The System Becomes the Method: Stanislavsky – Boleslavsky

– Strasberg

Sergei Tcherkasski

This text is prepared by the author on the basis of his official abstract of the dissertation "Directing
and Teaching of Richard Boleslavsky and Lee Strasberg of the1920s–1950s as an Experiment in the
Development of the Stanislavsky System" submitted for the D.Sc. (Theatre Arts Studies) degree
defended in May 2012 at the St. Petersburg Theatre Arts Academy and approved by the Higher
Attestation Commission of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation. During
the preparation for the publication in the Stanislavski Studies journal the text of the official abstract
was partly abridged and rearranged. The following text consists of:
1. Preface to the publication by Prof. Igor Stupnikov
2. Introduction, definition of the subject of the research, its goal, novelty, relevance and topicality,
overview of the materials analyzed in the research
3. Structure of the dissertation and overview of its text
4. List of the author’s main publications on the subject of the dissertation
5. Afterword.

Sergei Tcherkasski: in words and deeds

Preface to the publication of the author’s summary of Sergei Tcherkasski’ dissertation

Usually dissertation abstracts are not published in theatre journals. But the abstract you are going to
read is an unusual one. Firstly, it is the author’s summary of his dissertation for the Doctor of
Science (Theatre Art Studies) degree (D.Sc. in Russia is a second higher doctorate degree which
may be obtained only by Ph.D. holders and requires a D.Sc. dissertation which solves some
problems of significance). Secondly, and this is the main point, the dissertation is written by a
theatre practitioner – director and acting teacher.
It’s no longer a secret that scholarly activity is often viewed with some suspicion by theatre makers
– they suppose that either one creates theatre or writes about it. Such a position seems to be
supported by the fact that for the last sixty years less than ten practitioners stood for their
D. Sc. (Theatre Art Studies) dissertations in Russia. But let us have a closer look at their names –
Nicolay Gorchakov, Vasily Toporkov, Maria Knebel, Georgy Tovstonogov, Oscar Remez, Valery
Galendeyev, Irina Malochevskaya. It’s obvious that these directors, actors and teachers are not only
able to do their creative work, but also able to pass their knowledge of Stanislavsky practice, their
own experience and the methodology of theater-making to the next generations. And you can’t
name this tiny group of D.Sc. – practitioners as other than brilliant
No wonder, Sergei Tcherkasski’s entrance into that privileged group aroused pride, and curiosity,
and jealousy and serious interest among those concerned.
I attended the defense procedure and I can report that Prof. Tcherkasski’s dissertation and its
abstract received positive reviews from notable Russian theatre scholars and teachers – Anatoly
Smeliansky, Alexei Bartoshevich, Valery Galendeev, Irina Malochevskaya, etc.; from leading
theatre practitioners – Lev Dodin, Artistic Director of the Maly Drama Theatre (St. Petersburg),
Pavel Homski, Artistic Director of the Mossoviet Theatre (Moscow), Semen Spivak, Artistic

stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013 92

Director of the Molodezhny Theatre (St. Petersburg), etc.; and from American scholars and
practitioners: David Chambers (Yale School of Drama), Robert Ellermann (Lee Strasberg Theatre
and Film Institute and New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts) and Anna Strasberg
(Artistic Director and Co-Founder, Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute).
And the St. Petersburg Theatre Arts Academy Dissertation Council’s opinion (later approved by the
Higher Attestation Commission of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian
Federation) stated that “dissertation of Prof. Tcherkasski introduced new archival materials on the
development of the Stanislavsky System in the Moscow Art Theatre and its First Studio, and in the
American Laboratory Theatre, the Group Theatre and the Actors Studio. Tcherkasski’s research
clarified the lines of penetration and adoption of Stanislavsky’s ideas in the international theatre of
the 20th century. Its results have both theoretical and practical significance for modern actors’
training and theatre making”.
Naturally Sergei received deserved congratulations from his colleagues that day. But what is
interesting, and even symbolic – that very night he rushed to the Academy Theatre where his
students, would be actors, were performing one of their last diploma productions.
All in all, there were 9 diploma productions of Tcherkasski’s Acting Studio (some of them were in
the repertoire for up to two years). The diversity of the director’s choice speaks for itself – Russian
classics of the mid-20th century Open Hearts by Vasily Shukshin and Warsaw Melody by Valentin
Zorin; Time and the Conways by J. B. Priestly; Russian new drama Flying by Olya Mukhina; Irish
and Italian playwriting – Pillowman by Martin McDonagh and Risk by Eduardo De Filippo,
Japanese farce Dressing Room by Kunio Simidzu; musical performance Stage Mirror; and dance
movement improvisation We Dance Paintings. Three of these productions received prizes in
international and domestic festivals, and students were invited to work in leading St. Petersburg and
Moscow theatres – the Maly, the Alexandrinsky, the Baltic House, the Akimov Theatre, the
Vakhtangov Theatre, etc.
No less successful were Sergei Tcherkasski’s 2006 Studio graduates – now they are young actors of
the Moscow Art Theatre, the Taganka, the New Theatre, the Baltic House, etc. As for 2002
graduates – they are already winners of the Golden Mask Award – the highest National Theatre
Award in Russia, some of them were bestowed with the title of honored artist of Buryatia.
It seems that Tcherkasski indeed is able to combine theory and practice. And today he is already
teaching new students of his Studio at the St. Petersburg Theatre Arts Academy (four years MFA
course, 2012–2016). And what is worth noticing – students make etudes on the life of the actors of
the Moscow Art Theatre’s First Studio, and rehearse The Good Hope – the play that Richard
Boleslavsky directed exactly a hundred years ago. So Tcherkasski’s practice matches his theoretical
research, his words and deeds going together.

Igor Stupnikov,
Ph. D., Doctor of Science (Theatre Art Studies),
Professor of the St. Petersburg University,
Member of the St. Petersburg Theatre Arts Academy’s Dissertation Council

stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013 93

A hundred years ago K. S. Stanislavsky for the
first time defined the substance of his quest in
the field of acting methodology as an
exploration of a system of elements of an
actor’s inner creative state 1 . These elements,
according to Stanislavsky, reflect the natural
laws of nature, the organic laws of life itself.
Creative discoveries and constant searches of
the creator of the System defined the
development of the art of theatre, and, during
the 20th century, the entire world’s actor
training was based on Stanislavsky’s ideas,
both developing them and arguing with them.
That is why today, at the beginning of the 21st
century and the beginning of the second
century of the life of the System, it is
impossible to regard the development of the
Stanislavsky System outside of the analysis of
its impact on the world theatre and without
considering the reciprocal impact which the
international theatre thought and practice had
on it.
The strongest influence of Stanislavsky’s ideas
was experienced by the American theatre. The
historical Moscow Art Theatre tour of 1923–
1924, 380 productions performed in
12 months, not only shook the US theatre
world but led to the creation of the American
Laboratory Theatre (1923–1930), which
became the first place where American actors
were consistently exposed to the Stanislavsky
System. Artistic Director of the theatre Richard
Valentinovich Boleslavsky (1887/89–1937),
actor of the Moscow Art Theatre, actor and
director of the First Studio, in 1910s was an
immediate participant in all the key moments
of the evolution of the System. After
Boleslavsky’s emigration, his creative work
happened to be outside of the field of interests
of Soviet theatre studies, and his American
destiny and contribution to the international
1
Term "System" for the first time appeared in
Stanislavsky’s work The Program of an Article: My
System, written in June 1909 (Archive of the Museum of
the Moscow Art Theatre, K. S. Stanislavsky Fund.
628, p. 46-48). In Russian Stanislavsky himself and
other authors in different years spelled the word System
differently: “system”, System, or just system; in the
present work this term is spelt according to the norms of
English language – the Stanislavsky System.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
dissemination of the System were not analyzed
at all. However, Boleslavsky’s theatre work, as
well as about fifteen Hollywood films he made
with Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Clark
Gable, John Barrymore, etc. left a noticeable
trace on the history of the art of theatre and
cinema of both countries. Boleslavsky’s book
Acting: The First Six Lessons (1933) became
the first account in the English-speaking world
of the Stanislavsky System and, having been
reprinted a great number of times, remains in
demand up to this day 2 .
Among Boleslavsky’s many students, Lee
Strasberg (1901–1982) definitely stands out –
as one of the most influential teachers of acting
in the 20th century, director, theatre
theoretician, who created, if we may use
A. M. Smeliansky’s words, "the Stanislavsky
industry in the US". In 1931 Strasberg,
together with Clurman and Crawford, founded
the Group Theatre (1931–1941), America’s
first permanent professional company, having
chosen the Stanislavsky System as the basis of
its acting methodology. For more than thirty
years Strasberg was the head of the Actors
Studio (opened in 1947), where the
Stanislavsky System was definitively
transformed into its American version – the
Method 3 , which in the 1950s acquired a
classical form and became the foundation of
the American school of acting. Among
Strasberg’s students and leading Method actors
– Marlon Brando, Marilyn Monroe,
Montgomery Clift, Maureen Stapleton, Anne
2
Boleslavsky R. Acting: The First Six Lessons. NY,
1933.
3
In this work we always keep term the System for
Stanislavsky’s own ideas and term the Method – for
American interpretation of the Stanislavsky System,
mainly in the teaching of Lee Strasberg.
In some of my previous writing I’ve also used shortcuts
the American Method and the Russian System in clear
understanding that Stanislavsky–Boleslavsky–Strasberg
research of the human’s nature and psychophysiology in
application to the actor training is the holistic process of
the discovery of the objective natural laws common to
actors around the world. In Stanislavsky’s own words:
"My System is for all nations. All people have one
nature, but adjustments are different. The System does
not touch adjustments" (Stanislavsky K. S. Iz zapisnih
knigek. .: VTO, 1986Vol. 2. P. 313. )
94
Bancroft, Geraldine Page, Paul Newman, Al
Pacino, Dustin Hoffman, Robert de Niro, etc.
