Actor Training Second Edition Actor Training expands on Alison Hodge’s highly-acclaimed and bestselling Twentieth Century Actor Training. This exciting second edition radically updates the original book making it even more valuable for any student of the history and practice of actor training. The bibliography is brought right up to date and many chapters are revised. In addition, eight more practitioners are included – and forty more photographs – to create a stunningly comprehensive study. The practitioners included are: Stella Adler Joseph Chaikin Vsevolod Meyerhold Eugenio Barba Jacques Copeau Ariane Mnouchkine Augusto Boal Philippe Gaulier Monika Pagneux Anne Bogart Jerzy Grotowski Michel Saint-Denis Bertolt Brecht Maria Knebel Włodzimierz Staniewski Peter Brook Jacques Lecoq Konstantin Stanislavsky Michael Chekhov Joan Littlewood Lee Strasberg Sanford Meisner The historical, cultural and political context of each practitioner’s work is clearly set out by leading experts and accompanied by an incisive and enlightening analysis of the main principles of the practitioners’ training, practical exercises and key productions. This book is an invaluable introduction to the principles and practice of actor training and its role in shaping modern theatre. Alison Hodge has been a professional director since 1982. She was assistant director for Gardzienice Theatre and co-authored, with Włodzimierz Staniewski, Hidden Territories: the Theatre of Gardzienice (Routledge, 2004). She is director of The Quick and the Dead, an international theatre research company, and a Reader in Theatre Practice at Royal Holloway College, University of London. Her website can be found at www.alisonhodge.net Actor Training Second Edition Edited by Alison Hodge First published 2010 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010. To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk. Selection and Editorial Material © 2010 Alison Hodge Individual Chapters © the contributors All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Actor training / edited by Alison Hodge. – 2nd ed. p. cm. Previously published under title: Twentieth century acting training, 2000. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Acting – Study and teaching. I. Hodge, Alison, 1959– II. Twentieth century acting training. PN2075.T94 2010 792.02'807 – dc22 2009028309 ISBN 0-203-86137-X Master e-book ISBN ISBN10: 0-415-47167-2 (hbk) ISBN10: 0-415-47168-0 (pbk) ISBN10: 0-203-86137-X (ebk) ISBN13: 978-0-415-47167-1 (hbk) ISBN13: 978-0-415-47168-8 (pbk) ISBN13: 978-0-203-86137-0 (ebk) For Sophie and Hannah And, in gratitude, to Janice Barton, Tatiana Bre, Daniela Garcia Casilda, Chiara D’Anna, Luis Gallo Mudarra, Alexia Kokkali and Göze Saner Contents List of illustrations ix Notes on contributors xii Acknowledgements xvi Preface xvii Introduction xviii 1 stanislavsky’s system: pathways for the actor Sharon Marie Carnicke 1 2 meyerhold and biomechanics Robert Leach 26 3 jacques copeau: the quest for sincerity John Rudlin 43 4 michael chekhov on the technique of acting: ‘was don quixote true to life?’ Franc Chamberlain 63 5 michel saint-denis: training the complete actor Jane Baldwin 81 6 the knebel technique: active analysis in practice Sharon Marie Carnicke 99 viii contents 7 brecht and actor training: on whose behalf do we act? Peter Thomson 117 8 joan littlewood Clive Barker 130 9 strasberg, adler and meisner: method acting David Krasner 144 10 joseph chaikin and aspects of actor training: possibilities rendered present Dorinda Hulton 164 11 peter brook: transparency and the invisible network Lorna Marshall and David Williams 184 12 grotowski’s vision of the actor: the search for contact Lisa Wolford 199 13 jacques lecoq, monika pagneux and philippe gaulier: training for play, lightness and disobedience Simon Murray 215 14 training with eugenio barba: acting principles, the pre-expressive and ‘personal temperature’ Ian Watson 237 15 ariane mnouchkine and the théâtre du soleil: theatricalising history; the theatre as metaphor; the actor as signifier Helen E. Richardson 250 16 w Łodzimierz staniewski: gardzienice and the naturalised actor Alison Hodge 268 17 anne bogart and siti company: creating the moment Royd Climenhaga 288 18 augusto boal and the theatre of the oppressed Frances Babbage 305 Index 325 Illustrations 1.1 Konstantin Stanislavsky (1922) 2 1.2 Stanislavsky as Astrov in Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya (1899) 3 1.3 Stanislavsky as Satin in Gorky’s The Lower Depths (1902) 7 1.4 Stanislavsky as Gaev and his wife Maria Lilina as Anya in Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard (1904) 14 1.5 Stanislavsky as Mikhailo Raikitin and Olga Knipper as Natalya Petrovna in Turgenev’s A Month in the Country (1909) 20 2.1 Biomechanics: The Stance on the Back 27 2.2 Biomechanics: The Leap to the Chest 31 2.3 Biomechanics: The Stab with the Dagger 32 2.4 Biomechanics in action: D.E. (1924) 34 2.5 Meyerhold’s exercise: The Dactyl 35 2.6 Meyerhold’s exercise: Shooting from the Bow 39 3.1 Copeau: gymnastics class in the garden at Le Limon 45 3.2 Jacques Copeau as Plébère in L’Illusion 52 3.3 Copeau’s production of Les Fourberies de Scapin, Place Saint-Sulpice, Paris (1922) with Georges Vitray as Scapin and Suzanne Bing as Hyacinthe 59 4.1 Chekhov in the title role of Strindberg’s Erik XIV (1922) directed by Vakhtangov and performed by the Moscow Art Theatre 66 4.2 Chekhov in the Dartington Studio with students 69 4.3 ‘Lightness’ exercises by Chekhov Theatre Players in the Dartington Hall Gardens (1936) 72 4.4 Chekhov as Malvolio in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night performed by the Moscow Art Theatre 76 5.1 Saint-Denis giving a mask workshop at Juilliard retreat (1968) 83 5.2 Neutral or ‘noble’ masks: Four male and four female. Four stages of life – childhood, youth, maturity and old age 92 x illustrations 5.3 Saint-Denis’s production of Chekhov’s Three Sisters, for John Gielgud’s season at The Queen’s Theatre, London (1938) 94 6.1 Knebel as Charlotta in Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard performed by the Moscow Art Theatre 100 6.2 Knebel’s production of The Magic Blossom at the Central Children’s Theatre, Moscow 112 6.3 Knebel at GITIS 113 7.1 Brecht directing Regine Lutz in Heinrich Von Kleist’s The Broken Jug 122 8.1 Littlewood directing Fanny Carby in a rehearsal of They Might Be Giants by James Goldman (1961) 132 8.2 Henry Chapman’s You Won’t Always Be On Top 134 8.3 Littlewood’s production of The Hostage by Brendan Behan at the Théâtre des Nations Festival, Paris 136 8.4 Littlewood’s production of Brendan Behan’s The Quare Fellow 141 9.1 Lee Strasberg directing a scene during class at The Actors Studio 147 9.2 Stella Adler giving direction to acting students at the Stella Adler Conservatory 153 9.3 Marlon Brando practicing for his role as a paraplegic in the film The Men 156 9.4 Marlon Brando stars in the film A Streetcar Named Desire, directed by Elia Kazan 156 9.5 Sanford Meisner 157 10.1 Joseph Chaikin with the Living Theatre in Brecht’s Man is Man 166 10.2 Cynthia Harris, Shami Chaikin, Tina Shepard, Jim Barbosa, Ron Faber, Ralph Lee and Peter Maloney in The Serpent developed by the Open Theater between 1967 and 1969 167 10.3 Paul Zimet and Raymond Barry in Terminal developed by the Open Theater between 1969 and 1971 173 10.4 Tina Shepard, Paul Zimet and Jo Ann Schmidman in The Mutation Show developed by the Open Theater in 1971 175 10.5 Tina Shepard, Shami Chaikin and Tom Lillard in Nightwalk developed by the Open Theater between 1972 and 1973 177 11.1 Peter Brook: Stick exercise with the American Theater of the Deaf, Paris (1971) 186 11.2 Peter Brook’s production of Shakespeare’s La Tempête (1990). Ferdinand (Ken Higelin) explores a tropical paradise generated by ‘invisible spirits’ – Pierre Lacan, Tapa Sudana, Bakary Sangare (Ariel) 188 11.3 Peter Brook: Le Mahabharata at the Bouffes du Nord, Paris (1985). Note: An archery contest. Bamboo sticks are used to suggest weapons and to construct a dynamically layered space. The actor-storytellers aim to produce an energized depth of field, rather than absolute uniformity 195 12.1 Jerzy Grotowski, Chicago, April (1995) 200 12.2 Teatr Laboratorium 13 Rze˛ dów, Opole (1964) with Rena Mirecka and Zygmunt Molik 205 illustrations xi 12.3 Teatr Laboratorium 13 Rze˛ dów, Opole (1964) with Rena Mirecka and Andrzej (Gaston) Kulig 206 12.4 Teatr Laboratorium 13 Rze˛ dów, Opole (1964) with Rena Mirecka 210 13.1 Lecoq with students at his international school in Paris 218 13.2 Gaulier observing students’ work in Japan 220 13.3 Pagneux leading a workshop in Spain 221 13.4 Theatre Complicite’s production of The Elephant Vanishes, inspired by the short stories of Haruki Murakami, directed by Simon McBurney, British production (2003) 232 14.1 Barba: Training at the Odin Teatret in the early 1970s 241 14.2 Barba: