Stanislavski and Contemporary Acting Techniques
by Lauren Brown
College of the Arts
School of Theatre and Dance
University of Florida
First Reader: Dr. Charlie Mitchell
Second Reader: Dr. Colleen Rua
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Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to outline some of the training techniques that originated after the work of acting theorist Konstantin Stanislavski, developments which speak to the heart and evolution of modern-day theatre. After defining Stanislavski’s approach, I will explore and contrast his methods with the improvisational work of Viola Spolin and her theatre games, Uta Hagen’s Six Steps to creating believable characters, and Sharell B. Luckett’s Black
Acting Methods and The Luckett Paradigm, a program composed of rituals, processes and techniques which privileges Back American culture in performance. Whether significantly branching off from Stanislavski’s techniques or coming from its own origin, I will show how these alternative approaches redefine the theatrical experience by emphasizing individualism, organic self-expression, and human play in the course of training contemporary performers.
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Stanislavski and Contemporary Acting Techniques
The purpose of this paper is to explore certain acting techniques used during the 20th and
21st centuries which came after the work of acting theorist Konstantin Stanislavski. The exploration of these developments is intriguing in that it speaks to the heart and evolution of modern-day theatre. Whether branching off from Stanislavski techniques or coming from its own origin, these alternative approaches under discussion may even mean redefine the theatrical experience.
Born in 1863, the Russian actor, director, and theatre theorist Constantin Stanislavksi drafted a series of techniques to help actors create believable characters through studying the world of the character and the play. For him, the three main principals that the actor must understand are the character’s given circumstances, the tasks and objectives, and the magic “if.”
The given circumstances establish the who, what, when, where, and how of the character.
The actor must first discover details about his character’s personality, demographics, occupation, family circumstances, relationships, etc. by studying the script. The actor must also understand the nature and context of the conflict. Furthermore, he must discover the time/year/season, where he event(s) take place, and how these factors work together to influence or affect the character.
Discovering these elements reveals the actor to the world of the character.
The magic “if” involves the actor imagining what the character might actually do in each situation (Moore 1984). Based on the given circumstances, the actor must decide how his character might respond when faced with opposition, new opportunity, fear, etc. The magic “if” becomes the nature of the portrayal of the character on stage. It is the imagined and well-
Brown 4 informed response to a happening. This discovery also allows the actor to remove his personal instinctual behavior in favor of becoming a character.
Objectives are the goals of the character and tasks are the means of achieving those goals.
They are the efforts/actions the character makes to get what they want. Moreover, tasks are the choices the character makes to achieve the goal. The magic “if” will inspire the actor to handle the actions a particular way. For example, in the play Medea by Euripides, the character of
Medea seeks to avenge her husband for betraying their family for money. Her distress causes her to pursue extreme means to torture her husband, Jason, even going as far as murdering their children in front of him. In this example, we can see that Medea’s objective is to avenge her husband. Relentless Medea’s tasks vary from convincing Creon to allow her to stay longer in the city, to manipulating Jason to think she has suddenly changed her perspective, to murdering their children. These tasks collectively build to the completion of Medea’s objective -- making her husband pay for what he has done.
The magic “if” is the suggestion to the actor as to how the tasks should be portrayed based on the circumstances. Objectives may change throughout the play. Nonetheless, the actor must discover what the character wants (objective), why he/she wants it, and how he/she seeks to achieve it (tasks). Stanislavski declared in An Actor Prepares (1989) that
[The magic] If is the starting point, the given circumstances, the development. The one
cannot exist without the other if it is to possess a necessary stimulating quality. However,
their functions differ: if gives the push to dormant imagination, whereas the given
circumstances build the basis for if itself. And they both, together and separately, help to
create an inner stimulus.
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In other words, these textual discoveries, though distinct, coexist and guide the actor to develop a character based on facts and imagination.
Another concept Stanislavski emphasized was Affective Memory. He wrote that after numerous distractions during his performance mixed with nervousness and the robotic delivery of his lines, he tapped into his memory to recall a positive moment. Afterwards, the performance became electrified: “Leo’s interpretation of Othello suddenly rose in my memory and aroused my emotion... I cannot remember how I finished the scene... the black hole disappeared from my consciousness, and I was free from all fear... there was the applause, and I was full of faith in myself” (Stanislavski 1989). Stanislavksi goes on to say how he remembered nothing after it was all over yet he earned great veneration from his viewers. Here, he points to a consciousness that takes place in affective memory that then leads to a certain subconsciousness in performance.