Today Strasberg’s interpretation of the
discoveries of the early period of the
Stanislavsky System and mechanisms of the
use of affective memory in acting are the
subject of research and ongoing debates.
However, Strasberg’s Method still helps to
create brilliant actors, many of whom studied
and up to this day study at the Lee Strasberg
Institute of Theatre and Film created in 1969.
A number of principles of Boleslavsky’s and
Strasberg’s school are documented in the
literary heritage of both masters. Two director-
teachers not only passed on their knowledge of
the Stanislavsky System to the new generations
of theatre practitioners, but effectively
developed and adapted it with regard to the
new tasks of theatre, and, most importantly,
theoretically comprehended this process. That
is why their literary and pedagogical work is of
particular value to contemporary theatre
training – as a matter of fact, a considerable
part of the writings by Boleslavsky and
Strasberg are dedicated specifically to the
methodology of actor training.
Thus, Boleslavsky’s and Strasberg’s creative
work plays a significant role in the history of
the world-wide dissemination of the
Stanislavsky System in the 20th century and
becomes one of the brightest chapters in the
history of Russian-American theatre
connections.
The structure-forming core of the subject of
this research is the line of direct succession in
theatre training: Stanislavsky – Boleslavsky –
Strasberg. And the subject of this research
itself could be formulated in the following
way: directing and theatre teaching of
Stanislavsky’s students and followers Richard
Boleslavsky and Lee Strasberg in American
theatre of the 1920s – 1950s in connection with
the theory and practice of actor training in the
Stanislavsky System. Our goal is to study
comprehensively the main concepts of their
theatre teaching and directing in the context of
the development of Russian and American
theatres, to reveal their substantial
development of the main concepts of the
Stanislavsky System.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
The novelty of the research is defined by the
fact that for the first time in Russian
scholarship the directing and teaching of
Boleslavsky and Strasberg are analyzed as an
experiment in the development of the
Stanislavsky System in a wide cultural and
historical context; we have significantly
enriched the knowledge of the activities of the
Laboratory Theatre, the Group Theatre and the
Actors Studio whose work forms the most
important through line of the history of
American theatre in the 20th century.
Boleslavsky’s and Strasberg’s directing and
teaching are for the first time examined as a
complex phenomenon, including their
directing, the practice of actor training and
elaboration of theoretical concepts of actor’s
work.
Theoretical interpretation of the subject of the
research is also conducted on the basis of the
author’s experience as director and acting
teacher 4 .
Relevance and topicality of the scholarly
research of this line of the System’s
development (from Stanislavsky – through
Boleslavsky – to Strasberg) is connected, first
of all, with revealing the interpenetration of
cultures and community of the world theatre.
It’s no coincidence that analyzing the crisis in
the understanding of Stanislavsky’s legacy in
the Soviet theatre of 1950s, Smeliansky, in his
preface to the second volume of Stanislavsky’s
collected works emphasized that it was "the
community and kinship of the world theatre
that extended the life of Stanislavsky’s ideas" 5 .
And the author of almost the only Russian
work about the international destiny of the
System, N. N. Sibiriakov pointed out the
4
Practical research of the correlation between the
System and the Method has been taking place in the
author’s teaching in the Acting Studio of the St.
Petersburg State Theatre Arts Academy (which he is the
head of since 1998), during the numerous international
workshops in leading theater schools of the world, and
out of his experience of directing productions at the
RADA (Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London,
2000, 2007), the Stetson University (USA, 2001),
National Theater Institute at the Eugene O'Neill Theater
Center (USA, 2003), the NIDA (National Institute of
Dramatic Art, Sidney, 2010).
5
Smeliansky A. M. Professiya – artist // Stanislavsky
K. S. Collection of works: In 9 vol. .,1989. V. 2. P. 36.
95
absence of absolutely necessary "researches, in
which, based on concrete factual examples,
Russian and Soviet theatre culture will be
positioned in the space of the world theatre
art" 6 .
Secondly, the relevance of the research is
connected with the conceptualization of the
development of modern theatre and actor
training in the channel of Stanislavsky’s ideas.
Today, when attempts are made to diminish the
System’s significance or to prove its
narrowness, it seems productive to look at
Stanislavsky also through the eyes of American
theatre practitioners. It is in the 20th century
American theatre, as in no other theatre in the
world, that the Stanislavsky System was not
only perceived, but also substantially
conceptualized and developed. "In many
European countries Stanislavsky, – Smeliansky
points out, – is just a part of the legendary yet
remote historical landscape. As for the
Americans, not only do they constantly publish
Stanislavsky, but also present the main source
of knowledge about K. S." 7 . Two first books
by Stanislavsky were published in English
earlier than in Russian, so the majority of
translations into the languages of other nations
during the 20th century were based on the
American editions. And today the number of
new English language editions about the
Stanislavsky System is not smaller than the
amount of Russian-language publications. That
is why the dialogue with American followers
of Stanislavsky’s methodology today is more
relevant than ever.
Thirdly, the topicality of the dissertation is
connected to the development of the subject of
continuity in theatre pedagogy, which
determines creative substance, methodology
and the nature of the theatre school becoming
the guarantee of the theatre’s progress. It is in
the art of theatre, due to its immediacy, that the
process of passing on professional skills from a
teacher to a student is extremely important 8 .
6
Sibiriakov N. N. Mirovoye znacheniye Stanislavskogo.
M., 1988. P. 12.
7 9
Smeliansky A. M.: Interview / recorded by O. Fuks //
Kultpokhod. 2008. 4. P. 36.
8
Problem of continuity in theatre directing and teaching
occupies one of the most important parts in author’s
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
Materials, that were analyzed in the research
includes 9 :
– K. S. Stanislavsky’s works on the System of
different periods;
– Richard Boleslavsky’s books Acting: The
First Six Lessons and Lee Strasberg’s A Dream
of Passion, as well as their essays and
publications in the American press of various
years (the author has for the first time compiled
an index of Boleslavsky’s and Strasberg’s
works);
– publications of materials on the teaching
activities of the Moscow Art Theatre’ First
Studio actors who have become leading
teachers of the Stanislavsky System in the
USA (Andrius Jilinsky, Maria Ouspenskaya,
Vera Soloviova, etc.);
– literary works, memoirs, interviews with
America’s leading theatre figures who worked
or studied at the Laboratory Theatre, Group
Theatre and Actors Studio (Stella Adler, Elia
Kazan, Morris Carnovsky, Harold Clurman,
Cheryl Crawford, Robert Lewis, Sanford
Meisner, etc.);
– books by Edward Easty, Lorrie Hull which
are manuals on the performance of the Method
exercises, notes on Strasberg’s lessons of
various years in the works by Jean
Scarfenberg, Victor Seymour, Raymond
Gasper and etc.;
– American newspaper and magazine reviews
of the productions of the 1910s – 1950s;
research. In 2003 he had defended his first Ph.D.
dissertation “Problem of Continuity in Theatre Directing
and Teaching: Formation of Sulimov’s School of
Directing” (2003), devoted to his teacher Mar Sulimov,
leading Professor of Directing at the St. Petersburg State
Theatre Arts Academy in 1960-90s. Later he published:
Tcherkasski S. Valentine Smyshlyaev – Actor, Director,
Theatre Teacher .St. Petersburg, 2004 (about a member
of the MAT First Studio, notable director and
teacher);Sulimov’s Productions or Foretaste of
Pedagogy in Sulimov, Mar Initiation To Directing.
St. Petersburg, 2004; and most recently – Sulimov’s
School of Directing / Ed. S. Tcherkasski .St. Petersburg,
2013.
In the present publication we had to omit the overview
of the dissertation’s bibliography which consists of 1500
titles in Russian and English. For details see afterword at
the end of this publication.
96
– archive materials from the Archive of the
Moscow Art Theatre Museum (manuscripts of
Stanislavsky, Stella Adler, Richard
Boleslavsky, materials of the work of the First
Studio); from New York Public Library
(Boleslavsky’s lectures Creative Theatre and
lectures at the Laboratory Theatre of 1925–
1926, materials from the collection of Eunice
Stoddard and Roman Bohnen about the work
of the Laboratory Theatre and the Group
Theatre, the manuscript of Stanislavsky’s An
Actor’s Work on Himself), from the archive of
the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in
New York (Lee Strasberg’s lectures and
documents); from the private archives of
American theatre practitioners and researchers
(Jerry W. Roberts, Mel Gordon, Robert
Ellermann);
– video materials: films by Boleslavsky,
Rasputin and the Empress, The Painted
Veil,Les Misérables, The Garden of Allah, Men
in White, etc., numerous films of the 1930s –
1980s starring actors from the Group Theatre
and Actors Studio ;
– records of the Actors Studio sessions made
by the author in 2003 and 2007; his scholarly
correspondence with American theatre teachers
and scholars in 2000–2011.
THE STRUCTURE OF THE
DISSERTATION.
The study consists of an Introduction, four
chapters divided into sections, and a
Conclusion. A Bibliography in Russian and
English is attached (over 1500 titles) and
includes the first attempt to create an index of
Boleslavsky and Strasberg’s literary legacies
In the Introduction the relevance and novelty
of the research undertaken are substantiated.
The subject, objectives and goals of the
research are identified, a brief characterization
of Boleslavsky’s and Strasberg’s work is
provided as well as of that of the theatres they
created – the Laboratory Theatre, the Group
Theatre and the Actors Studio.
