My way of dealing with problems in acting; if this is the basic concern, I move it to the act.vtheatre.net (Fundamentals of Acting), if the issue is serious -- I move it up into Theatre Theory directory.
Look through Act or Acting Index you see how much "bioMX" is in there!
How not to clash with Wilde text? Movement and speech are not in sync; movement as a stylized social dance, mannerism. Handshake, hand kissing... They do not sit down or get up, everything is staged, for the public. They observe themselves all the time! (Uri Lotman wrote a wonderful (structuralist) article about Russian aristocracy behavior at the turn of the 19th century. Everything was a ritual! He thinks that the Decembrists went to "die" in 1825 because it was "heroic" ACT! We all are social actors (look at the TV politics).
Oscar Wilde also believed that "living" must be WORK OF ART.
Actors must play characters who are constantly watch themselves in mirrors (cameras and screens in our case). They don't see each other (as a family watching TV), only at important moments they turn to each other -- Oh? Did you say it, dear?
I will incorporate some of the pages in this directory into THR221 Intermediate Acting and will be using BM directory for my lessons in the Spring 2002.
Since I am working on two other acting directories -- FunDaMentals and Method Acting for Directors, some topics and issues will be moved. [The pages will stay messy until I get them to stage of the print.]
Many years ago, centuries, when I began my webbing (six-year loan), I wanted it for one purpose -- to write my comments and notes (on what I read). I didn't know that I am the last in the line to use my webpages...
2005 * After so many years of webbing I cannot change the nature of my webpages -- they are what they were from the start; notes, thoughts, points I make for myself for classes and productions. Do they have an independent existence? Maybe, somewhere in the future...
Stanislavsky: Важно, чтоб отношение к роли артиста не теряло его чувственной индивидуальности и вместе с тем не расходилось с замыслами писателя. Если исполнитель не проявляет в роли своей человеческой природы, его создание мертво. *
* Артист должен сам находить и любить сверхзадачу. Если же она указана ему другими, необходимо провести сверхзадачу через себя и эмоционально взволноваться ею от своего собственного, человеческого чувства и лица. Другими словами - надо уметь сделать каждую сверхзадачу своей собственной. Это значит - найти в ней внутреннюю сущность, родственную собственной душе.
* Воображение создает то, что есть, что бывает, что мы знаем, а фантазия - то, чего нет, чего в действительности мы не знаем, чего никогда не было и не будет. А может, и будет! Как знать? Когда народная фантазия создавала сказочный ковер-самолет, кому могло прийти в голову, что люди будут парить в воздухе на аэропланах? Фантазия все знает и все может. Фантазия, как и воображение, необходима художнику.
* Мы, артисты, так привыкли на сцене дополнять факты подробностями собственного воображения, что эти привычки переносятся нами со сцены в жизнь. Здесь они, конечно, лишние, но в театре необходимы. Вы думаете, легко сочинять так, чтобы вас слушали с затаенным дыханием? Это тоже творчество, которое создается магическими "если бы", "предлагаемыми обстоятельствами" и хорошо развитым воображением. Про гениев, пожалуй, не скажешь, что они лгут. Такие люди смотрят на действительность другими глазами, чем мы. Они иначе, чем мы, смертные, видят жизнь. Можно ли осуждать их за то, что воображение подставляет к их глазам то розовые, то голубые, то серые, то черные стекла? И хорошо ли будет для искусства, если эти люди снимут очки н начнут смотреть как на действительность, так и на художесгвенный вымысел ничем не заслоненными глазами, трезво, видя только то, что дает повседневность?
* Надо развивать его (воображение) или уходить со сцены. Иначе вы попадете в руки режиссеров, которые заменит недостающее вам воображение своим. Это значило бы для вас отказаться от собственного творчества, сделаться пешкой на сцене. Не лучше ли развить собственное воображение?
Есть воображение с инициативой, которое работает самостоятельно. Оно разовьется без особых усилий и будет работать настойчнно, неустанно, наяву и во сне. Есть воображение, которое лишено инициативы, но зато легко схватывает то, что ему подсказывают, и затем продолжает самостоятельно развивать подсказанное. С таким воображением тоже сравнительно легко иметь дело. Если же воображение схватывает, но не развивает подсказанного, тогда работа становится труднее. Но есть люди, которые и сами не творят и не схватывают того, что им дали Если актер воспринимает из показанного лишь внешнюю, формальную сторону - это признак отсутствия воображения, без которою нельзя быть артистом.
"Работа актера над собой" [ ru ]
"Notes" pages are not for you, for myself. For Anatoly. I use the Web like my walls -- to post reminders for myself what I have to do, what is not done, what should be done...
MASTER: Anatoly, why don't you do it easy? Why don't you tell the stories? Every "subject" is a story. Look around, how do we communicate with children or pets? How do we understand OTHERS? Biomechanics? Talk about the movies, American movies! Tell me about it? Tell us the stories of dancing, painting, living...
2-6-04. Since I have a (sub)title "Biomechanics for Method Actors," maybe I should -- Meyerhold's formula "Actor = Creator + Medium" -- break the book in two parts: Creator (Method) and Medium.
The textbooks on acting talk about the later. The craft.
HYow to make it work? You need the first Actor = The Creator.
I believe in "theory" -- knowledge of the principles behind the game. "BioMX Theory for Actors" uses the terms defind by Meyerhold (see Dictionary).
Meyerhold's quotes -- the leads for each chapter. (I have WWWilde lines).
Introduce film terms: POV, subjective space and time -- see Dictionary!
Collect the bibliography and LINKS! Index with ## of pages from A to Z is missing. Should I bother?
