Write at least 1 paragraph (4 sentences or more) responding to 1
of the questions below. Then write at least 1 paragraph responding to
another student's response to 1 of the questions.
Questions from Chapter 10:
1.
"The circumstances and the partner can play an important part in making the action strong." Draw from an experience on stage to explain what Stella Adler is saying.
2.
"In an action you must know what you do, where you do it, when you do it, and why you do it. But you don't know how you do it. The how is spontaneous and unexpected." Explain why this is the case.
3.
"The action embraces a number of other actions -- getting across the border, deciphering the prescription, signaling form help -- but escaping is what you are doing most. What you do most is your action." Describe how your end goal in a play motivated your other actions throughout the play.
4. "One of my students got so caught up in his attempts to capture the attention of the circling helicopter that he ignored my stage signals. No matter how I tried to get his attention he kept jumping and waving, stopping the drama and spoiling the progression. An actor must correct himself as he goes along and not let emotion distort or interfere with the action." Describe a time when you let your emotion distort of interfere with the action.
My end goal as prince charming was to woo some damsels. Every action I took related to getting some or my pursuit to get some. I married Cinderella, hooked up with the baker's wife, and ended up with sleeping beauty. My end goal caused twists and turns that helped develop the plot.
ReplyDeleteGood response; I could see how that was your character's goal. I think a stronger goal would be his desire to find the PERFECT woman. Yes he went through several women and was okay with tossing them aside because they were not "the one." But then he found Cinderella and really thought she was perfect -- until he found out she wasn't. In his lines in Act Two he mentions that he really thought he found the perfect person for a moment. In this way the audience can see his pursuit for perfection and his passion in the moment instead of seeing the character as a simple man-whore. We have to believe that his actions come from a noble place.
ReplyDeleteI thought the moral was that there wasn't a true knight in shining armor or a prince charming. I didn't try create a noble place because I thought a greater lesson would be taught if Cinderella's Prince contrasted that of a fairy tale prince. I could have played him a little more charming and less arrogant in order to convey that message as well though. I just thought a simple man-whore would create a better on stage moral and interaction with the damsels that ended up with broken hearts.
ReplyDelete1. "The circumstances and the partner can play an important part in making the action strong." Draw from an experience on stage to explain what Stella Adler is saying.
ReplyDeleteI think what she's saying is fairly obvious. If only one half of the pair of actors is invested in the scene, the scene will most likely fail. I think there were some moments in Into the Woods where some of the actors weren't putting as much into a scene as their partners, and, although it may have come together in the end, it definitely took away from the show and caused tension in the cast.
Right before that quote, Adler says :The circumstances and the partner keep the action from ever becoming an abstraction." An abstraction is something that takes away from something else. SO, not only do both actors have to give the scene their all, but they have to act the scene in a relevant way, and not take away from the actual purpose of the scene. If there is a death scene, and one character is sobbing obnoxiously loud in the corner, that character is taking away from the scene, which might have been amazingly acted by the other characters.
I like that you added that not only to all the actors have to be invested in the scene, but they also have to when certain things are appropriate. Such as your example with the obnoxious cryer, there does not always have to be an obvious kind of drama. Instead, maybe it would have been better for the actor to be dumb founded that their friend, or whomever it was, is dead. Every actor has to balance each other. I think what Adler was getting at is that sometimes being bigger isn't the way to go. The action is stronger when everyone is working together to achieve that one goal.
DeleteI agree with the fact that if one of the actors are putting more into a scene and the other actor is kind of holding back, it can cause multiple problems within a scene or play. It is important to measure up someones abilities with a similar person to them. If one actor is better than the other, one of them ends up outshining the other one. There must be a balance between actors in order to create harmony for a scene.
Delete2) The "how" is unexpected because the "how" is your reaction to what, where, when, and why. You can't reacte without something to make it happen. It is a cause and effect situation. In order for your responce to be natural you can't plan it out. It is in the moment when the actor lets their emotions take over. "How you respond" is when the audience is able to connect with the character. It is what they are looking for. Everything else are just facts that could be read from a piece of paper. The audience is watching for the "how" so it is not something that can be forced.
ReplyDelete3)As Belinda in "Noises Off!" I had several end goals that developed as the play went on. In Act I, her goal was to make the performance go on, while trying to make everyone else as comfortable with each other as she seemed to be with herself. Because of this, she did tend to act extremely push-over ish. I remember touching shoulders often and doing other comforting things. As Act II came around, her goal shifted to just flat out making it through that one show, but at the same time there were undertones of wanting to keep Dotty away from Fredrick. While the supportive air was still there, her movements were much more frantic and a tad bit more selfish, especially when coming to the Fredrick and Dotty issue. Finally, in Act III the final end goal was to return backstage and take care of her problems with Dotty and Fredrick. At that point, she didn't even care. Therefore, all inclination of charitability and that sort of thing was gone. She just wanted to get her stuff done.