The significance of the Stanislavsky System
for the American theatre is revealed, as well as
the relevance of the exploration of its
development in Boleslavsky’s and Strasberg’s
work for the contemporary actor training.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
Further an analysis of literature on this topic
and an overview of Boleslavsky’s and
Strasberg’s literary heritage are provided, and
the terminology used is specified 10 .
In the first chapter "The Stanislavsky System
and Theatre Work of Richard Boleslavsky in
the 1910s"we analyze the process of origin
and development of the Stanislavsky System
which defined Boleslavsky’s formation as an
actor, director and teacher.
For this purpose in the first section
"Stanislavsky’s Research of the Inner
Psychotechnique of an Actor in the 1900s –
1910s"the so-called "early period" of the
System, usually dated 1906–1915/17, is
examined in detail. This period started with the
fundamental formulation of the necessity to
search for objective laws of psychophysiology
in an actor’s creative work, with the
introduction of the principle of consistency in
an actor’s work on himself and on a role, and
was connected with analytical research of
certain elements, – and, according to the ideas
of that period, affective memory became the
leading (fundamental) element in an actor’s
inner creative state. Stanislavsky became the
first theatre practitioner who started to develop
the methods of using this psychophysiological
quality of a man discovered by the French
psychologist Théodule Ribot in theatre
practice. It is affective memory or "living
memoirs" (Stanislavsky’s term) that make
"secondary feelings" (Vakhtangov’s term) on
stage authentic and truthful.
Besides that, Stanislavsky is searching for the
methods of training of certain elements of an
actor’s inner creative state and for the first time
in the history of European theatre art he
consistently studies the tradition of yoga.
A parallel reading of Stanislavsky’s works and
books by yogi Ramacharaka (the pen name of
American author William Atkinson, 1862–
1932), combined with examples from the
10
For example, we underline that the System is not the
entire creative legacy of Stanislavsky, but only part of it
– the system of the actor training, built on the study of
the objective laws of nature. Problems of Stanislavsky’s
own practice as an actor and director, his aesthetic
views, principles of theater management, etc. remain
outside of thus defined the System concept, though they
are actively involved in its analysis.
97
rehearsal practice of the Moscow Art Theatre
and the First Studio reveal that it was yoga that
gave Stanislavsky a reliable technique for the
training of many elements of the System such
as muscle release, communication, attention,
visions and “I am". Besides that, Stanislavsky
uses the yogic concept of prana and draws
upon the yogic notions of the solar plexus 11 .
In this section we show that it is in yoga that
Stanislavsky found the conceptual idea of a
connection between the inner creative state and
the unconscious as a source of creative
intuition and transcendental knowledge. The
slogan declared by Stanislavsky in 1916 – "to
the unconscious through the conscious", was
subsequently reiterated by the creator of the
System a countless number of times. And in
1938 Stanislavsky writes that it is the chapter
The Subconscious in the Inner Creative State
of an Actor from An Actor’s Work on Himself
that contains "the essence of creativity and the
whole System" 12 .
The author of the present research reveals that
it was in the period of the 1910s that
Stanislavsky found and described almost all of
the elements of an actor’s psychotechnique.
Some of them will change their names in the
process of the development of the System, but
a set of elements even in the 1930s will by and
large remain the same as it was in the 1910s,
and the period of the 1920s will mostly add
elements of external technique.
The First Studio of the Moscow Art Theatre
was Stanislavsky’s main research laboratory of
the early period. The most consistent teaching
of the System taking place in the Studio in
1912–1916 and the creative evolution of the
Studio itself during the whole decade were
among the most brilliant pages of the theatre
history of the 20th century, they truly fertilized
the development of world theatre. Here the
genius of Vakhtangov and Michael Chekhov
was formed; here the whole constellation of the
future leading actors of the Russian theatre was
born. Many of the leading actors of the First
11
For detailed analysis of Stanislavsky and yoga
connections see two articles by the author published in
Stanislavski Studies e-journal, Issues 1 and 2.
12
Stanislavsky K. S. Sobraniye sochineniy. In 9 vol.
Vol.2. P.42.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
Studio in the 1910s later became significant
figures in the US theatre pedagogy (Chekhov,
Boleslavsky, Ouspenskaya, Soloviova,
Jilinsky, Lazarev), and each of them in his/her
own way developed Stanislavsky’s ideas
overseas.
The shift of interests of the System’s creator
towards external techniques, apparent after
1915–1917, also had an impact on the last
work produced by Stanislavsky in the First
Studio (1917), – "the production of Twelfth
Night was actually a lesson on action" 13 , and
largely initiated the processes connected with
the search of new ways of an actor’s existence
on stage which subsequently lead to
Vakhtangov’s Princess Turandot.
The second section of the first chapter
“Mastering of the Stanislavsky System in
Boleslavsky’s Acting and Directing in the
1910s (the Moscow Art Theatre, the First
Studio, the Bolshoi Drama Theatre)”covers
the stages of Boleslavsky’s learning process.
Analysis of Boleslavsky’s creative work as an
actor with the Moscow Art Theatre and the
First Studio allows us to conclude that he
distinctively represented the Moscow Art
Theatre school and was an actor of wide range,
with infectious stage presence and good taste.
Besides the role of the student Belyayev, he
played Laertes in Shakespeare’s Hamlet
(1911), the artist Teplovsky in Leonid
Andreyev’s Yekaterina Ivanovna (1912),
Alcide in Molière’s The Enforced Marriage
(Le mariage force) (1913), Fabrizio in
Goldoni's The Mistress of the Inn (La
locandiera) (1914) and other roles. Later
Boleslavsky was cast as Gorky’s Satin in The
Lower Depths, and when during the American
tour of the Moscow Art Theatre Stanislavsky
had to give up this role because he was sick, of
all the performers of this role he preferred to
pass it onto Boleslavsky.
The author of the research reveals that
Boleslavsky’s first directorial work – The
Good Hope (Op Hoop van Zegen) by Herman
Heyermans was connected with the process of
actor training and daily lessons based on the
13
Dikiy A. D. Povest’ o teatranlnoy yunosti. M., 1957.
P. 290.
98
System. Rehearsals smoothly flowed into
classes, and classes enriched rehearsals. As a
result, Boleslavsky, drawing on the lessons of
A Month in the Country, managed to
accomplish the things that were only supposed
by Stanislavsky when he initiated the Studio,
and if during the rehearsals of Turgenev’s play
System-based exercises only helped to express
the author’s "psychological laces", in The
Good Hope the whole production was created
from "school" exercises and etudes. Further
analysis of Boleslavsky’s directorial works in
the First Studio (Wandering Pilgrims by
Vladimir Volkenstein, Balladyna by Juliusz
S owacki) allows us, following in the footsteps
of Pavel Markov, to formulate the
characteristics of Boleslavsky’s directorial
manner which was characterized by "yearning
for monumentality and undoubted heroism. He
was attracted both by the wide scope and depth
of feelings" 14 .
The dynamism of Boleslavsky’s development
at that period is confirmed by the analysis of
his uneasy but creatively fruitful relations with
Vakhtangov (Boleslavsky acted in
Vakhtangov’s productions The Festival of
Peace (Das Friedensfest) by Gerhardt
Hauptmann and The Deluge by Henning
Berger). The research allows us to reveal that
Boleslavsky initially – even at the time when
Vakhtangov was trying "to expel theatre from
theatre" – was endowed by that very feeling of
elevated and open theatricality which the
creator of Turandot would achieve only at the
end of his life, having dynamically changed
during his short lifetime.
The experience of the "outlined grotesque"15 of
Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night where
Boleslavsky as Sir Toby showed "the great
power of expressive comicality" 16 , had an
impact on the first big production directed by
Boleslavsky outside of his alma mater. The
Torn Cape by Sem Benelli at the Bolshoi
Drama Theatre in St. Petersburg, then named
Petrograd (1919), where, according to the
theatre’s artistic director N. F. Monakhov,
14
Markov P. A. O teatre. V. 1. P. 369.
15
Markov P. A. O teatre. V. 1. P. 382.
16
Efros N. E. Moskovsky Khudozhestvenny Teatr:
1898–1923. M.; Petrograd., 1924. P. 407.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
"Boleslavsky brilliantly managed to create the
atmosphere of a real Italian street – busy,
noisy, bright, picturesque, cheeky and witty" 17 ,
became for Boleslavsky an important
experience in mastering the theatre of open
theatricality. Among the fans of this work of
Boleslavsky were Alexander Benois, Nikolay
Monakhov and Alexander Blok who remarked
on "Boleslavsky’s brilliant talent" 18 .
In this research we show that already in his
first works at the First Studio some of the main
qualities of Boleslavsky as a teacher were
already present. He was noted for his ability to
work with actors thoroughly, to build a creative
atmosphere of friendly, even loving attention
to performers which lead to their harmonious
self-revelation. Boleslavsky’s rehearsals "were
filled with an over-riding sense of joy and
love" 19 .
In the same section we explore the
characteristics of Boleslavsky’s personality
which largely defined his professional life. He
was "adventurous" and "nobly dedicated to
theatre" 20 , endowed with "irresistible charm" 21 .
Among his qualities were the happiness of
being, lightness, dynamism and even theatrical
"hooliganism". He would be easily fascinated
by something, but would equally cool off.
His aspiration to do too much would often turn
into a lack of responsibility. This research
provides an opportunity to see how the said
qualities of a gifted but flippant student
experienced a drastic change when
Boleslavsky entered the path of an acting
teacher.
The conclusions of the first chapter summarize
the main qualities of Boleslavsky which
defined his potential as a future teacher of the
Stanislavsky System.
