The Image of the Actor

The Image of the Actor
Author: Shearer West
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Total Pages: 214
Release: 1991-03-15
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 9780312057381

The mistake of interpreting 18th-century theatrical portraits too literally has been made since the 19th-century when a different set of artistic codes prevailed. The image of the 18th-century actor which we can obtain from prints, paintings and pamphlets of the time, is not a collection of visual truths, but a construction based on critical canons, aesthetic prejudices, and commercial motivations prevalent during the period. Through an analysis of the importance of theatre among all the pleasures and pastimes enjoyed by 18th-century Londoners the author presents a detailed picture of the cultural climate inhabited by the actor and his audience. The overwhelming fascination they had with the actor provides the background to an analysis of the function of the theatrical portrait, the burgeoning economy of the engraver, and the illustrator. Concepts of classicism and realism are explored in terms of how Garrick and Kemble will have been viewed in their work. The author also draws an interesting analogy between the aesthetics of action and sculptural representation through the work of Siddons, and goes on to consider the representation of the comic actor and how it was informed by art and art theory.

The Actor, Image, and Action

The Actor, Image, and Action
Author: Rhonda Blair
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 153
Release: 2007-11-30
Genre: Art
ISBN: 1135976244

Rhonda Blair examines the physiological relationship between bodily action and emotional experience, in the first full-length study of actor training using the insights of cognitive neuroscience and their crucial importance to an actor’s engagement with a role.

The Actor, Image, and Action

The Actor, Image, and Action
Author: Rhonda Blair
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 203
Release: 2007-11-30
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1135976236

The Actor, Image and Action is a 'new generation' approach to the craft of acting; the first full-length study of actor training using the insights of cognitive neuroscience. In a brilliant reassessment of both the practice and theory of acting, Rhonda Blair examines the physiological relationship between bodily action and emotional experience. In doing so she provides the latest step in Stanislavsky's attempts to help the actor 'reach the unconscious by conscious means'. Recent developments in scientific thinking about the connections between biology and cognition require new ways of understanding many elements of human activity, including: imagination emotion memory physicality reason. The Actor, Image and Action looks at how these are in fact inseparable in the brain's structure and function, and their crucial importance to an actor’s engagement with a role. The book vastly improves our understanding of the actor's process and is a must for any actor or student of acting.

The Real Life Actor

The Real Life Actor
Author: Jeff Seymour
Publisher:
Total Pages: 196
Release: 2014-05-02
Genre:
ISBN: 9780692210253

There is a sense that permeates most acting classes which promotes the idea that acting is hard and you need to do a bunch of traditional steps if you're ever going to get anywhere. The flame of this concept is kept lit for two reasons. One is tradition. Successful actors and teachers in our theatrical history supposedly believed in or espoused such ideas and two; it is easier for teachers and actors to follow a path that is well worn. Actors feel intimidated to challenge the ideas and teachings of past masters. But isn't that exactly how every field of endeavor evolves? Think of where we'd be in science or medicine or sports if no one questioned past methods or tried to discover new ones. This book will show you an approach that is direct and to the point, an approach that will be far easier to remember and utilize. We'll use real life. We call it acting only because people are watching. "If you're an actor, this book will restore your sanity." Steven Pressfield, Author: The War of Art, Turning Pro, The Legend of Bagger Vance

Picture Personalities

Picture Personalities
Author: Richard DeCordova
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Total Pages: 190
Release: 2001
Genre: Motion picture actors and actresses
ISBN: 9780252070167

Moving pictures existed for over a decade before anything resembling a star system appeared. Then American cinema went from being devoid of stars to being dependent on them. This is an account of this development in cinema and modern culture.

The Routledge Companion to Michael Chekhov

The Routledge Companion to Michael Chekhov
Author: Marie Christine Autant Mathieu
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 564
Release: 2015-05-15
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1317506855

The Routledge Companion to Michael Chekhov brings together Chekhov specialists from around the world - theatre practitioners, theorists, historians and archivists – to provide an astonishingly comprehensive assessment of his life, work and legacy. This volume aims to connect East and West; theatre theory and practice. It reconsiders the history of Chekhov’s acting method, directing and pedagogy, using the archival documents found across the globe: in Russia, England, America, Germany, Lithuania and Switzerland. It presents Chekhov’s legacy and ideas in the framework of interdisciplinary theatre practices and theories, as well as at the crossroads of cultures, in the context of his forays into such areas as Western mime and Asian cosmology. This remarkable Companion, thoughtfully edited by two leading Chekhov scholars, will prove invaluable to students and scholars of theatre, theatre practitioners and theoreticians, and specialists in Slavic and transcultural studies. Marie-Christine Autant-Mathieu is Director of Research at the National Center For Scientific Research, and Assistant-Director of Sorbonne-CNRS Institute EUR’ORBEM. She is an historian of theatre and specialist in Russian and Soviet theatre. Yana Meerzon is Associate Professor in the Department of Theatre, University of Ottawa. Her book publications include Adapting Chekhov: The Text and Its Mutations, co-edited with Professor J. Douglas Clayton, University of Ottawa (Routlegde, 2012).