I broke down it in two: Part I. Actor's Text & Part II. Actor's Chronotope (the book needs more structure).
Extra pages on Vectors and Axises (or to move it all into StageMatrix?)
The Game (Some pages are not linked and you can find them only through the hyperlinks in text).
The Rules?
Take online quiz! (I plan to have a page of Questions-Tests after each chapter). [From the Biomech @ Theatre w/Anatoly. The theatricality must be in -- Play & Game]
I don't know if I am getting anywhere with the textbooks. Meybe this type of books are not for me? I wanted to have them in different form, full of theatricality, light, play-like... What I have is a mess.
Are we there? Finally, the three levels of acting are in place: Fundamentals, Biomechanics, Method -- and directing "Stagematrix"! Even they got their own showcase studies: The Importance of Being Earnest, 12th Night and Hamlet.
Notes for directors:
You need both -- Stanislavsky and Meyerhold. Stanislavsky -- for working with each actor, Meyerhold -- to work with each and all of them on stage.
[The organization of the webpages is questionable; messy.]
NB. If you are not new to my pages, maybe you see the "method to my madness": in order for me to munderstand what works and what doesn't, I need to test it on my webpages. The layout, graphics, general organization... What kind of images, how far should I go, do they all have a style? I don't know the forms (and yes, even such a simple task as a textbook asks for its own narrative and its voice). Besides, my subject are theatre and film related and they should have visual representation.
This page is my self-reflections on my pages and I permit myself to make some observations. How come I didn't see the obvious from the start (didn't let Meyerhold to be the narrator of the book)?
Meyerhold images - album @ picasaweb.gool.com/anatoly.antohin
Directing Group @ Flickr.com
* "The Stop" is the punctuation of the action/thought/send - and it is the actor's choice how to carry out the punctuation. And, that the audience can't see when an action ends in the intellect - they need to see it end in the body. And also that this concept applies to everything from commedia to Chekhov.
The dactyl - this is a movement done at the start of every etude (etudes being defined as small "plays" or scenes for one or two people). The purpose of the dactyl is to check-in with the partner, establish a joint rhythm.
Etudes: "the throwing of the stone." He demonstrates the "pedestrian" non-actor version of the movement, and then shows us how what we've been working on is a more dynamic stylized version of the same thing. And he lists for us the concepts we know that go into this movement - the use of inertia, the akaste or prep moment, the paseil or sending, the specificity of foot and hand placement, and grupurovka or the contraction around the center.
... the biomechanic run - first the prep stance, left leg forward, weight on it, right leg far back and bent. Right arm forward and bent, left arm back and up. Head looks forward. Torso is twisted to the point that the chest faces the left and the back faces the right. Also, there is grupurovka for the torso - a bit of a curve. Then, when you run, the knees come up to the chest, and the torso stays in grupurovka - and the arms attach to the side of the body at the elbow and pump up and down.
Biomechanics -- Acting II
I need to see the difference -- what the new directory has? Turn it into a manual for students? Instructors?
My online writing is coming to its natural end; I have to work on print books, and BM is at the top of the list. In short, I have to leave on webpages only the texts, which are not used for the textbook. I will post the links to the book by the end of the summer.
Anatoly 4.21.04
Meyerhold's actors (Garin, Il'insky's page in "Actors on Acting"). In "Meyerhold at Work" by Braun.
Here is the story for you, Master. About one man with many lives. Oh, I know this story too well, I myself had several lives.
The story about a Jewish boy in provincial town of Pensa. Maybe more German, than Jewish, but very Russian boy. You are Russian, if you love Russian books, Russian music, and Russia, of course.
The boy was smart and he made not only to Moscow, but in time to became the founding actor of the Moscow Art Theatre. Many of them died in this status -- Actor of the Moscow Art Theatre. Not our boy, who left his teacher, his fortune to become a director.
There was the third life and at the end of this third life our man was famous director in the capital of the Russian Empire...
That wasn't enough for him -- and for Russia. The Revolution turned everything upsidedown -- and the "Silver Age" aesthet got his fourth life as a communist. Loud as ever, he became Comrade Meyerhold, big boss of the Red Theatre, friend of Comrade Trotsky, enemy of everything he was before...
His fifth life started, when his fourth life ended. The Theatre of Meyerhold was taken away, closed. This life was short. As his sixth life of the prisoner and enemy of the people. He was shot and his name was forbitten to mention...
Well, our hero got another life, the seventh... He is more known than ever. And there is no end to this last life of Vsevolod Meyerhold.
"The actor is an Instant Analyst." Peter Brook -- When I first began to work in the theatre, I worked with a very young Alec Guinness. Alec Guinness, who had already done a lot of work, said to me, "I must warn you, if you interrupt me while I am rehearsing something emotional, if in the middle of a scene you just interrupt me because you just want to tell me something, I'll yell at you". "But", he said, "don't take this as showing any bad faith, any bad intentions on my part. I can't bear to lose the thread, the unity of my character, so I will shout so as to stay within what I am doing". This is the only occasion I have ever heard an actor say such a thing and to me it is the exception that underlines an astonishing rule. Normally, an actor can be deeply inside an extraordinary, complex character, inter-relating with great passion with another character and you can say, "Just a moment, could you just step two inches to the right because otherwise you would be out of the light" and he says in his normal voice "Oh yes, certainly", immediately picking up again not only the thread of the scene, but the entire human being who is, as it were, put on and taken off as easily as a coat. But the mystery is that this coat goes on and off inside and the actor can slip into the entire fibre and structure of a human being in a flash, without using any mental devices or tricks.