17
Monakhov N. F. Povest’ o zhizni. L.; M., 1961.
P. 173.
18
See: Blok A. A. Pismo M. F. Andreyevoi. 1919.
21 Sent. // Sobr. soch.: In 8 v. M.; L., 1963. V. 8. P. 527.
19
Soloviova V. Interview. 1975. 1 Dec. Quoted in:
Roberts J. W. Richard Boleslavsky… P. 34.
20
Giatsintova S. V. S pamyatyu nayedine . M., 1985.
P. 93.
21
Shverubovich V. V. O starom Khudozhestvennom
teatre. M., 1990. P. 498–499.
99
In the second chapter "Directing and
Teaching of Boleslavsky in the 1920s –
1930s" we attempted to look at Boleslavsky’s
directorial, pedagogical and theoretical works
of the American period together and relate
them to the timeline of the development of the
Stanislavsky System, and also evaluate the
impact of the artistic leader of the Lab (as the
American Laboratory Theatre was called by its
actors) on the students, first of all, on Lee
Strasberg.
This analysis is conducted against the
background of the reconstruction of the
developmental processes in the young
American theatre, which, despite the stormy
"overtaking" development – the appearance of
national playwriting (O’Neill, Lawson, Rice,
Treadwell, Howard, Barry), directors
becoming stronger (Hopkins, Moeller, Light,
McClintic), the movement of new stagecraft
(Johns, Simonson, Bel Geddes, followed by
Gorelik, Aronson, Mielziner, Oenslager), the
birth of American theatre criticism (Nathan,
Woollcott, Young, Atkinson, Krutch,
Macgowan, Sailor), – in the first quarter of the
20th century remained largely an actors’
theatre.
In the first section "The American Tour of the
Moscow Art Theatre of 1923–1924s and Its
Impact on the American School of Acting"
we analyze the overseas tour of the Moscow
Art Theatre which became the most important
cultural event in the theatre life of the USA in
the 1920s. The ensemble quality of acting and
the unity of creative methodology of
Stanislavsky’s actors became an artistic
revelation and shook theatrical America.
At the same time analysis of actors work and
methods of actor training in American theatre
in the first quarter of the 20th century (the
theatre pedagogy of Lois Calvert, William
Gillette, David Belasco, Philip Moeller)
reveals either the set of methods of purely
external technique or intuitive and empirical
approaches. And Broadway theatre learnt not
to train a new generation of actors, but select
talents through an elaborate and well-
developed system of auditions and casting,
mainly typecasting. This allows us to draw a
conclusion that the introduction of American
theatre practitioners to Stanislavsky's
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
methodology of acting that took place during
the 1923–24 tour of the Moscow Art Theatre
was an accident which expressed the necessity;
this also explains the reasons why the
Stanislavsky System became so much in
demand in order to solve the principal inner
contradiction of US theatre connected with the
absence of an acting school and a theatre
pedagogy. As an American theater scholar
admitted, after the tour of the Moscow Art
Theatre “the Russians became the measure
against which all acting could be judged” 22 .
The first steps of the System in the US were
connected with the series of Boleslavsky’s
lectures Creative Theatre, delivered at the
Princess Theatre in January 1923 (according to
a witness, they were "like the coming of a new
religion which could liberate and awaken the
American culture" 23 ), and with the publication
of Stanislavsky’s first book My Life in Art
which initially appeared in English (1924).
Besides that, the model of a repertory theatre
with a permanent company demonstrated by
the Moscow Art Theatre showed the artistic
advantages of collective creative work lost by
American theatre under the pressure of the
commercial forms of organizing theatre. Since
the 1923–1924 tour of the Moscow Art Theatre
a dream about repertory theatre, theatre as an
artistic home has been living in the American
theatre. The establishment of the Laboratory
Theatre (1923), the Civic Repertory Theatre of
Eva Le Gallienne (1926), the Group Theatre
(1931) – this is the direct outcome of the
Moscow Art Theatre lessons.
The tour of the Moscow Art Theatre defined
the American destiny of Boleslavsky. On the
eve of the visit of the Moscow Art Theatre he
was on the brink of leaving the country.
Boleslavsky’s reunion with the company
(which had brought him up as an artist) that
happened during the tour, and the opportunity
to play on the same stage with Stanislavsky
secured his relevance in the US as a powerful
22
Carnicke S. M. Stanislavsky in Focus. London, 2009.
P. 24.
23
Stockton M. K. Report and Synopsis of Growth of the
Laboratory Theatre from June 1, 1920 – June 1, 1928.
Quoted in: Roberts J. W. Richard Boleslavsky… P. 108.
100
representative of the art of the Moscow Art
Theatre, the vehicle of its methodology.
The tour of the Moscow Art Theatre also
defined the destiny of Lee Strasberg. It was
under the influence of the revelations
experienced at its performances that young
Strasberg made a final decision to dedicate his
life to theatre and to study theatre art. In
January 1924 Lee Strasberg became a student
of Boleslavsky’s Laboratory Theatre.
The second section of the second chapter "The
Laboratory Theatre (1923–1930) and
Directing and Teaching of Boleslavsky in the
1920s –1930s"reconstructs the curriculum of
the Laboratory Theatre school – "the first
school in America to offer comprehensive
actor training" 24 , including, besides the lessons
in acting, classes in movement, ballet, speech,
voice, history of theatre and international fine
arts. Information is provided about the teachers
of the Lab, about the work – starting from 1926
– of the directing class, which was attended by
Lee Strasberg and Harold Clurman. A special
place is allotted for the professional biography
and teaching principles of outstanding actress
and leading teacher of acting Maria
Alexeyevna Ouspenskaya (1887–1949), a
founding member of the First Studio of the
Moscow Art Theatre, Boleslavsky’s faithful
ally at the Laboratory Theatre, a fellow of the
yogic organization SRF, and subsequently a
well-known Hollywood actress.
In the course of the analysis of Boleslavsky’s
productions at the Laboratory Theatre the
author singles out the pedagogical component
in the formation of the repertoire, the
succession to the experience of the First Studio
and its meaningful development. Boleslavsky
managed to find a place in his repertoire for
psychologically elaborated realist drama
(Granite by Clemence Dane and Martine by
Jean-Jacques Bernard refer us to The Good
Hope) and the comedy of open theatricality,
farce and vaudeville (Shakespeare’s Twelfth
Night, The Straw Hat by Eugène Labiche,
which continue the traditions of Twelfth Night
in the First Studio), and mystical stories (The
24
Smith W. Real Life Drama. NY, 1990. P. 15.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
Sea-Woman’s Cloak by Amelie Rives-
Trubetskoy resonates with Balladyna).
Boleslavsky always underlined that the Lab
"must get it roots into American soil" 25 ; he
planned a season of American plays, and the
failure of this project for financial reasons was
one of the important reasons why he left the
theatre. Boleslavsky is also credited with the
discovery for the stage of the future classic of
American drama Thornton Wilder. His first
produced play The Trumpet Shall Sound (1926)
was staged in close interaction with the theatre,
and that had an impact on the playwright’s
creative development – there is evidence that
Wilder’s observations of the Lab actor’s
exercises had given him the idea of an empty
stage and imaginary props which he used in
Our Town.
The section shows that Boleslavsky’s teaching
in the Lab was nourished, among other things,
by his directing work on Broadway. We look at
the series of large-scale musical productions
where his mastery of elaborating crowd scenes
played a definitive role. Having started as "a
special director from the First Studio of the
Moscow Art Theatre" in Max Reinhardt’s
mystery production The Miracle (1924) where
he brought on stage seven hundred actors and
extras, Boleslavsky directed a number of
impressive productions with the music of
Rudolf Friml – Vagabond King (1925, 511
performances; London premiere – 1927, 480
performances), White Eagle (1927) and The
Three Musketeers after Dumas’s novel (1928).
In these productions the author also reveals the
pedagogical component of Boleslavsky’s
directing, his ability to turn a group of extras
into an ensemble of memorable individualities.
The director-teacher, according to a witness,
thoroughly "studied the speaking voices of the
chorus – two tenors shouted at this point, two
baritones at that. He discovered and directed
some eighty-seven set cues for crowd reactions
in the first act of Vagabond [King] alone. <…>
Chorus boys and girls sat up nights developing
their “characterizations”" 26 .
25
Brochure, American Laboratory Theatre, 1928–1929.
P. 2.
26
Janney R. [From the Drama Editor’s Mailbag] // New
York Herald Tribune. 1937. 31 Jan.
101
In this section Boleslavsky’s staging of
Shakespeare of the 1920s is also explored; in
his works the critics saw both the breaking of
stereotypes of Shakespearian productions
"restrained by Anglo-Saxon self-consciousness
or deliberation" 27 and "investing the play with
a festival gaiety" 28 , noted "high spirits and
animal gusto of his direction" 29 . And many
descriptions by Brooks Atkinson prove that
acting in Boleslavsky’s productions was both
psychologically convincing and consistent with
the vaudeville and burlesque staging 30 . Besides
Twelfth Night and the less successful Much
Ado About Nothing at the Lab, Boleslavsky
worked on Broadway productions of The
Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night’s
Dream and Macbeth. In the latter Boleslavsky
acted as the representative of Gordon Craig in
the realization of costumes and lighting design
which reveals a lengthy process of Craig’s
creative influence on Boleslavsky starting as
early as the production of Hamlet at the
Moscow Art Theatre.
Analysis of failures of a number of Broadway
productions of Boleslavsky (Ballyhoo! by Kate
Horton, Mr. Moneypenny by Channing
Pollock, Judas by Walter Ferris and Basil
Rathbone, etc.), connected with the obvious
weaknesses of the plays, gives the opportunity
of revealing the story of Boleslavsky’s
compromises and artistic disappointments
which lead to his departure from the Lab and
the theatre as a whole.
