Stanislavski and SNM: Incompatible? Nope!

Stanislavski and SNM

Constantin Stanislavski – the father of modern acting technique. An actor himself, plus a theoretician, director, and teacher, Stanislavski devoted his life to the theatre. He wanted to make the theater of his day more ‘realistic;’ he wanted a codified, effective method for training actors; and he wanted a technique that would encourage the illusive but ultra-potent state of what he called ‘inspiration’ to manifest itself frequently, even reliably. Stanislavski changed acting forever, and his writings form the foundation of theory/practice for almost every great acting teacher who taught in America from the 1930s to the present. Uta Hagen, Stella Adler, Michael Chekhov, Boleslavski, Strasberg, Harold Clurman, etc. are all Stanislavski-based. Consequently, it is the most common technique still taught, in some form, to American actors at the secondary and undergraduate levels.

After seeing SLEEP NO MORE for the first time, I began to wonder if Stanislavski’s system was relevant to that show. SNM is so ‘strange’ in that it’s not totally linear/chronological, there are few spoken words in anything except in 1:1s, the stories unfold primarily through movement and dance. Can you apply something generally associated with naturalism to something that is pretty ‘out there’ and avant-garde? Well, I have found it fruitful to explore Stanislavski’s notions of ‘realism’ and ‘naturalism.’

In Stanislavski’s youth, theatre was of the declamatory type – the actor was charged only with being heard and proper execution of the stylized physical poses that supposedly communicated emotions or mental states. In many ways, all of Stanislavski’s work was a reaction against that norm which he found unsatisfying both as an actor and a spectator. Stanislavski sought something more authentic, expressions of the real human condition. BUT Stanislavski also meant “truthful” – not absolute photo/emotional-realism. Those aren’t interchangeable terms. Still, Stanislavski’s work is most often associated with naturalism, hence my interest in whether his ‘normal’ means of preparing a character, analyzing a text, or experiencing a theatre piece can be applied to something as different as SNM. So, I went back to my Stanislavski texts, and was delighted to read this quote from Sonia Moore, who studied at the Moscow Art Theatre:

"[Stanislavski’s system is] not a series of rules for staging a naturalistic play or any other play. These teachings are beyond the limits of one theatrical direction in their historical significance. Stanislavski believed not in naturalism, which presents the surface of life, but in … truth of content. … This is even more important in an unconventional production… . There is no contradiction between unconventional staging and an actor who lives the inner experiences of the character. It is the truth of the actor’s behavior that will keep the audience’s attention."

After my last viewing of the show, I had the amazing opportunity to speak peer to peer to some of the actors at the bar, and I’ve continued the conversation with a couple of very gracious performers upon my return to Dallas. They had their basic training in Stanislavski methodology. One actor assured me that the characters they play each have a fully-developed “through-line” that accounts for everything the character does moment to moment. Even for characters who were less specifically delineated, this actor told me that they have taken the time to develop a whole back-story with given circumstances, motivated idiosyncrasies, etc.

It also leads me to something I experienced fully – the sense of this highly stylized production being more ‘real’ than most realism I’ve seen. The choreography, its execution, and the focus and intensity with which the actors interact with one another (and the audience in 1:1s) initiates a kind of crucible effect. Noble emotions, dark urges, psychological torture, joy and pain were all put by the creators through a refiners’ fire, and everything that was mixed in, muddled, or superfluous was burned away. What is left, and beautifully performed each night, flies at the audience in a potent barrage of concentrated, unadulterated reality. It’s not ‘box set’ realism; it is HYPER-realism that is able to bypass a spectator’s intellectual guard rails and critical sensors and penetrates straight to the soul level. The Macbeths’ lust and their guilt, the witches’ joyous bacchant frenzy and their remorse in the aftermath, Hecate’s haunting loss and urgent desire….. It all comes through and Stanislavski’s term ‘truth of content’ describes the SNM brand of ‘realism’ beautifully.

A final application of Stanislavski thought I’d like to apply to SLEEP NO MORE is that of actor intention. For Stanislavski, the ideal an actor strives for is what he calls the ‘creative state,’ which is the environment most likely to produce that indescribable, jointly-experienced “magic” only theatre can provide to the actor and spectator alike. Stanislavski described the phenomenon this way:

"After an actor has consciously prepared the pattern of his role and approaches the play’s events as if they were happening for the first time (…which makes every performance different), his contact with the audience may give birth to true, spontaneous actions that are unexpected even by the actor himself. These are moments of ‘subconscious’ creativity when an actor improvises although his text and the pattern of his role are firmly fixed. Such creativity or inspirational improvisation is the goal and essence of the Stanislavski school of acting."

This idea is often misinterpreted, or the emphasis is misplaced, and it’s distilled down to meaning that performances are best when they’re spontaneous, unexpected, and improvised. But re-read the other parts of the quote – ‘After an actor consciously prepared’ and ‘although his text and the pattern of his role are firmly fixed.’

In online interviews I’ve seen and read with the SLEEP NO MORE creators and original cast members, reporters remark that the piece feels so free and improvised. The cast and creators are quick to inform the reporters that they are mistaken – the whole is carefully and deliberately crafted, that choreography is set and indelible, that performers do not ever deviate from what has been prescribed.

So, why does everyone think it’s an improvised free-for-all? Because that’s what it feels like – the audience is “inspired” in a kind of magical way, when the actor has done and continues to do their job properly. Sonia Moore explains: “We find that [inspiration] is born through the conscious effort of the actor who has mastered his technique. Inspiration is the result of conscious hard work; it is not a power that stimulates work.”

On the other hand, the creators and actors are also quick to admit that the audience’s energy and reaction adds an unknown quantity to the mix, a kind of spontaneity that can change, or perhaps more precisely – co-mingle with the indelible. One actor told me: “[The spectator] nuances more than changes [a scene.] Everyone brings a different energy into that space and all of those energies can affect you differently and bring out different shades of something.” But if an actor hasn’t done their homework sufficiently, or if actors do not treat an individual performance as something that’s happening, as Stanislavski said, “for the first time,” differences can throw them rather than inform and enhance, and the audience will disengage.

SLEEP NO MORE therefore requires an actor’s constant, focused attention – another Stanislavski staple. As one SNM actor told me, “You have to work hard to stay focused and make your thoughts that much more razor sharp and clear without words...if you drift off and imagine your grocery list for five seconds the audience will know or sense that you're not 100% in it...they're very intuitive… .”

And that quality was one of the things I loved most about SLEEP NO MORE – the actors’ dedication to the work, to each moment, to each other, and to the spectator. As I mentioned in a previous post, the day I saw THE TRIP TO BOUNTIFUL on Broadway, it was apparent those actors had forgotten the Stanislavski truth they were undoubtedly taught at some point: “My task is to elevate the family of artists from the ignorant, the half-educated, and the profiteers, and to convey to the younger generation that an actor is the priest of beauty and truth.” The BOUNTIFUL folk erred wildly on the side of being ‘profiteers’ rather than being ‘priests of beauty and truth,’ a heinous sin considering the BOUNTIFUL performers were the veteran pros. The SNM kids had far greater artistic integrity and were infinitely more effective because of it.

So, even all this many decades since Stanislavski tread the boards, and even though he is associated with naturalism, Stanislavski is as useful and applicable today to the ‘normal’ and to the cutting-edge, the challenging, the experimental, and the game-changing.