This subconsciousness is often where the magic of the performance happens, because the actor is free from mental constraints and fully immersed in the character.
Previously, actors would often "recite” roles, using diction and methods of speech
(Moore, S., et al (1984)), but Stanislavski suggested instead that actors could experience the emotions by putting themselves into the character’s shoes and recalling relevant memories. He declared that “delicate and deep human feelings are not subject to such technique. They call for natural emotions at that very moment...” (Stanislavski 1989) These natural emotions come from recalling as many similar details from a lived experience as possible.
While the Stanislavski technique dates back to the early 20th century, it prevailed to be one of the most popular acting techniques still used today.
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Viola Spolin Theatre Games
Actress, director, author, coach, Viola Spolin created theatrical games which were popularized in the early 1960s and taught the formal rules of theatre in an organic way through improvisation. Born to Russian Jewish Immigrants, she would “sing, play parlor games, and mount plays they’d written and improvised,” whenever the extended family got together (Viola
Spolin Biography). Later, she developed an interest in theatre, seeing opera performances even before high school. After high school, she began to study with Neva Boyd, a “theorist of the educational and social benefits of play who trained social workers in group work” (Viola Spolin
Biography). Boyd’s focus was to include immigrants into current culture by educating them using games which taught them skills such as socialization, language, morality and cooperation.
Greatly inspired by the influence these games had on young immigrants, Spolin was then led to create her own theatrical games, which would help actors develop and learn through experience.
Through these games, actors gain understanding through spontaneous experience, rather than intellectuality, something heavily enforced by Stanislavski. Spolin took a nonverbal approach in helping actors create their best work from an organic place, fully immersing themselves into the environment, living moment to moment, and solving problems.
Spolin’s book, Improvisation for the Theatre (1963), contains over 200 improvisation games and is said to have “revolutionized the way acting is taught” (Viola Spolin Biography).
Spolin not only wanted these games to be taught in the theatre but also in schools for anyone who wished to “play in the theatre” (Spolin 2017). She believed that anyone could be an actor because “if the environment permits it, anyone can learn whatever he chooses to learn; and if the individual permits it, the environment will teach him everything it has to teach. “Talent” or “lack of talent” have little to do with it” (Spolin 2017). Spolin goes on to say that “the “average”
Brown 7 person has been known to transcend the limitation of the familiar, courageously enter the area of the unknown, and release momentary genius within.” This was her definition of a good actor.
Spolin’s actor training method features games, all of which include a circumstance, which the actor must creatively work through, therefore learning by experience, rather than intellectual instruction. “In moments of pure spontaneity,” she says, “cultural and psychological conditioning fall away, allowing for the player to explore the unknown” (Viola Spolin
Biography). She also states that, “Through spontaneity we are re-formed into ourselves” (Spolin
2017). Thus, she leads the actors into games that encourage such spontaneity.
“Follow the Follower,” one of Spolin’s improvisation games, calls the actors to mirror one another with their bodies. They each take turns being the mirror until eventually there is no leader. There is a moment of deep connection between the two. The actors become completely coordinated and focused. Although this game uses no words, it follows the same concept of the
“Yes, and...” approach, which forces the actor to go along with whatever the other actor says, not necessarily adding any dimension to the scene. Yet “Follow the Follower” extends the “Yes, and...” approach to establishing a deeper connection between the actors. This game forces actors to get out of their heads, to throw out all predetermined movements and/or thoughts and to allow themselves to drift into the unknown (A discussion... 2019). In this state of being, discoveries are made and beautiful moments are created.
Another game is the “Singing Dialogue.” Actors turn their words into a song which helps with line memorization and the painting of words with melody. Spolin noted that singing engages a different part of the brain that helps to “unlock” the meaning of the dialogue (Singing
Dialogue 2018). The actors must also sing with their whole bodies. They may even play with word usage: elongating a word or repeating a phrase. (Spolin 2017). This may appear comical,
Brown 8 but it does help with coloring the words, so that the actors do not become predictable or too comfortable.
