Stanilavski book

The book starts by introducing the practitioner born in 1863 who influenced the theatre and acting industry immensely with his theories and exercises which enabled the actor to portray a truth through their acting. His legacy legacy lives on even though he founded these ideas back in the 1800s. Stanislavski's idea of naturalistic acting lead on to other techniques like method acting .

The book was really useful to read because it was not only informative and explain the reasoning behind each theory brought up in the book but also the book suggested exercises specific to the techniques which through my training as an actor will be really helpful to recall.

It was interesting because it gave a lot more insight and detail into the general information for example the detailed ground plan for Act one of Anton Chekovs "the seagull" was good to has as a visual in the book as many actors being fairly practical and creative people would benefit from seeing the actual set out of the stage. The bella Merlin book contains another interesting section about how to access a script initially called "stage 1:the period of study" I found this particularly engaging because I was able to recall some information I already knew in this section from past studies at The BRIT School and I was able to absorb the information in that section as an active reader and the questions that it suggests you ask which include : "what is the style of the writing", "what are the external characteristic of the dramativc personae" and "how do you personally feel about the play" are maybe both the first things you would ask yourself when initially accessing a piece of text however, if next I get a part of a play to analyse or I have to learn lines for a performance I will look at those questions and by looking through a different perspective it will really help me grow as an actor.

I decided to put one of the exercises in the book into practice over this summer which was exercise 4.1 because from past training and workshops relaxation methods really help me to feel energised and ready for anything which is crucial as an actor. However, I found this exercise fairly unhelpful in comparison to the relaxation exercises I have found in other actor's guidebook for example the sun salutation exercises which really helps me prepare calmly whereas the tensing of my muscles in contrast to the release of tension in my muscles in this exercise just caused me pain rather than relaxing me. This has a negative effect on me and therefore I probably wouldn't use it again in preparation for acting however if I practice this exercise i'm sure I will get better at it and will find it a good technique for me to relax and get into a state of readiness.