"So successfully have we disguised from ourselves the intensity of our own feelings, the sensibility of our own hearts, that plays in the tragic tradition have begun to seem untrue."
"So successfully have we disguised from ourselves the intensity of our own feelings, the sensibility of our own hearts, that plays in the tragic tradition have begun to seem untrue."
But what does an actor use to create his art? Some would say nothing, but this isn't true. In fact, the actor has the most complicated instrument of all- himself! His experiences, his imagination, his sensitivity. His physical body and his observations. Everything that makes up the sum total of a person's humanity is part of the actor's instrument. As Eleonora Duse once said, "All that I have to offer as an artist is the revelation of my soul."
An actor without an emotional core is like a cardboard cutout of a human being.
To walk three miles, or four miles, or five miles, or whatever it is, above her ankles in dirt, and alone, quite alone! What could she mean by it? It seems to me to she's an abominable sort of conceited independence, a most country-town indifference to decorum.
“As they say, history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.”
It‘s rough, but it‘s good. It does feel a little outrageous with some of the violent/illegal things the Happy Campers do towards the end, which is what I think may have been what other people have meant in their reviews when they say it‘s unbelievable etc.
“No, my dear fellow, I am not proud, but I am in love, and I believe love is more apt to make one blind than pride is.”
“I saw that what transpires in the mind is just as real as any flesh and blood occurrence.”
“I said I was impressed, Martha. I‘m beside myself with jealousy. What do you want me to do, throw up?”
This would be a great monologue! #actorslife #monologue #scenestudy #zindel
“She is an example of those women who idolize a fashion style when they‘re too young to assume it, and only after decades find themselves able to buy and effect the style on their own person, though now it be a thing of the past.”
A little hard to get in to, but an interesting story about a power struggle between family members over a business proposition. It would be interesting to see onstage, to do the work of the characters‘ underlying emotions, personal histories. Also it‘s unique for its time because a woman comes out on top and will be independently wealthy. There‘s also a subplot about the daughter being a bit more aggressive about her life path.
The sensations of heat, cold, headache, drunkenness, nausea, and illness etc., are -conditions- of the scene; rarely is the scene -about- the cold or the headache. .. there to condition your actions truthfully .. with sensory accuracy and faith..
“No director can help you with substitutions since he has not been a part of your life experience. He will help you with the character elements he is after, dictate the place, the surroundings, the given circumstances, and define your relationship to the other characters in the play, but how you make these things real to yourself, how you make them exist is totally private work.”
One of the best textbooks I‘ve ever used.
“First, you must learn to know who -you- are. You must find your own sense of identity, enlarge this sense of self, and learn to see how that knowledge can be put to use in the characters you will portray on stage.”
It‘s a classic for a reason.