Lastly, I will discuss the game called “The Where.” Actors (a class or group) collaboratively establish an invisible where with features that make up the place. Through improvisation, actors make contact with each feature of the place. The area from which an actor enters the stage will suggest the who and influence how the characters interact with one another
(Spolin 2017). Spolin mentions how the “where” in the who, what, when, where and how is often overlooked in acting (Using the Where 2018). This exercise allows the actors to utilize the where in support of the scene. This ties in with Stanislavski’s idea that location is crucial in understanding the given circumstances. The location may impact the characters on psychological, relational and/or physical levels.
Developed over thiry years after the Stanislavski technique, the improv games that Spolin created took an innovative approach in actors training. Instead of drawing from research on the character’s identity, her approach was to allow the actors to grow, using their own imaginations to craft believable characters and circumstances. Spolin passed away in 1994 but her method is still being taught to this day, primarily by one of her pupils, Gary Schwartz, who worked with her for twenty years. Schwarts is the only master teacher to receive endorsement from Spolin and her son, Paul Sills, co-founder, and director of The Second City (About 2018).
What this revolutionary approach speaks to is the human ability to become a character based on imagination and experience. The actor pulls from within to imagine, establish and build a character. The difference between Spolin’s improvisation technique and Stanislavski’s technique, other than the above information, is that there is no individual character study. If an actor is presented with a script, using Spolin’s method will not always help the actor discover
Brown 9 character qualities that are presented within the script. The improvisation method may be useful for training actors to think on their feet; however, the limitation is that it does not engage the actor much in the material presented in the script. This must be observed in another context.
Spolin’s focus in her theatrical games were imagination, being present, and building genuine connections.
Uta Hagen and the Six Steps
Uta Hagen, a well-known actress, director and acting coach from the 1960s to the early
2000s, was the founder of the Six Steps Acting Method. These steps, like most other acting techniques, help actors to create believable characters. Like the Stanislavski approach, Hagen’s method requires the actor to do a bit of character discovery. It starts with researching the character’s identity before doing any stage work. Her six questions are as follows: Who am I?
What are the circumstances? What are my relationships? What do I want? What is my obstacle?
What do I do to get what I want (Uta Hagen's 6 Steps for Building a Character)? In the next few paragraphs, I will break down each of the questions and address their main concerns.
Who am I? This question corresponds to the overall condition of the character. This includes the character’s current state of being, self-perception and what adorns (or does not adorn) them. This question is comparable to Stanislavski’s “who” concept in the process of discovering the Given Circumstances.
What are the circumstances? Notably, Stanislavski incorporates the “Who” within the
Given Circumstances; meanwhile, Hagen separates them. According to Hagen, the given circumstances are the time, location, atmosphere and the happening (what has just happened/what is about to happen) (Uta Hagen's 6 Steps for Building a Character). What just
Brown 10 happened and what is about to happen will influence and inform a variety of actor choices. For instance, how does the character enter a room? If a character has just had a bad argument offstage, they will enter a certain way. Moreover, if a character just got a job promotion, the entrance would be different. Thus, the circumstances inform the nature of the actions.
What are my relationships? What is the character’s relationship to the circumstances -- how do they feel about it/how do the circumstances affect or influence them? What is the significance of the place to the character? Does the place hold any significance at all? What are the character’s relationships to the people around them? In understanding the character’s relationships, the approach to handling an obstacle is then influenced.
What do I want? This can also be described as the character’s goals or objectives. As I mentioned earlier, these objectives can break down into smaller ones and even change throughout the scenes. Objectives can also be the character’s needs. Needs will increase the stakes a bit and are often unchanging; meanwhile, wants may be more flexible and can often change. Stanislavski couples tasks and objectives, signifying that one influences the other; meanwhile, Hagen separates them, signifying that they are independent, yet interdependent.
What is my obstacle? This question addresses what is stopping or blocking the character from getting what they want. Typically, the bigger the obstacle, the bigger the efforts will be to overcome, go around, or go through it. The actor must understand what the obstacle is so that there is intentionality behind every tactic and action. In other words, understanding the obstacle gives every action a sense of direction and purpose.
