19.12.14 - Konstantin Stanislavski

"As actors we use our imagination to visualise everything from the circumstances of the play, what we want, how we will achieve it, our characters past to the events of the play"

Given Circumstances

• Information
• Script
• Stage Direction
• Character Interaction
• Text
• What people say
• What people don't say
• Research
• Director

Imagination

• Passive imagination - seeing ourselves from the audience point of view
• Active imagination - seeing yourself through your own(actor's) eyes
• Stanislavski's aim for an actor
• Actors must use the imagination actively so we can experience " I am being" the character

Exercises

1. We started by walking around the room in neutral, opening ourselves to what ever we would have to imagine. Andy would then describe a place for us we would adapt ourselves into that situation and imagine ourselves in those places. The three places describes were a church wedding, walking on the downs and busy London rushing to see your mother. All of these different situation were very different for me, since I have different connections to each scenario. Church one made me feel a bit imitated and very awkward after it was told we were at a wedding we weren't invited to. I am not religious, so I felt out of place in a church, but still respectful. I could imagine all the art and beautiful architecture, but also felt that I shouldn't be there. This exercise was very much about imagination and training yourself to imagine different situation, but also connecting them with your past experiences.
2. Second exercise was much about concentration and how quickly imagination can be broken, but also created. We were told to imagine ourselves in our kitchen cooking. We had to imagine the space, the table tops and cupboards . Then, Siou gave us a math equation to solve and suddenly, the imaginative kitchen disappeared and the math problem appeared in front of me. Then we had to go back to that kitchen, but it was harder now because we had been distracted. 
3. At the end of the class we did a exercises we did multiple times last year. In this exercise two people were chose and each were given a different objective and then they had to improvise a scene with their objective in mind, but not show the other person what the objective is. As an audience, we had to try and figure out what the objectives were. This really trained us how to use the objectives to create character and emotions, without blatantly saying THIS IS WHAT WANT, but be more subtle about it

Units & Objectives

• Units are specific points in the play that each contain an individual motive for the character 
• Helps the actor reference each emotions and create character
• Objectives are goals that the character wants to achieve
• action oriented