Acting Technique 2: Samford Meisner

Notes in Meisners life:

He was born in 1905 and died in 1997  and was a renowned drama teacher across the world. He had mer Lee Strasberg, a fellow American director and actor, and both had learnt Stanislavskite technique. Strasberg was obsessed with emotional memory.

Stanislavski said his system is not centred around effective memory but is centred around an actors imaginative connection and given circumstances and the truthful plane of objectives. This influenced Meisner to devise his own system, focusing on those three principles.

The Meisner System is based on listening. The actions of one actor is dependent on focusing on and reacting to the emotions and actions of the other. Meisner technique also requires immense focuse and intimacy, keeping the actors in pairs and at a close proximity at all times. At its basic level, all Meisner technique requires you to do is make physical calls about your fellow actor/actress and repeat it alongside him/her until either they respond with a physical call of their own or you find a new physical call. The idea of this is to connect to your partners physicality and body language more, whilst the repetitive nature of it "zones" the brain out allowing you to connect on a more emotional and, aruguably, spiritual level. 

As this repetition continues the bodies energy will begin to build, due to many different factors I.e. Tension between the partners (be it sexual, frustration or anger), nervousness and, or a want for motion. This brings on the second level, which is physical movement calls. Here, during the times when a release of energy occurs in an actor the other actor may call it out. For instance of during the exercise, an actor feels nervous he/she may fidget or fold their arms. At this point their partner can and should call this out. This increases an actors awareness, as well as improving the openness and intimacy of the exercise. 

The final level to this technique is the use of emotional physical calls. This relates to the movement calls except that the actor who made the movement call can now use their own intuition and call out how that person is feeling. Using the folded arms as an example again, once the actor has called the folded arms he/she may say that their partner is nervous. This opens up a new level of awareness  for both actors as well as improving the intuition of both actors, something I think is key to acting. 

I personally feel that Meisner technique. Is extremely useful for the actor, as it unlocks a level of intuition that I feel is crucial for stage acting, as the actor must know how to react instinctively on stage in order to make it truthful. I also feel that, when used correctly, it can be used to find out more about your character and someone else's character, as if done in role, it can help create a deeper relationship between the two characters, that the actors can feed off of on stage.

1960's research

Britain in the 1960's was an interesting place to be, seeing great times of affluence, social change and the advent of great historical leaps, yet plagued toward its end my affairs, socio-political upheaval and an economic downfall that eventually led to the devaluation of the pound in 1967.

However, that is not to devalue the great changes that happened during this decade in history. Having come out of the rationing of food for just over 5 years and with the departure of Churchill, Britain was beginning to enjoy a period of great affluence. More and more people could afford luxuries such as TVs, cars, fridges and much more. As such, the socio-political climate began to change as well.

Not only was the technology increasing in Britain so was its people. People became more invested in tv shows, like Coronation street which premiered in 1960. Fashion was also become much more apparent with women donning shorter hair styles and more provocative dress wear.

It also influenced a new "teenager" culture, with young people becoming more and more frustrated with their rights and their identity. With the advent of the Beatles, and similar rock-and-roll music styles coming to the fore front, teenagers began to feel like they were more important and had an identity other than what their parents wanted for them. Students began to protest the Vietnam war, staged sit-ins in universities to create more choices for their futures and banded together under the names of mods and rockers. They began to feel a sense of freedom that had not been seen before.

However the 60's was not all affluence and technological advances. Some of its change was much more dramatic than a few teenagers protesting. The 60's also marked the advent of a much more focused feminist movement, trying to bring about a change in the way they could and should be employed.

Change was also coming for people of ethnic backgrounds, particularly black people. 

With the advent of the mods and rockers, came a resurgence of animosity toward people of ethnic backgrounds, causing several murders injuries and many black people to lose their homes. They began to protest against these atrocities, hoping that someday soon they could live in a Britain where they felt safe and wanted.

6 characters 2: developing character

In this group of sessions we continued to develop our characters through various exercises.

To develop our characters we used an exercise called emotional centres. These govern the dominant way that our characters move and feel within the space and the play. The centre that felt the closest to Father, I feel, was a warm red plate expanding from my chest. It felt as if I was insulated and also isolated from the outside world, something that I feel Father is over the course of the play. I also feel that because it was less mental then the others it was almost as if he had seperated his physical prescence from his mental prescence. Something that I also feel is crucial to his role, as this adds to his manipulative nature.

We also used status levels to create a hierarchy within the play as well as to ascertain our characters movement type and physicality. For Father I gave him a 1-9. The 1 is the level of movement and physicality. I gave him this movement level as I feel that when he does move, however rare that is, he moves very slowly yet deliberately. The 9 therefore, is linked to his status and emotional intensity. This is due to his philosophical speeches and his affinity for a drastic change in temper. This emotional intensity coupled with his physical intensity is what defines Father in my mind.

Acting Technique 1: Michael Chekov

Some notes on Chekhov's life:

Michael Chekhov was born in 1891 28 years after Stanislavski, both coming from Russia. They wrote a book called "to the actor" published in 1952. Stalin didn't like him so he left to travel around Europe and then ended up in America and worked with the likes of Clint Eastwood and Marilyn Monroe.

The book is an invitation to the actor to experiment on their own. Stanislavsky used his own system Chekhov wanted your to find your own. Things dominant in his work are atmosphere, the Actors creativity, and the physicalisation of inner experience.

We predominantly focused on objectives and how they can be used to fuel a scene. This was demonstrated by the group walking through the space with a purpose I.e, to rush to the hospital or to enjoy the sunshine or to avoid a person in the room. The change in objective affected both or emotions and also our physicalities, something I think is important in showing beat changes within a scene. I feel that I can use this within my 6 characters work as it will help me emphasize the right points in my speeches, as well as knowing how to react to what someone else is saying to me on stage.

My Initial impressions of the play and my character

Having read the play for the first time I am feeling very pleased and excited to be a part of this project. I feel that with a lot of work and dedication this piece can truly become something that challenges audiences and actors alike.

The play; 6 Characters in Search of An Author is seemingly self-explanatory albeit a strange concept to deal with in and of itself. A director is rehearsing a play (in the text this play is Rules of The Game a Pirandello play that was his prior successful work before this one) when suddenly 6 characters walk in proclaiming that they are unfinished characters and need to be in immortalised in a piece of art and finished in order for their story to end. Their story as it is explained and developed is an intriguing, disturbing and dysfunctional one mostly down to the efforts of the Father and the Stepdaughter. Their efforts to become immortalised in a work off art also bring about many philosophical questions regarding reality and life itself. What does reality mean and how do we determine what reality is? Are we really ever alive? These are some of the things that we will tackle using and developing the play.

My character is the character of Father arguably the reason the 6 characters are in search of an author to end their story. His actions prior to the play, from his estrangement with his wife to his sending his son to boarding school as well as his sexual encounters with his stepdaughter are what has led to the characters being the way they are, if not for their author writing them that way. His prescence and demeanour within the play is seemingly authoritative and ghostly at the same time. He seems to exude power and shame at the same time, something I will find interesting to play throughout this process. I also sense an anger in him that is not seen until the end of the play but is definitely hinted at during my portion of the role (it is to be split in three between myself Danny and Michael) and this too will be something I need to think about during my portrayal of the role.