and also how far they will go to achieve their objective. Then determine your character’s motivation for this action, this in turn helps you to portray the emotions that the character is experiencing whilst you complete the objective.

The “magic if” An actors job is to be believable in unbelievable surroundings, to help achieve this Stanislavski asks, “What would I do if I found myself in this (the character's) circumstance?” The “magic if” simply involves an actor putting him/herself in the character’s shoes within a certain scenario.

Lee Strasberg American actor, director, and theatre practitioner. Directed The Actors Studio, which was then considered the nation’s most prestigious acting school. Often considered the "father of method acting in America."

Famous for actors “refusing to break character.” Strasberg’s Method Lee Strasberg’s actors intensify their connections to the work by mimicking characters’ experiences within the context of their own (real) lives, and reaching deeper connections and understandings of their characters’ emotional worlds. Famous for actors “refusing to break character.” This acting technique asks actors to become their characters through empathy and personal connection via memory recall.

How to use this method Method acting relies on an actor’s ability to empathize with a character through deeply personal connections. Using memory recall, recreate a character’s life in the real world in order to better understand them. This can be dangerous to an actor’s mental and physical health!

Examples of method actors

Meisner technique & Practical Aesthetics The Meisner Technique teaches the actor to think less, react to stimuli and get in touch with their instincts. Meisner noted that you should ‘Act before you think – your instincts are more honest than your thoughts.’ Developed by actor William H. Macy and playwright David Mamet, practical aesthetics emphasizes the simple pursuit of an action above all else. Actors’ attention goes to text-analysis, script work, and a literal understanding of a scene’s driving events.