At the end of the section we provide a brief
overview of Boleslavsky’s work in Hollywood
(1932–1937) and conclusions about the results
of the 7-year work of the Laboratory Theatre
for the subsequent development of American
theatre.
In the third section of the second chapter "The
Basic Principles of Boleslavsky’s Directing
and Teaching and His Literary Legacy" we
carry out analysis of Boleslavsky’s literary and
27
Atkinson J. B. The Play // New York Times. 1925.
19 Dec.
28
Brown J. M. The Director Takes a Hand // Theatre
Arts Monthly. 1926. Vol. 10. No. 2. P. 76.
29
Ibid.
30
See: Atkinson J. B. The Play // New York Times.
1925. 19 De .
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
pedagogical legacy, which consists of
transcripts of his lectures from different years,
about fifteen articles and the book Acting: The
First Six Lessons. It vividly reflects his
teaching at the Laboratory Theatre, based on
his experience during the Moscow Art Theatre
and First Studio years and the development of
his own views on teaching theatre, and also
provides the opportunity to analyze what
exactly Strasberg took from his teacher at
the Lab.
Boleslavsky’s lectures Creative Theatre (1923)
lay the foundation for the ensemble collective
theatre work and the necessity of a unified
acting technique for a company; they separate
the theatre of experiencing from the theatre of
representation and introduce the basics of the
actor’s technique allowing him to "live the
part". It is not by accident that the whole
structure of lectures leads to the question of the
use of affective memory in an actor’s work. In
1923 that was the core of Boleslavsky’s
pedagogical approaches, the main "news"
which he was bringing to American actors and
future students. Indeed, according to Clurman,
“affective memory” was the element that most
excited many of the Lab’s actors" 31 .
In this section we analyze the article The First
Lesson in Acting: Concentration (1923), which
starts the cycle of Boleslavsky’s works that
subsequently formed his main book Acting:
The First Six Lessons. The article considers the
program of actor training (later fairly
adequately realized in the practice of the Lab),
establishes the priority and significance of
concentration and training of the sense memory
(five senses). Boleslavsky’s lectures in the
Laboratory Theatre 1925–1926s reveal the
connection between the sense memory and
launching of the mechanism of affective
memory.
Boleslavsky’s understanding of dramatic action
is discovered when we read his article
Fundamentals of Acting (1927), in which he
proposes an original model of the analysis of
an actor’s stage life. It is presented as a swing
"problem step / action step", and thus the alive
process of an actor is interpreted not as a
31
Roberts J. W. Richard Boleslavsky… P. 165.
102
vector of action directed towards a certain goal,
but as an action which is every moment altered
through the comprehension of the next task in
the process of the perception of given
circumstances.
The analysis of further publications of the
Lab’s artistic director provides arguments
allowing disagreement with J. W. Roberts who
states that after 1926–1927 Boleslavsky’s
teaching changed its priorities from affective
memory to action. On the contrary, it is in
these years that Boleslavsky independently
comes to the ideas characteristic of the
synthesizing period of the development of the
Stanislavsky System. In the article A Second
Lesson in Acting: Memory of Emotion (1929)
he unfolds examples of the use of affective
memory (which haven’t lost their methodical
value today and are being examined in detail in
this section) and insists on the necessity to
enrich "the golden casket" of sense and
affective memory of an actor, and in A Third
Lesson in Acting: Dramatic Action (1931) he
speaks about the through line of actions –
spine, about the hierarchy of "elementary"
actions, constituting the main, throughline of
actions of the role, and reveals the dialectic
connection between the action and affective
memory.
In the present section we also examine how
questions discussed by Boleslavsky in the
subsequent chapters – physical
characterization, the way of character’s
thinking, the rhythm of thoughts, as well as the
problem of their correlation with an author’s
writing (A Fourth Lesson in Acting:
Characterizations), approaches to observations
(A Fifth Lesson in Acting: Observation), the
analysis of the levels of the rhythmic
organization of life and the influence of rhythm
on the subconsciousness and emotional life (A
Sixth Lesson in Acting: Rhythm) – are tied up
in an integral system of actor training.
In conclusion, we provide a general evaluation
of the book Acting: The First Six Lessons
(1933) – the first book on the System in the
English-speaking world which was published
before An Actor's Work on Himself by
Stanislavsky. Besides its methodological value,
the book is known for its clarity, laconism,
elegance of dialogue and literary mastery
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
which have made it one of the most popular
books on the Stanislavsky System.
The author concludes that Boleslavsky’s
directing, teaching and theoretical research in
the second half of the 1920s come close to the
dialectic comprehension of the connection
between emotions and action, to the
harmonious understanding that emotions may
indeed be triggered by action, but the only
source of their creation is an actor’s emotional
memory.
Besides that, analysis of Boleslavsky’s
teaching in this section leads the author to the
conclusion that, having started to teach the
System according to the conceptions of the
1910s gained during the practice of an actor
and director of the Moscow Art Theatre and its
First Studio, Boleslavsky did not limit himself
to the repetition of lessons taken. His staging
and teaching of the American period taking
place without the opportunity of a direct
dialogue with his teacher, not only adapted the
System to the needs of his new students, but
also creatively developed it. The coincidence
of the results which were achieved in the 1920
– 1930s in the course of the independent
development of the System’s early period by
both Stanislavsky and Boleslavsky prove the
fruitfulness of the basic ideas of the System.
At the end of the second chapter the author
draws conclusions about the significance of
Boleslavsky’s directing-teaching and theoretic-
methodological work of the 1920s – 1930s for
the development of the 20th century American
theatre. The major milestones of his work are
the creation of the unique school-studio-theatre
Lab, its teaching curriculum which was the
place where hundreds of students became
familiar with the Stanislavsky System, and
various productions of Shakespeare, Hamsun,
Labiche, Wilder, Rives, Dane, Romains,
Schnitzler etc., as well as the book Acting: The
First Six Lessons.
In the third chapter "Formation of the
Method in Practical Theatre Work of Lee
Strasberg in the 1920s – 1940s"the author
proposes the periodization of the history of the
Group Theatre which became "an artistic
achievement unparalleled in American
103
theatre" 32 , establishes its succession to the
Moscow Art Theatre’s ideas and methodology
of the Stanislavsky System (Lee Strasberg,
Harold Clurman, Stella Adler, Eunice
Stoddard, and Ruth Nelson studied in the
Laboratory Theatre under Boleslavsky and
Ouspenskaya). In the beginning of the chapter
the priorities in the research of Strasberg’s
directing and teaching of the period are
defined, the necessity of including in this
chapter analysis of the development of the
Stanislavsky System itself in 1930s is
substantiated.
In the first section of the third chapter
"Strasberg’s Directing and Teaching at the
end of the 1920s – beginning of the 1930s:
Creation and Leadership of the Group
Theatre" the acting work of Strasberg at the
Theater Guild (supporting roles in the
productions of 1925–1931) and his early
directing experience are examined as a process
of a practical test of the fundamentals of the
System received by Strasberg from
Boleslavsky, in drama of different styles (from
Racine to Leonid Andreyev and Synge) and as
a process of the search of like-minded people
for the permanent company of the future
theatre. Strasberg’s productions of 1928 – New
Year’s Eve by Waldo Frank and Balloon by
Padraic Colum – feature the actors who will
soon be lead actors at the Group: Morris
Carnovsky, Franchot Tone, Sanford Meisner.
In this chapter the role of the Group Theatre
ideologist, Harold Clurman (1901–1980), is
revealed, as well as that of his famous Friday
night lectures in the season of 1930–1931, and
Cheryl Crawford’s (1902–1986) management
is characterized. Together with Strasberg they
formed a trio of director-managers of the new
theatre who, together with 28 actors, on June 8
1931 went to the summer camp in Brookfield
for the rehearsals of the first production of the
Group Theatre.
The first period of the Group’s work (summer
of 1931 – summer of 1934) is connected with
the establishment of the methodology of work
and formation of a common acting technique
under Strasberg’s undivided directorial
32
Actors on Acting / Ed. T. Cole, H.K. Chinoy. NY,
1970. P. 543.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
guidance. Strasberg’s seven productions define
the theatre’s path from its first artistic success
(The House of Connelly by Paul Green, 1931)
to the wide acclaim and, as a result of that, to
box-office success of the theatre (Men in White
by Sidney Kingsley, 1933). Work on
productions was based on improvisations; it
included basic exercises on sense memory and
observations, taken by Strasberg from the
Laboratory Theatre. Exercises on emotional
memory became a revelation for the actors,
they gave them a precious opportunity for
individual expression, and they united their
performance by common "emotional
authenticity".
In the analysis of Strasberg’s rehearsal process
particular attention is paid to his re-definition
of Stanislavsky’s principle "as if" –
"substitution" principle, which Strasberg
himself considered one of his main discoveries,
correlating it to Vakhtangov’s "justification"
principle. Stanislavsky’s question "What would
you do, what would you feel, how would you
react, if you found yourself in the given
circumstances described in the play?",
Strasberg replaces with the question "Author
and director demand that the character behaves
in this scene in a certain way. What motivates
you, an actor, to behave this particular way?"
Examples from Strasberg’s work analyzed by
the author reveal the fruitfulness of such an
approach, which especially was in demand
when actors worked in film.
The Group Theatre productions directed by
Strasberg (besides those mentioned they
include 1931– by Paul and Claire Sifton, 1931;
Night over Taos by Maxwell Anderson, 1932;
Success Story by John Howard Lawson, 1932;
Gentlewoman also by Lawson, 1934) are
examined in the context of American socio-
economic life in the "Red Decade" (1930s); we
analyze the repertoire of the theatre which
included only contemporary American plays.
The theatre "with its own opinion" dared to
disagree with influential Broadway critics; and
an example of the Group Theatre’s struggle
against Broadway critics for its own audience
and for the life of the production of Success
Story discovers the company’s moral unity as
well as the main contradiction in the life of the
104
theatre – its "effort to work in the commercial
theatre with a non-commercial philosophy" 33 .
In the course of research the succession of the
Group’s management of their inner theatre life
to the principles of the Moscow Art Theatre is
defined. We examine the daily life of the
Groupstroy actors’ commune and the
experience of the application of the new to
American theatre laws of life of the permanent
company, as well as incidental creative,
ethical, financial, and social problems. We pay
attention to Strasberg’s work with designers
Robert Edmond Jones, Max Gorelik, etc.;
reconstruction of their sets allows us to bring to
light the stage milieu in which Strasberg’s
actors lived and to feel the stylistic diversity of
certain productions. We analyze the causes of
the failure of Lawson’s Gentlewoman (1934)
which eventually led to the conflict between
Stella Adler and Lee Strasberg.
Analysis of the Group Theatre under the
artistic direction of Strasberg provides proof
that the company was a theatre-school, and its
actors were united by increased interest in the
technique of acting and its methodology. That
is why analysis of the Group’s actor training
curriculum becomes the subject for a separate
discussion in the second section of this chapter.
In the second section of the third chapter
"Curriculum of Actor’s Training at the
Group Theatre and the Influence of the
Russian Theatre Art of the 1920s – the 1930s
(Stanislavsky, Vakhtangov, Meyerhold)"
particular attention is paid to Strasberg’s first
attempts of building a curriculum in Method
training. The unique experience of three
summer training periods in 1931, 1932 and
1933 largely guaranteed the unity of the Group
Theatre’s acting technique. The curriculum of
the first summer (summer of "emotional
authenticity", as it was nicknamed by the
actors themselves) laid emphasis on the actor’s
psychotechnique (exercises on sense memory
and affective memory), that of the second
summer – on external technique (eccentricity,
development of imagination, exercises based
on pictures), and that of the third summer
united the skills gained during the previous
33
M. Gorelik cited at: Smith W. Real Life Drama. P. 72.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
work in productions of Anton Chekhov’s and
Eugene O’Neill’s one-act plays and improvised
micro-shows. Detailed examination of those
destroys the stereotyped perception of
Strasberg’s methodology being connected
solely with the actor’s inner technique.
In the chapter we also thoroughly examine
materials on Strasberg’s, Clurman’s and
Adler’s visit to Moscow in May–June 1934 –
Strasberg’s diary entries, his interviews and
conversations with Soviet theatre practitioners.
We analyze Strasberg’s negative reviews of
certain Moscow Art Theatre productions
marked by a decline of creative discipline,
Strasberg’s admiration for Meyerhold, who, for
the young American director, became "the
embodiment of the art of directing", "the
genius of theatre" (Strasberg’s article about
him was titled The Magic of Meyerhold),
whose actors, however, lacked (according to
Strasberg) "emotional authenticity". We draw a
conclusion that the question of the application
of the fundamentals of the Stanislavsky System
outside of realistic playwriting, the question of
correlation between the inner truth of an actor
and theatricality of a production turns out to be
in the center of Strasberg’s creative reflections,
and productions of different theatres which he
saw in Moscow become the most important
lesson and guideline to his subsequent
directorial trials.
The section is finalized by the juxtaposition of
a number of conflicting sources (memoirs of
Adler, Clurman, Stanislavsky) in order to
uncover the essence of Stanislavsky’s lessons
with Stella Adler which took place in Paris in
July 1934. Upon her return to the US Adler
informed the Group Theatre members that
Stanislavsky had rejected affective memory as
a source of emotions in favour of action, and if
an actor correctly performs the succession of
actions dictated by the play’s given
circumstances, required emotions will appear
by themselves. Adler’s rejection of the
necessity of Strasberg’s "exercises" marked the
beginning of a further lengthy critique of
Strasberg and accusing him of "abuse of
affective memory". In his polemical answer
Strasberg declared that "he taught the Strasberg
105
Method, not the Stanislavsky System" 34 , and
that moment gave birth, according to this
version of a witness, to the term the Method,
and ever since the presence of the definite
article and spelling of the word Method with a
capital letter had attached this notion to
Strasberg’s teaching.
In Strasberg’s opinion, shifting accents from
affective memory to action was both incorrect
and non-productive. Strasberg admitted that
Stanislavsky had new ideas, but considered
them erroneous. Strasberg underlined: "If you
are unable to bring in emotion, then what is the
point of action? Stanislavsky says clearly: ‘If
your senses are working and if you’re in good
adjustment with your partner then all you need
is the action’. If everything works perfectly
then you don’t even need the action! However,
if you have only action and other things not,
then nothing’s working" 35 .
As both Adler and Strasberg differently
interpreted Stanislavsky’s views of the 1930s
in their heated arguments, the rehearsal
practice of the creator of the System was
examined by the author of the present work not
in the rendering of his American followers, but
according to the first-hand source. Two
questions were brought to the center of
attention – they are essential not only for
interpretation of the methodological conflict at
the Group Theatre, but also for the
understanding of the development of the
Stanislavsky System itself. The first question
was about correlation between affective
memory and action in Stanislavsky’s practice
of the 1930s. The second question was about
interrelation between the early and the late
periods of the System.
It has been underlined that the history of the
development of the System (chronology of
Stanislavsky’s creative thought) and the history
of its publication (chronology of the System as
a literary product) are far from being
synchronous. As a result, the System as
practice – even practice of solely Stanislavsky
himself – turns out to be much deeper and
more substantial than the System as a literary
product. Thus, the leading circumstances in the
34
Cit. at: Lewis R. Slings and Arrows. P. 71.
35
Cit. at: Adams C. Lee Strasberg. NY, 1980. P. 179.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
interpretation of Stanislavsky’s discoveries in
the 1930s – both in the USSR and in the US –
are, first of all, the insufficiency of
Stanislavsky’s own written comments on his
work and, secondly, the multiplane nature of
Stanislavsky’s research at that period. "Late"
Stanislavsky comes to the new understanding
of action as an integral psychophysiological
process, in his research works the concept of
physical being (physical existence) is gestating.
At the same time, in the 1930s Stanislavsky
still considers affective memory – as a key
element of actor’s psychotechnique – to be "the
main element in our creative work" 36 . And the
influence of yoga’s philosophy and practice on
the System which goes back to the 1910s is of
a longstanding nature and apparent in
Stanislavsky’s rehearsal and research work of
the 1930s. About one third of the System’s
elements, mentioned in An Actor’s Work on
Himself up to our day are improved by yogic
training.
The present research challenges the simple
scheme that has taken root in the perception of
many theatre practitioners: early Stanislavsky
(the System’s leading element – affective
memory) vs. late Stanislavsky (the System’s
leading element – action), according to which
the late period cancels the early one, and even
the name early itself is of a judgmental nature
and becomes a synonym for immature.
Research conducted reveals that any period of
the System contains ideas and elements,
traditionally connected only with the early
period of its development, which allows
formulating a new attitude to the early period
of the development of the System, understood
as a "whole culture". The early period of the
development of the Stanislavsky System is
essentially a basic, fundamental period, an
integral part of the System and modern
methodology of acting.
In this section an attempt is made to formulate
the logic of the Stanislavsky System’s
development – from the analysis of separate
elements of an actor’s inner creative state
(through Ribot’s discoveries and yoga practice)
36
Quoted in: Dybovskiy V. V. V plenu predlagaemykh
obstoyatelstv // Minuvshee: Istoricheskij almanakh. 10.
M.; SPb., 1992. P. 314–315.
106
and the realization of the role of unconscious
processes in acting – to elaboration of various
conscious methods of triggering unconscious
processes in acting, creation of the inner
creative state, "I am" (use of the mechanisms
of affective memory, leading from senses to
the true emotion, use of physical actions and
sensations, etude technique, etc.). Today in
Stanislavsky’s legacy it is timely to
distinguish, according to V. M. Filshtinsky,
three principal parts: "The first one – teaching
about physical existence as an inseparable from
psyche and foremost element of our
psychophysiology. The second one – analysis
of events of life in a play as the most important
instrument of a director ("method of active
analysis").The third one – etude method of
actor’s work (or etude approach)" 37 .
And the following conclusion of
Nikolai Demidov, Stanislavsky’s long-time
assistant, seems to be of major importance:
with all the diversity of sometimes self-
excluding tryouts of different periods of his
research work "Stanislavsky never changed in
his essence. He always aspired to one thing
(only one thing!): he tried to find a way to truly
live on the stage… The reason why
Stanislavsky could combine all this variety of
contradictory approaches is that he took only
one thing from them: the thing needed in order
to achieve the main goal" 38 . Integrity and
holistic unity are organically inherent to the
Stanislavsky System.
In the third section of the third chapter
"Strasberg’s Directing and Teaching in the
Second Half of 1930 – 1940s"we show that
American followers of the Stanislavsky
System, on the contrary, chose the path of
contrasting the System’s elements. The
methodological split at the Group Theatre
concerning the use of affective memory and
action, as the author of the research reveals,
was determined by a whole range of diverse
reasons: different experiences gained by
Strasberg and Adler at the Laboratory Theatre
classes which they took at different times and
37
Filshtinskiy V. M. Otkrytaya pedagogika. SPb., 2006.