Generating Images of Stratification

Generating Images of Stratification
Author: Thomas J. Fararo
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2013-03-09
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9401701237

Generating Images of Stratification is a self-contained presentation of a theoretical research program that deals with a significant explanatory problem relating to social inequality and that constructs generative theoretical models in doing so. In more detail: -Self-contained presentation - In respect to the background sociological facts and theoretical ideas and also the formal methods the book provides clear and simple accounts accompanied by examples. - A theoretical research program - The emphasis is on theory development, involving a series of theoretical models constructed within a core framework of principles and methods. - Deals with a significant explanatory problem relating to social inequality - We know from research that how people perceive the stratification system of a society depends upon their position in that system. So the problem is: What process generates this regularity and thereby explains empirical generalizations about the social structuration of images? - Constructs generative theoretical models - The book is an extended presentation of "generative theory" in sociology, a formal method of producing effective theoretical explanations. Generating Images of Stratification is of interest to mathematical sociologists and formal theorists in sociology; sociologists interested in social stratification; methodologists, both in sociology and in other fields; philosophers of social science; and theoretical scientists and mathematicians who are interested in applying their analytical tools to social science topics.

Actor Training

Actor Training
Author: Alison Hodge
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 363
Release: 2010-01-29
Genre: Art
ISBN: 1135173834

Presents an introduction to how actor training shapes modern theatre.

Games for Actors and Non-Actors

Games for Actors and Non-Actors
Author: Augusto Boal
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 332
Release: 2005-06-29
Genre: Games & Activities
ISBN: 1134498519

Games for Actors and Non-Actors is the classic and best selling book by the founder of Theatre of the Oppressed, Augusto Boal. It sets out the principles and practice of Boal's revolutionary Method, showing how theatre can be used to transform and liberate everyone – actors and non-actors alike! This thoroughly updated and substantially revised second edition includes: two new essays by Boal on major recent projects in Brazil Boal's description of his work with the Royal Shakespeare Company a revised introduction and translator's preface a collection of photographs taken during Boal's workshops, commissioned for this edition new reflections on Forum Theatre.

Training of the American Actor

Training of the American Actor
Author: Arthur Bartow
Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
Total Pages: 355
Release: 2006-02-01
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1559366192

Successful acting must reflect a society’s current beliefs. The men and women who developed each new technique were convinced that previous methods were not equal to the full challenges of their time and place, and the techniques in this book have been adapted to current needs in order to continue to be successful methods for training actors. The actor’s journey is an individual one, and the actor seeks a form, or a variety of forms, of training that will assist in unlocking his own creative gifts of expression.—from the introduction The first comprehensive survey and study of the major techniques developed by and for the American actor over the past 60 years. Each of the 10 disciplines included is described in detail by one of today’s foremost practitioners. Presented in this volume are: • Lee Strasberg’s Method by Anna Strasberg, Lee’s former student, widow, and current director of The Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute • Stella Adler Technique by Tom Oppenheim, Stella’s grandson and artistic director of the Stella Adler Institute in New York • Sanford Meisner Technique by Victoria Hart, director of the Meisner Extension at New York University • Michael Chekhov Technique and The Mask by Per Brahe, a Danish teacher inspired by Balinese dance and introduced to the Chekhov technique in Russia • Uta Hagen Technique by Carol Rosenfeld, who taught under Hagen’s tutelage at the Herbert Berghof (HB) Studio • Physical Acting Inspired by Grotowski by Stephen Wangh, who studied with Jerzy Grotowski himself • The Viewpoints by Mary Overlie, the creator of Viewpoints theory • Practical Aesthetics by Robert Bella of the David Mamet-inspired Atlantic Theatre Company school • Interdisciplinary Training by Fritz Ertl, who teaches at the Playwrights Horizons Theatre School • Neoclassical Training by Louis Scheeder, director of the Classical Studio of New York University Arthur Bartow is the artistic director of the Department of Drama at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. A former associate director of Theatre Communications Group, he is the author of the landmark book The Director’s Voice.