What do I do to get what I want? Stanislavski would have called this a tactic. These are a means of achieving the objective (Uta Hagen's 6 Steps for Building a Character). This question encompasses the character’s attitude/position towards the goal, their behavior, and their actions.
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Stanislavski and Hagen share remarkably similar approaches but their training techniques are different. I do not believe that Hagen accidentally left the word “given” off of the word
“circumstances.” Anyone who knew Hagen knew that she was not a person who did many things by accident in the world of theatre. Stanislavski may have attributed the Given Circumstances to what is provided textually but Hagen suggests by her removal of the word “given” that the circumstances are sometimes created by the actor. This method therefore extends beyond script acting and delves into improvisational acting as well. With the Six Questions Method, actors get the best of both worlds because these questions guide any type of actor with mostly any type of role.
On another note, Hagen also used a technique when coaching that involved tapping into the actor’s memory -- like Stanislavski suggested with Affective Memory -- recalling a time when he was in a similar situation to the character and allowing the memory of how it made him feel to fuel the emotion behind the dialogue and action. Therefore, there is a true-to-life aspect when it comes to acting using Hagen’s acting method. She stated:
If I am to play a silly, fluffy creature and I think I am not such a person, I cannot use
myself. I mistakenly believe I can only indicate what she would do. Yet if I watch myself
greeting my dogs with gushes of baby talk and giggles, I am silly.” (Hagen 2009)
In this way, Hagen indicates that it is better to reenact a true experience that is similar to the character, than to pretend to be something you are not. Hagen uses a strategy that extends beyond the character and draws from the psyche and the actor’s own experiences. Stanislavski’s main goal in character study was to reveal the character’s identity. What one gains from this approach is the understanding that characters are have human experiences. Stanislavski sought to make the character’s experiences come to life through analysis and recall. Similarly, Hagen’s
Brown 12 drive was to portray the character’s experiences with the actor’s nonfictional, remembered reactions.
Black Acting Methods and The Luckett Paradigm
The Black Acting Methods Paradigm, established in 2017, was birthed from the exclusion of the African and African American theatrical contributions in Western acting theory
(The Affirmation [Introduction] 2017). Research that supports the theory that theatre originated in Africa is often overlooked in American classrooms in favor of sharing contributions from those with fair skin. Black Acting Methods is powered by “Black theory and Black modes of expression” (2017). This Paradigm seeks to:
(1) honor and rightfully identify Blacks as central co-creators of acting and directing
theory by filling the perceived void of black acting theorists, (2) uplift, honor, and
provide culturally developed frameworks for Black people who are pursuing careers in
acting, (3) provide diverse methodologies for actors and teachers of all races and cultures
to utilize, and (4) highlight performance practitioners’ labor in social justice issues and
activism.” (2017)
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Black Acting Methods is more than just a training technique for actors. It is a theatrical movement, a semi-revolutionary approach for the 21st century. Founder Sharell B. Luckett draws her inspiration from Freddie Hendricks (late 20th - early 21st century), an African American theatre director, teacher, and “playwright” who would often present stage plays and musicals using no script. Instead, actors used history’s examples of the earliest forms of theatre (rituals, storytelling, dancing, singing, improv, etc.) in actor training. The Luckett Paradigm empowers
African Americans to write their own works (writing oneself into history), connect with musical aspects, discover spirituality, and revere Black culture. This technique coincides with a well- known quote from W.E.B. Dubois which states that theatre should be created “About us. By us.
[and] For us.”
This is a very close-knit actor’s training program that challenges actors to focus on the
“breath, the body, confidence, mental health, and imagination” (Training). Luckett’s strategy inspires actors to be versatile so they can work and/or create with or without a script. The message here is that actors should not be so reliant on another person’s interpretation or work.
Instead, Luckett challenges the actors to become creators themselves. She speaks of the struggles that are prevalent in the Black community, that only Blacks themselves can voice. In that comes the potential to contribute one’s own unique voice, especially the Black voices that have stories yet to be told. Whether a film, stage or television actor, this technique applies to all types of
Black American actors. But, more importantly, this actor training program seeks to make a historical footprint in social justice and performance work.
Before authoring her book, Black Acting Methods in 2017, Luckett originally utilized
Stanislavski, Freddie Hendricks and Miesner techniques when teaching her high school classes.