P. 83.
38
Demidov N. V. Tvorcheskoye naslediye: In 4 v. SPb.,
2004. V. 1. P. 399–400.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
different situations – those of studying in a
class and producing a show; historical
circumstances of the "Red Decade", calling for
action both in life and on stage (according to
an American scholar, "action was the cry of the
1930s and of the Group" 39 ); the conflict
between the matured actors and the director
who created them – Strasberg’s authoritarian
perfectionism did not correspond with the
company’s democratic aspirations; the fact that
supporters and opponents of the use of
affective memory belonged to different
psychological types of actors (it is more clearly
seen when we compare the psychophysics of
Strasberg and Adler themselves).
In this research we show how the severity of
the long-term theatre argument between Adler
and Strasberg dating back to 1934 determined,
for half a century, the development of
American theatre pedagogy and actor training.
As a result, teaching of the Stanislavsky
System as a whole in American theatre broke
down into schools with an emphasis on various
elements of the System. Three schools became
dominant – Lee Strasberg’s, Stella Adler’s and
Sanford Meisner’s – whose creators were once
united in collaborative work at the Group. We
could say (in a very schematic way!) that in
their struggle for the integral alive acting
Strasberg dedicated his research to and
emphasized the problems of relaxation,
concentration and affective memory, Adler – to
imagination, given circumstances and physical
actions, and Meisner – to spontaneity of
behavior, stage attitude and the reality of
doing.
In this section Strasberg’s productions of the
second period of the Group Theatre’s life are
reconstructed: the multicolored chronicle Gold
Eagle Guy by Melvin Levy (1934), epic (in
Brecht’s sense of the word) drama The Case of
Clyde Griffiths by Erwin Piscator based on
Dreiser’s An American Tragedy (1936),
antiwar musical Johnny Johnson by Kurt Weill
and Paul Green (1936). We note considerable
widening of the stylistics of the actor’s stage
existence in these productions as well as the
influence of Meyerhold’s lessons on
Strasberg’s directing.
39
Smith W. Real Life Drama. P. 182.
107
Besides that, we analyze the conflict of the
Group Theatre’s Actors Committee with the
directors of the theatre after which, at the
beginning of 1937, both Strasberg and
Crawford left the theatre. At the same time, an
overview of productions of Clurman, who
became the head of the theatre, allows us to
note that, although the tactics of rehearsals
were changed, methodologically they were
based on the principles of actor training and
common acting psychotechnique of the
company which were established during the
years of Strasberg’s work. The same
conclusion can be made if we analyze the
playwriting technique of Clifford Odets (1906–
1963), actor of the Group Theatre who became
a leading American playwright.
A brief overview of Strasberg’s Broadway
productions from the end of the 1930s to the
beginning of the 1940s and his short period of
film work in the mid-1940s confirms the
tendency in his work which started to show
earlier – in the first place he worries about
pedagogical problems of an actor’s
development, during the rehearsals he mainly
tries to achieve a new level of actor’s
authenticity. This allows us to draw a
conclusion about the final shift of Strasberg’s
interests toward pedagogy.
At the end of the third chapter conclusions are
drawn about the significance of Strasberg’s
directing and teaching activities at the Group
Theatre. It is here that the Stanislavsky System,
passed over to American disciples at
Boleslavsky’s Laboratory Theatre, was
comprehended, became the basis of a common
acting technique of the whole company, was
developed and started to transform into the
American Method.
The fourth chapter "The Principal
Procedures for Actor Training in Lee
Strasberg’s Method" opens with analysis of
Strasberg’s main book A Dream of Passion,
which, according to Strasberg himself, is "the
first authentic description of the Method" 40 .
Suggested by the author to be a complex
philological and theatricological analysis of
reasons why Strasberg quoted Hamlet in the
40
Strasberg L. A Dream of Passion. Boston, 1987.
P. XIII.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
book’s title justifies the choice of its Russian
translation according to Boris Pasternak’s
poetic version of Shakespeare’s line.
This chapter contains a brief overview of
Strasberg’s activities at the Actors Studio – he
was its Artistic Director from 1951 to 1982, –
and Strasberg’s private acting classes. It was
here that in the 1950s Strasberg’s Method
acquired its self-reliant, complete and classical
form, and Method acting gains acclaim and
becomes the foundation of an American school
of acting. This allows us to concentrate on the
principal methodological questions of
Strasberg’s teaching only in the 1950s helping
to clarify key moments in the development of
the Stanislavsky System in Strasberg’s
Method, leaving the questions of the
development of the Method itself to another,
certainly necessary, research.
In the first section of the fourth chapter
"Fundamentals of the Method: Relaxation,
Improvisation, Affective Memory" we make
the first attempt to bring into use of Russian
scholarship and theatre practice the principal
concepts of the Method.
The section shows how Strasberg, following
Stanislavsky, pays foremost attention to the
actor’s relaxation as the basis of the tuning and
development of his apparatus. However, in the
elaboration of this process he goes further,
considering not only the questions of physical
relaxation, but also the problems of the release
of psychophysical tensions.
Strasberg should also be credited for the clear
statement of a problem of the unhindered
expression of an actor’s intensive inner
emotions. It happens very often that an actor
truly experiences, lives the part and feels deep
emotions, but tensions of the body and mind
make him unable to express his inner world,
and the members of the audience do not even
suspect the richness of the actor’s thoughts and
feelings, and see only regular clichés of non-
expressiveness. Strasberg leads the struggle
against mannerisms in acting, caused by
"character’s armor" (Wilhelm Reich’s term)
using methods of body-oriented
psychotherapy. In Strasberg’s relaxation
practice actor training comes close to
contemporary body-oriented psychotherapy
methods – Reich’s system, methods of
108
Alexander and Feldenkrais, Lowen’s
bioenergetics, the technique of Pilates, etc., and
actor training enters the context of modern
practical psychology. At the same time
Strasberg pays much attention to individual
training which seems interesting in the view of
the possible adoption by contemporary Russian
actor training (usually designed as a group
training). The dissertation brings into use
episodes in Strasberg’s classes, gives concrete
examples of the release of muscle tensions
through the temporary limitation of an actor’s
mobility or release of an actor through the
analysis of his psychotraumatic experience,
etc.
Analyzing the principles of the use of
improvisation in Strasberg’s work, the author
of the research reveals its affinity with etude
technique. The section provides a historical
analysis (based on examples from the practice
of the Moscow Art Theatre and its studios of
different years) of parallel development and the
struggle between the different approaches to
etude-improvisations – both as verbal
improvisations for the creation of a text (new
play), and as an etude exploration of the
author’s text and life behind this text. Having
received at the Lab the skills of using etude-
improvisations in an actor’s work on himself,
Strasberg brought them into the rehearsals of
the Group Theatre’s productions – this has
been revealed in many examples of the third
chapter.
So Strasberg widened the realm of application
of etude-improvisations in the practice of
American theatre, because though Boleslavsky
and Ouspenskaya, as we show in the second
chapter, actively used etudes in their lessons,
i.e. in the process of actor training, they did not
include them in rehearsals. Meanwhile it was
noticed that descriptions of etudes during the
production of The House of Connelly (1931)
unwittingly "recall Stanislavsky’s rehearsals on
Tartuffe" 41 of 1936–1938, which gives an
example of forestalling the use of etude
technique in Strasberg’s work compared to the
practice of the creator of the System. Certainly,
as it is revealed by the research conducted,
41
Carnicke S. M. Stanislavsky in Focus. London, 2009.
P. 201.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
Stanislavsky used different etude approaches
ever since the times of the First Studio, but the
use of etude-improvisations in the rehearsals of
the Group Theatre productions in 1931–1934
indeed looks more systematic and consistent.
Thus, for the second time we reveal the
situation when disciples "forestall"
Stanislavsky in certain tryouts and researches.
Smeliansky calls this "the aerial transmission
of art". The author of this research, as in the
case with Boleslavsky, who anticipated certain
approaches of his teacher in the 1930s to
action, does not hurry to give Strasberg the
palm of victory, but suggests seeing in this
coincidence-forestalling a hidden potential of
the First Studio methodology. In other words,
we suggest seeing in this one more proof of the
significance of the early, basic period of the
System.
In the section we examine in detail the
procedures for emotional memory exercise –
the basic exercise of the Method. According to
Strasberg, emotional memory is evoked from
subconsciousness through the work of five
senses (i.e. sense memory). This formulation is
more than valuable as it tightly connects three
categories – emotional memory, sense memory
and subconsciousness, and suggests
mechanisms of their use and training which
were elaborated in detail by Strasberg during
the decades of his work.
Following Strasberg’s arguments, the author of
the dissertation examines examples of the work
of the mechanism of affective memory in
Proust’s and Wordsworth’s literature works.
We thoroughly reconstruct the scholarly
polemics around this psychophysiological
quality of a man in the works of Wilder
Penfield, P. V. Simonov, E. P. Ilyin,
P. P. Blonsky and V. P. Osipov in which we
can discern concepts with applied relevance for
the actor’s profession. We find out that the
development of emotional memory largely
determines predisposition to acting and
creativity in general.
In this section we provide and analyze the
difference between Strasberg’s approach and
Stanislavsky’s work in the 1930s which
Strasberg formulated himself: "In his final
period Stanislavsky made an effort in his
research to stimulate an actor’s reality and
109
emotion by simple and unforced methods.
Unfortunately, Stanislavsky’s correct statement
that emotion cannot be directly forced has led
to the erroneous conclusion that it cannot,
therefore, be stimulated. Stanislavsky never
gave up the demand that the actor should be
capable of living through a part. However,
because of the difficulties he encountered, he
hoped to stimulate the actor, who was already
trained to the emotional response (italics mine
– S. T.), by means of psychophysical
actions" 42 .