ReplyDeleteMelanie- One thing about Noises Off! Is that the motivation with almost every character dynamically changed when there was a different Act. I took notice to this, and it interested me. It was so long ago it's difficult to remember all of the changes that occured, but I noticed them. Having an overall goal and doing whatever neccessary to reach that in the in-between is what an actor needs to do, and you fiffiled that. Good job. :)
Delete2)The sense of why the "how" is spontaneous is because when you do something, you do not want to over think the action you are doing. Of course you must know when/why you are doing the action but you must not think too much about how you are doing something. It should just flow in a natural way and that is what makes the "how" spontaneous. It kind of shows that an actress/actor are capable of letting themselves go in a way so that every thing is fluid with what they are doing and saying. It's all apart of comfort and with the comfort every thing just kind of comes natural and you end up creating a memorable performance for the audience. All because you did not have to think too hard about what you are doing.
ReplyDeleteI definitely think this is true. It all goes back to treating the character like a person, not a character. A person doesn't over analyze every move they make so they have every minute detail of what they are thinking down. As people, we react often times with even the faintest amount of instinct, no action I think is without a bit of unexplainable instinct.
DeleteIn Into The Woods, Evan and I built off of eachother a lot in our actions and lines. We were able to make lines funny in ways that others may not have thought to do, I know that he made me strong in my lines, the way that he put emphysis on some of his lines made it easier for me to find a way to make my next line more humorous, and vise versa. The actions that were done on stage also built off eachother and helped with making the scene better.
ReplyDelete4. Oh boy. I know specifically a time where I was so engulfed with emotion that I had to collect myself and redo a whole scene. And this was in the rehearsal process with "Twelve Angry Jurors." At this time, there was a lot of tension at the table, in general. People were annoyed with one another because the play was a hard one to pull off. People would be talking during class, arguing, etc. And on top of that, there was tension with cast members not just during rehearsals, but outside rehearsals as well. Me being one of those people. So because of that, I would get critiques from the directors that in some of my lines I was coming on too strong, or sassy, and sometimes rude. It was my anger coming out where it shouldn't. Juror No. 8 Is a man full of passion, but at some moments towards some of the cast mates and in general it came out at anger. But eventually, the cast all tried working together as a whole, and the rehearsals were coming soundly toward the end. Toward the end, people took everything seriously and put everything else asside, which was really good.
ReplyDelete3. In The Hobbit, the main action was "To get the treasure". This action dictated nearly everything everyone did in the play. All of us dwarves put up with Bilbo to get the treasure. None of them wanted to set off with the whiny hobbit. None of them wanted to travel hundreds of miles without ponies and through forests and mountains. They did all of that to get to the treasure. Now, the play is dynamic and nearly every character changes by the end, but still- initial action is "to get the treasure". When I was Bofur, I tried very hard to show my displeasure at being with Bilbo and on a sort of road trip that was deadly, long, and uncomfortable. Bofur just wanted the treasure (this changed at the end of the play, though). Conversely, as a utensil in "Beauty and the Beast", my action was "to please". Here comes this pretty girl, or heck, just a girl, who has the potential to break the spell and change all of us utensils back into humans, so I'm going to dance, sing, and do whatever it takes for her to like it here in this gloomy, dark and evil-looking castle and fall in love with my pissy master. Whatever it takes. That means all smiles, and sucking up to her, and creating sympathy for the audience so they're all rooting for Belle to fall in love with the Beast.
ReplyDeleteTyping this made me think of something else- I think the final action you chose for your character to do affects how the audience sees your character- which makes sense, since the over all verb affects all your other actions. Just a small change in actions can make all the difference in how your character acts and how the audience and other characters react to you (within the lines of the script, of course).
I feel like the smaller actions could each individually be more important than the overall action, because the overall action is usually extremely prevalent in the script and in the performance. So prevalent, typically, that it would be near impossible to stray from it. To accidentally make a play that was intended to have the main action of "get the treasure" become "save the women and children" would require a certain amount of complete ineptitude when it comes to acting, or simply just an inability to read English. The little actions, even if done badly, will lead the audience to the main action. Doing them well is what will make the play good, which is probably why multiple chapters of the book so far have been focusing on just smaller actions. They build into the bigger one, but if the bricks are brittle then the building will break. Simple as that.
