Stanislavski Essay Example for Free

Stanislavski Essay * Realistic theatre has been dominant for the past 100 years, on cinema and stage. * The idea is to create believable characters and situations and t=give the illusion of real life * It makes the audience believe what they see/hear and become involved in the play * This style evolved during the twentieth century, moving to selective realism (focus on particular characters and events) and magical realism (similar to realism but with magical/supernatural elements involved). * The movement of realism in theatre began in the 19th century to move away from melodrama. Stanislavski started this through he creation of his own theatre company. * Born in Moscow 17th Jan 1863 * Well educated as a child and often went to the opera and theatre. Took his name as Stanislavski in a amateur theatre in 1885 * Joined a group and directed/acted in plays, did not enjoy melodrama as much * He met with a successful playwright to discuss ways of changing theatre and as a result the Moscow arts theatre was created. * Its production were famous and a success. * In 1906, Stanislavski also began to develop a system to train actors, in 1912 set up a studio to experiment with these techniques and continued this for the rest of his life. * The Moscow arts theatre toured Europe and Stanislavski work was known worldwide. * He suffered a heart attack while acting and gave up acting, instead focusing on training actors and writing books on his techniques. * He died in Moscow on 7th august 1938. Most influential director developed a whole style of staging and acting that worked. * He experimented with himself and actors to develop his work and performers. Teaching them to observe and exercise their creativity. * â€Å"Theatre of living experience†- actors had to believe everything happening on stage and what they were doing. Actors needed to have self-control and intensive training. * Aims of the techniques were all the same: develop creative intelligence, complete self-discipline, control over their voice, diction and physical movement and experience and create human emotions. * Insisted that the actors made their own techniques too * He was extremely dedicated and demanded the same of his actors, made them repeat scenes if they were not real enough. * Had integrity and was willing to accept ideas and techniques but only did what he believed in. * Refused to do propaganda plays, even if it meant death. However he was rewarded, as they believed his almost scientific experimenting fitted with communist theory. He was honoured well I his own country. Grotowski * Transformation: mixture of realism, surrealism and ideological theatre. Actors transform themselves and the space representing not just characters but the entire context of the play: location, sound, and the whole world of drama. Actors transform the imagination of the audience by changing themselves on stage. * Experimented with Artaud’s techniques, shock and mesmerise the audience and Brecht’s epic theatre, strong political and social messages through narration, actors changing orles and simple objects to signify sets and locations. * Born in Poland. Setup a theatre in 1959 to study the way theatre worked, experimenting with staging and acting. * Through 1960s and 70s the company had brief tours overseas making his theatre and techniques world famous. In 1976 he moved away from acting and directing and worked with small groups to develop self-awareness and self-realisation using his techniques. * Even though he moved away from mainstream theatre, his contribution has been enormous and his training techniques and the most demanding and intensive. He also revolutionised directing and staging. * Grotowski always knew that theatre could not compete with v and films complex technical equipment. He eliminated these from his theatre and created a theatre of poverty where the important elements were the actors themselves and their relationship with the audience. * To make the relationship more intense, he abandoned traditional theatre building style and stage his plays in old buildings with small audiences. The actors and audience had to share the space. * He aimed to do what v and film could not and that was to bring the audience face-to-face with living characters and live action. He directed the plays so that the actors were all around the audience and sometimes in their personal space. * There was failure in trying the physically involve the audience. Instead he arranged the space to make the audience completely involved as possible. * The plays he directed dealt with important issues and in many of the productions, the protagonist was a Christ-like figure, tormented and crucified. He made the audience confronted with terrible questions. He said that the spectators of his show were researching for the truth about themselves and their purpose in life. * Often he would direct plays just to test out his new techniques.

Summary of Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers Essay -- Fallen Angels E

Walter Dean Myers wrote the book Fallen Angels. It is about America's experiences in the Vietnam War as told by the main character in the book, Richie Perry. Perry goes through a lot of changes and sees some of his good friends die in battle fighting for a cause that no one could agree upon. The book has 4 other main characters, Lobel, Johnson, Brunner, and Peewee. The book starts off talking about the experiences of Perry while he is serving in Vietnam. His best friend, Peewee becomes instant friends with each other when they meet in the barracks. Peewee helps Perry by standing up for him during several disputes. Peewee and Perry wake up the next morning and find out that they are to go on patrol in order to search out and destroy any VÃ ®et CÃ ´ng soldiers that they encounter. The patrol lasts for a few hours and Peewee and Perry are just about to camp, when a mutual friend of Peewee and Perry drops out of formation for a second and steps on a land mine, killing him instantly. Perry is so upset by this and needs Peewee to help him talk out his feelings of grief for the loss of the friend. Peewee and Perry have a few days to rest, because they have a weekend pass and it grants them 48 hours of freedom. They go to Saigon and have a few drinks and generally have fun, before they have to report back to their unit, which is stationed in the nort hern highlands of South Vietnam. When they return, they are happy that they made good use of their weekend passes in Saigon. The next...

Blood Brothers evaluation Essay

The performance was melodramatic with big hand gestures and with altered voices. Being melodramatic and the big gestures made it clearer to see what was happening on stage especially as the audience was seated so far away from the actions of the characters. The narrative was set in an old road in Liverpool with Liverpudlian accents, so the actors altered their voices to cockney accents to create a believable setting. The staging was well thought out because the stage was narrow and the seats were plotted around the stage with three floors and lots of seating. It had a rich and luxurious feeling to it and the audience must have felt the same way too, especially with the binoculars built into the seats. The cyclorama (hanging cloth/sky cloth) had a big affect on the audience because it created an illusion of stars and night, which is not commonly used on most stages so it was particularly impressive. The thing that makes or can make musicals in this genre more attractive are props because they add colour, they make it more realistic, added connotations and helps you to tell what is happening by symbolic representation. The set disappointed me because you could see people controlling the light and the sound, which was a bit distracting, and it was harder to imagine the narrative. The lighting was technical with lots of lights to create the mood, atmosphere and time of day. To create stars on the cyclorama they beamed a concentrated white light onto a moving disco ball at an angle so the audience could tell what time of day it was. But the only problem was that some of the stars bounced of onto the audience so they had to move their head uncomfortably to dodge the beam going into their eyes. The main tone of lighting was houselights to portray inside scenes and flood lighting for the outside scenes. It shows the audience where the characters are and what time of day is being portrayed. The sound effects were very realistic and gave the audience a clear impression of the setting of each scene. At one point in the play they used a cockerel sound affect to help create the illusion of a countryside scene. The theme was a hybrid between a musical and a tragedy, with the addition of comedy, which made it even more entertaining. It was set back in the mid 80’s early 90’s. The houses on the set were council estate with an old brick laid road, which gave the impression of a run down, working class community. This could have made the audience sympathetic to the characters, although the children were not properly educated or disciplined enough by their parents to respect their environment. The biggest moments of impact were the rude parts which made me laugh and the unpredictable parts which shocked and surprised me and the audience around me. At one point a young boy was hiding behind a bed sheet on a washing line, when a certain part of the sheet started to rise, insinuating that the boy was sexually aroused by a young girl in his presence. This was a particularly hilarious scene and the audience roared with hysterical laughter. Towards the end of the play the two main characters, Mickie and Eddie, stood facing each other with Mickie pointing a gun towards Eddie. This whilst their mother Ms Johnston was trying to persuade Mickie to put down the weapon. Then BANG!! BANG!! – and Eddie fell to the ground closely followed by Mickie. The audience jumped with shock at this point.

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