But after being questioned about her lack of consistency due to switching from technique to technique, she was led to explore the origin of drama itself (Black Acting Methods with Sharell
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D Luckett...). After discovering that drama originated in Africa, Luckett was hungry to learn more about theatre origins in Africa that began with rituals in performance. Disappointment in not finding much information or prior writings, she was led her to author her own book and begin teaching her own Black Acting methodologies. She drew from Ntozake Shange’s questioning about black writing -- Shange said that because she did not see herself represented much in the theatrical world, she would represent herself by writing herself into time. Shange once said, “I write for young girls of color, for girls who don’t even exist yet, so that there is something there for them when they arrive” (Carrol 1995). She goes on to justify her choice of language when writing: “We must not only repossess the language, we must deslaveryize it”
(Carrol). Historically, black dialect was often used in a dehumanizing, satirical manner, yet
Shange sought to take it back. Luckett seeks to do the same, using the culture that once made
Blacks inferior in the eyes of others and proudly showcasing its raw beauty.
Black Acting Methods are “rituals, processes and techniques, where Black theories and
Black modes of expression inform how actors engage with and interpret text -- literary and embodied text” (Black Acting Methods with Sharell D Luckett...). When the actors completely immerse themselves in the embodiment of the characters, it is important to Luckett that they also take care of their mental health. This type of mental healthcare is combined with black psychology -- how African values and experiences come into play when we think about mental health. With the understanding of mental health and African values, this paradigm offers classes and healing strategies that help people heal from trauma and develop resiliency. The rituals, processes, and techniques that the Black Acting Methods utilize allow all that is within to come to surface, all while protecting the actor’s well-being.
One of the strategies Luckett uses in her technique draws from the teachings of Freddie
Hedricks, an African American theatre director. This strategy is called “the default.” Having a
Brown 15 wide variety of students of all nationalities and ethnicities, they start with an open text, which is a few lines of plain dialogue with no context. The lines are open to one’s own interpretation, leading the students to create their own meanings. Though cultural evidence is always displayed through the dialects of these lines, the action itself is interpretable. Luckett mentioned that there is no thing that does not have cultural meaning -- everything has an origin, or a causer, or an influencer of some sort. In other words, nothing comes from nothing but everything originates from something. The idea of this activity is that each person will naturally put his or her own
“flavor” on the lines and reveal a little bit about his or her own culture. (Black Acting Methods with Sharell D Luckett...). Even with the writing exercises Luckett uses in her predominantly white college classes, it demonstrates that the words students put on paper come from lived experiences -- they come from within.
Luckett declares that it is helpful to start with a music circle in her classes. She notes in her book, Black Acting Methods: Critical Approaches, that the formation of a circle is an African ideology that establishes the acting space and helps create an understanding of the environment.
Everyone contributes in some way -- tapping the foot, playing the piano, singing, etc. This concept comes from the African ethos of synchronicity, meaning that if one person starts a rhythm, everyone else after will follow and harmonize with that rhythm (Black Acting Methods with Sharell D Luckett...).
Luckett seeks to train actors to not limit themselves only to acting but to also play a part in the many other compartments of theatre. She asks that they step out of their comfort zones to offer up of themselves in a contributory way. By contributing, actors will become versatile creators rather than mere actors. For instance, she suggests that the actor should also know how to choreograph his own works, which is what they learn how to do in Black Acting Methods training classes. When actors learn how to do things themselves, it will limit the need to find
Brown 16 someone else to do it for them. As she states, it should not be a burden to know how to do everything because artists should not be restricted to perform one role (Black Acting Methods with Sharell D Luckett...).
As demonstrated, the Black Acting Methods Technique is different from Stanislavski’s
Technique in that it is derived from a cultural perspective, rather than a literary perspective. This technique studies texts at times but mainly draws deeply from the lived experiences of African
American culture more than it does from the imagination of a character’s experiences and perspectives.
Conclusion
Stanislavski’s Techniques have been proven reliable in both the 20th and 21st centuries. I do not believe that it will ever be abandoned as it is still the most popular actor training technique. But when we look at what else is being used today to train actors, there is a bit of a drift from the sole focus on textual discoveries and imagination. Meanwhile, there is a noticeable inclination towards self-discovery in acting that springs up during the late 20th to the early 21st century.