Delete2.) This statement represents something that I know I find very difficult to do in theater because of how foreign of an action it is for any person to do. To try to think like someone else is relatively difficult in and of itself, but to act on the actions that those foreign thoughts prompt is something our brains will literally fight back against, because you've been thinking like you for your entire life and trying to bypass that fact and present something completely different is something your brain probably isn't going to be okay with. Therefore, knowing those four w's is just the beginning of stepping into character and performing the actions in a way that the character would, because ideally, the actions should appear as if they're being performed for the very first time by someone who has never experienced this particular event before. That's why the "how" is spontaneous. It's a reaction by the character to the situations in the play, and in the character's mind it's never happened before. But again, getting into character that much requires a lot of repetition and rehearsal because bypassing that temptation to be yourself isn't easy. This is kind of why being good at improv is useful, because I think it trains your mind to get into character quite a bit faster and more efficiently.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Keenan, and that knowing the four w's of your character is half the battle of getting into character (or at the very least, the beginning). Spontaneity is also a very particular thing that actors need to know how to do. Think of actors in a broadway play, or on tour. That play is on almost every night, twice a day on the weekend, and not to mention all of the dress rehearsals. I think that's one of the reasons why actors get fired from touring/long running shows fairly frequently. As time goes on, they loose the spontaneity that enchants an audience. If you don't have that spontaneity, then the play isn't new. It isn't truthful. The audience can see right through you, and they get a feeling that this character has seen this all before- even though that's impossible. It's rather ironic how important spontaneity is in a profession that requires hours and hours of rehearsal.
DeleteI agree with what Keenan and Katie are saying. Spontaneity is a pretty big part of performing an action. When you perform an action on stage, it can't feel forced or rehearsed; we're not robots, constantly doing the same thing over and over again. As an actor, you've got to learn to keep a sense of spontaneousness, to make it seem like its the first time you're doing this action, and to keep things fresh. If you don't, you're character becomes stale and uninteresting.
Delete3. In Night of the Living Dead, the character I played, Harry Cooper, just wanted to survive the zombie outbreak by hiding out in the cellar(a fact he was quite vocal about). That was his end goal: to get everyone into the cellar so they could survive. Over the course of the play, as things got worse and worse, and people kept disregarding his suggestion of hiding out in the cellar, he got more despereate in trying to obtain that end goal. So desperate, he turned into a big jerk(well, bigger jerk), started fighting with his wife, and eventually tried to shoot Ben, the main protagonist. In the end, after Harry was killed for his treachery, and everyone else had already died, Ben actually survived the zombie onslaught by (surprise) hiding out in the cellar, like Harry had been suggesting all along. Ironic, isn't it?
ReplyDeleteYour character's end goal of staying in the cellar I think is important when it comes to the parts where he gets more hostile. Knowing his prior motivation, make his actions more understandable to the audience. With Harry, his goal is crucial to understand because its the difference between life and death. As things start getting worse, this idea is all he has to hang on to. You could also say Harry's goal is just to not be eaten by zombies. His desire to stay in the cellar is fueled by his even bigger desire to not be eaten alive.
DeleteThat play was a great example of understanding your scene partner's prior situations. With Harry, you could tell he was very controlling over his family, and also very afraid at the same time. With Barbara you see how her brother's death traumatized her. Throw them and the other characters together in one room and see them fight for their lives, you're going to have hostile moments and arguments. Eventually leading to everyone having the same end goal: to live.
Delete1. There’s a somewhat defining scene in Othello where Desdemona accepts that her husband is going to kill her. She confesses this to Emilia asking her to lay her wedding sheets on her when she is dead. (This is the scene where Desdemona sings that eerie song). I think part of what Stella Adler is trying to get across is that there needs to be balance in the scene to make it strong. In this scene, Desdemona’s quiet sadness and acceptance is contrasted with Emilia’s bubbling frustration and refusal to let Desdemona just let go. If I try to imagine the scene without Emilia I feel like Desdemona’s situation would be less believable in that I can’t imagine someone would just give up on themselves that easily. It makes it seem like Desdemona just pities herself and so she just lets herself belong completely to Othello. The audience can’t relate to a character that is that completely unselfish. Emilia is in the scene to speak for the audience. She tries to knock a little sense into Desdemona and I think it’s after her attempts to help Desdemona that the audience can really feel bad for Desdemona. They see that she’s doing more than just giving herself to Othello; she’s really lost all hope. What’s more is that Emilia blames men for a woman’s corruption, possibly showing that Desdemona has lost hope for everyone’s sake as well. Hopefully that was a clear enough explanation. Anyway, it’s that balance of emotion that makes the situation strong.
ReplyDelete1)In NOTLD, my character, Barbara, and Ben had just met in the second scene, and had both come from completely different situations. I just experienced my brother getting mauled by a zombie and I had to run for my life into an abandoned house. Ben has been killing zombies for a while and had been on his own trying to survive. Our circumstances before our scene together were totally different, but now we’re in this room together unaware of what would happen next. He is totally alert and on his toes, and I’m totally silent up until he asks me about what happened to me. He was my partner for the scene, and him talking to me trying to get me to speak was an extremely important part of making the scene strong because that was when our paths would kind of 'cross'. I was able to show him the kind of situation I had just been through by being timid and afraid at first, and he was able to tell me about himself and how he had been surviving by the way he was building the wood up over the window and ordering me around to get nails for him.
ReplyDelete