Stanislavski’s Life and Impact on Theater
Stanislavski’s Life and Impact on Theater
As founder of the first acting "System", co-founder of the Moscow Art Theatre (1897-), and an eminent practitioner of the naturalist school of thought, Konstantin Stanislavski unequivocally challenged traditional notions of the dramatic process, establishing himself as one of the most pioneering thinkers in modern theatre.
Stanislavski developed an interest in opera as well as drama and in 1884 he had his voice trained and considered becoming an opera singer. In 1886, he became Chairman of the Russian Music Society and the Society benefited from his energy and business experience.
Before the realistic drama of the late 1800s, no one had devised a method for
achieving believability in a character. Through their own talent and genius, individual actresses and actors had achieved it, but no one had developed a system whereby it could be taught and passed on to future generations. The person who did this the most successfully was the Russian actor and director Konstantin Stanislavski.
Stanislavski proposed a new system for acting and has written many books about preparation and characterization. He created seven steps to building a character;
1. Who am I?
2. Where am I?
3. When is it?
4. What do I want
5. Why do I want it?
6. How will I get it?
7. What do I need to overcome?
These seven questions are to recognize the purpose of your character and your movement on stage.
Using the Moscow Art Theatre as his conduit, Stanislavski developed his own unique system of training wherein actors would research the situation created by the script, break down the text according to their character's motivations and recall their own experiences, thereby causing actions and reactions according to these motivations. The actor would ideally make his motivations for acting identical to those of the character in the script. He could then replay these emotions and experiences in the role of the character in order to achieve a more genuine performance. The 17th Century melodrama Tsar Fyodor was the first production in which these techniques were showcased.
He was involved in both traditional theater (using stylized, nonrealistic techniques) and the emergence of the modern realistic approach. By closely observing the work of great performers of his day, and by drawing on his on acting experience, Stanislavski identified and described what the great actors of his time did naturally and intuitively. From his observations...