Viola Spolin, for one, believed that anyone could be an actor because talent is grown from within and cannot be taught. Consequentially, she created improvisation games that sought to teach the principals of theatre, while allowing the actor to grow organically as a performer.
Spolin believed that each person has something unique on the inside that must be uncovered, which is why many of her improv games were designed to take the actor off guard. At that moment, she said "it creates an explosion that for the moment, frees us from handed-down frames of reference, memory choked with old facts and information and undigested theories and
Brown 17 techniques of other peoples’ feelings. Spontaneity is the moment of personal freedom...” (Spolin
2017) In that place, we find true beauty in performance.
Uta Hagen was known for her wise advice. Even before she became a director, she began giving advice to co-actors behind the scenes on how to become more believable in acting. What ignited her flame to become a theatre theorist was the fact that actors not only took her advice, a fellow actor, but it actually worked. She combines humanity with character discovery, slightly branching off the Stanislavski approach but remaining true to the script. Hagen knew that characters were people too (in most cases), so their experiences are often represented in real life and can thus, be reenacted by memory.
Sharell D. Luckett, pioneer of Black Acting Methods, began teaching the Stanislavski
Method herself. However, after realizing that she (a black woman) was underrepresented, she began to write herself into the history that no one else dared to write about. Black Acting
Methods is an approach that stems from cultural notions and Black experiences. It delves into spiritualism, musicality and the individual creativity that is birthed from each actor during a variety of exercises and games. This technique explores human rawness, something that has not been shown possible to exemplify through script analysis alone. However, when using a script, the script becomes words on a paper, open for the actor to interpret for himself.
What I have observed from analysis is that the closer we get to the future, the more we see individualism, organic self-expression, and human discovery play a role in actor training.
Acting is no longer about presenting, it is about living. As Stanislavski suggested through his experiences on stage, theatre is a lived experience, whether timely or timeless, and it is becoming more important to capture that essence in today’s actor training methods. We see evidence of this trend in Uta Hagen’s theory of remembering: bringing one’s own lived experiences into the
Brown 18 performance with reenactment; Sharell D. Luckett’s methodology describes a type of purging that allows the textures of culture and personality to create beautiful and organic pieces of work; similarly, Viola Spolin teaches spontaneity, which allows the actors to present their rawest selves on stage. Stanislavski is accredited for much of the analysis procedures in actor training but we can see an extension of this training technique in the works of Hagen, Luckett and Spolin, works that delves from within. In the culture we live in today, individualism is highly esteemed and even encouraged. Theatre, as we know it, is often a commentary on or a representation of the present day and age. Because modern-day society has shifted to another place, we see theatre practices following closely behind it.
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Works Cited
About. Spolin Games Online - Improvisational Library and Training. 2018. A discussion of Space Objects and Follow the Follower vs. Yes, and…. The Improv Zone. 2019. Carrol, Rebecca. "Rebecca Carroll, Back at You: Interview with Ntozake Shange." (Jan/Feb 1995). Commons, HowlRound Theatre. “Black Acting Methods with Sharrell D Luckett ... - Youtube.com.” YouTube. 2018. Hagen, U., Frankel, H., & Pierce, D. H. Respect for Acting. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 2009. Luckett, Sharell. "Black Acting Methods Studio." N.d. Moore, S., Gielgud, J., & Logan, J. The Stanislavski System: The Professional Training of an Actor: Digested from the Teachings of Konstantin S. Stanislavski. New York, NY: Penguin Books, 1984. Singing Dialogue. Spolin Games Online - Improvisational Library and Training. 2018. Spolin, V. Improvisation for the Theater: A Handbook of Teaching and Directing Techniques. Eastford, CT: Martino Fine Books, 2017.
Stanislavski, K. An Actor Prepares. Routledge, 1989. The Affirmation [Introduction]. Luckett, Sharrell & Shaffer, Tia, eds. Black Acting Methods: Critical Approaches. New York: Routledge, 2017. Theaterific. “Uta Hagen's 6 Steps for Building a Character.” Uta Hagen's 6 Steps for Building a Character -, 6 Apr. 2014.
Training. Black Acting Methods Studio. N.d. Using the Where. Spolin Games Online - Improvisational Library and Training. 2018. Viola Spolin Biography. N.d.