The italicized phrase has principal significance
– the actor who is "allowed" to perform
psychophysical actions has to be already, i.e.
trained in advance in emotional reactions. And
Strasberg continues: "I have found no
difficulty in using the emotional-memory
exercise and have developed specific
procedures for its use" 43 .
In the third chapter it was shown how
Stanislavsky, having switched his attention in
the 1930s to physical actions, did not cancel
the use of affective memory, moreover, he
continued relying on it and made it the basis of
psychophysical action, in a broader sense – of
existence on stage. In his turn Strasberg,
choosing his own path, does not reject
Stanislavsky’s action approaches. This reflects
the transition of the System from its early,
analytical period, when the accumulation of
knowledge about its separate elements was
taking place as well as the study of the means
of their training, – to the synthesizing stage
which is characterized by the free combination
of different approaches and techniques helping
to achieve the main goal of the System – the
integral, holistic and inspired inner creative
state of an actor.
Given examples of the use of affective–
emotional memory in the First Studio of the
Moscow Art Theatre and in Strasberg’s
practice vividly reveal a methodological step
forward made by the American teacher in
training and use of this element of the inner
creative state and allow us to outline the
possibilities of the further use of the Method in
contemporary actor training.
42
Strasberg L. A Dream of Passion. P. 151.
43
Ibid.
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
In the second section of the fourth chapter
"Procedures for the Actor’s Work on Himself
and Work on a Role in Lee Strasberg’s
Method" we unravel a methodologically
elaborated strict sequence of Strasberg’s
exercises in an actor’s work on himself. It
develops from simple – to more difficult; from
objects in the immediate surroundings of an
actor – to those which only exist in his
memory; from external objects, available for
observation, – to internal objects which can be
revived only if we use inner concentration.
Exercises ascend from one object of attention
to several objects, the training of multi-layered
concentration takes place, and the text is
added. A whole range of exercises on the list
are authorial, created by Strasberg himself:
emotional-memory exercise, personal object
exercise, private moment exercise, song-and-
dance exercise and etc., and we pay close
attention to the description and analysis of
those.
In the part of the section dedicated to the work
on a role, we analyze a substantial example of
Strasberg’s tactics of using an exercise on
emotional memory in the work with the Group
actor Roman Bohnen on a scene from
Lawson’s Success Story.
In the final part of the chapter we draw a
conclusion about the succession of Strasberg’s
Method to the principal concepts of the
Stanislavsky System; we also single out
methodological aspects, in which the disciple
of Stanislavsky’s disciple moved forward
along the path of exploration of the objective
laws of the actor's creative work and
methodology of their use in actor training.
In the Conclusion of the dissertation we
provide a resume of the work conducted,
formulate principal findings and mark out the
paths of further research.
All the results, received in the course of the
research, provide proof of the durability of the
adoption of the Stanislavsky System which
took place after the historical tour of the
Moscow Art Theatre in 1923–1924 in the
history of 20th century American acting. They
reveal the significance of the directing and
teaching, theoretical and methodological
activities of Boleslavsky, as well as the works
of his Laboratory Theatre in the chain of
110
continuity from the System of Stanislavsky to
the Method of Strasberg who, in his turn, laid
in the practice of the Group Theatre the
foundation for the formation of the US acting
school. The fruitfulness of Stanislavsky’s ideas
of the 1910s, flourishing in American theatre,
as well as the more thorough analysis of the
history of the development of the System
allowed looking afresh at its earlier period,
which should be perceived as the fundamental,
basic period, not cancelled by the later one.
The analysis of Lee Strasberg’s directing and
teaching proved that he managed not only to
adopt many of Stanislavsky’s ideas, but also to
develop them substantially, make a number of
methodological discoveries enriching the world
theatre practice and also being of interest today
in the motherland of the Stanislavsky System
itself. Among the fundamentals of Strasberg’s
Method are the following:
– the methodology of use of affective
(emotional and sense) memory in an actor’s
work, revealing of the diversity of triggers of
authentic emotions and the genuine inner
creative state of an actor. Strasberg interrelates
three categories – emotional memory, sense
memory and subconscious, and suggests the
mechanism of their use and training. He
concentrated his researches namely on the
recalling of a true emotion through the inner
reconstruction of the sensory reality of the
previous experience of an actor, moving along
the path of sense memories to the authentic
emotion. The procedures of finding the sensory
trigger, which provokes an emotion, or singling
out and embedding of such a trigger and
connecting it with the needed emotion
according to the laws of the conditioned reflex
in the course of the repeated performance of
the emotional memory exercise, is one of the
key Strasberg discoveries, his step forward in
the development of the Stanislavsky’s
approaches;
– the technique of "substitution" that
reformulated Stanislavsky’s magical "as if" in
the direction, suggested by Vakhtangov’s
"justification", and stretched the limits of an
actor’s possibilities beyond the limits of his
own experience. Productivity of this approach
was for the first time tested by Strasberg in
non-realism playwriting and subsequently
stanislavskistudies.org Issue # 3, November 2013
came in much greater demand by actors
working in film;
– the methodology of relaxation, elaboration
not only of the questions of physical relaxation,
but also the problems of the release of
psychophysical tension and the ability to
express freely the truth of intensive inner
emotions of an actor. In the practice of
Strasberg’s acting classes actor training came
close to modern body oriented psychotherapy –
the system of Reich, methods of Alexander and
Feldenkrais, Lowen’s bioenergetics, technique
of Pilates, etc., and elaboration of individual
relaxation trainings;
– versatile technique of etude-improvisations.
Use of them – "especially complicated and
ingenious one" – both at the phase of an actor’s
work on himself and work on the role and
production – "became Strasberg’s trademark in
the Group era" 44 . According to Strasberg,
translation of intellectual knowledge
("director’s" knowledge) about the character
into actor’s knowledge (emotional, sensory)
happens in the etudes that sometimes are
preceding logical analysis. This reveals the
affinity of Strasberg’s pedagogy to
Stanislavsky’s etude technique, represented in
the Russian theatre school by the line of the
pedagogical work of Stanislavsky – Demidov –
Knebel – Korogodsky – Dodin and Filshtinsky;
– the elaboration of common principles of the
creativity of an actor on the basis of fathoming
the objective laws of nature and
psychophysiology of man, the widening of
actor training at the cost of the achievements of
modern science. And the reciprocal process –
enrichment of psychology by the discoveries in
the field of general creativity of man which
were made in the course of exploration of the
art of acting; – teaching, according to
Strasberg, precedes directing. The Method
emphasizes thorough preliminary preparation
and training of an actor’s instrument before the
work on a play. Strasberg’s literary heritage
contains more than one warning to the teachers
of acting who replace the task of developing
the apparatus of a young actor with directing a
44
Gordon M., Lassiter L. Acting Experiments in the
Group // Tulane Drama Review. 1984. Vol. 28. No. 4.
P. 7.
111
scene for the exam. Among significant
methodologies of actor training suggested in
the 20th century, the majority is created by
directors (Stanislavsky, Meyerhold, Grotowski,
etc.), a smaller number – by actors
(Michael Chekhov). Strasberg’s Method was
created by a teacher.
Stanislavsky’s legacy and its development in
Strasberg’s theatre pedagogy, the System and
the Method represent different historical
phases of the holistic research of actor’s
psychophysiology. They are different in some
of their approaches to the achievement of the
inner creative state, but they are substantially
united by one main thing – the search for the
objective laws (laws of nature itself) in acting.
That is why Strasberg’s Method could and
should be comprehended by contemporary
theatre scholarship and pedagogy. The line of
the development of actor training coming from
the Stanislavsky System through Boleslavsky’s
lessons to Strasberg’s work and further to the
practice of the Method actors to the new
generation of the 21st century actors, proved its
fruitfulness and has to become the subject of
attention of the modern theatre pedagogy - in
both theory and practice.

The Author’s Main Publications on the Subject of the Dissertation

In Russian:
1. Tcherkasski S. D. Valentin Smyshljaev – akter, rezhisser, pedagog (Valentine Smyshlyaev – actor,
director, teacher). SPb.: SPbGATI, 2004. 91 p.
2. Tcherkasski S. D. Stanislavskyj i Strasberg – opponenty ili edinomyshlenniki? (Stanislavsky and
Strasberg – opponents or colleagues?) // Teatral'naja zhizn'. 2008. 3. P. 49–51.
3. Tcherkasski S. D. Anglijskaja "Utinaja ohota" (British “Duck Hunting”) // Teatral'naja zhizn' 2008.
1. P. 107–110.
4. Tcherkasski S. D. Stanislavskyj i joga: opyt parallel'nogo chtenija (Stanislavsky and Yoga:
Experience of Concurrent Read) // Voprosy teatra. Proscaenium. 2009. 3–4. P. 282–300.
http://sias.ru/publications/magazines/voprosyteatra/794.html
5. Tcherkasski S. D. Jogicheskiej elementy sistemy Stanislavskogo (Yogic Elements of the
Stanislavsky System) // Voprosy teatra. Proscaenium. 2010. 1–2. P. 252–270.
http://sias.ru/publications/magazines/voprosyteatra/738.html
6. Tcherkasski S. D. Gamlet, Strasberg i aktery: k perevodu nazvanija knigi Lee Strasberga “A Dream
of Passion” (Hamlet, Strasberg and Actors: On Translation the title of Lee Strasberg’s “A Dream of
Passion”) / Izvestija RGPU im. A. I. Gercena. 2011. 140. P. 126–135.
7. Tcherkasski S. D. K voprosu o logike razvitija sistemy Stanislavskogo, ili Vremja chitat' Strasberga
(The Stanislavsky System: Logic of Development or It’s High Time We Read Strasberg) // Teatr.
Zhivopis'. Kino. Muzyka. 2011. 4. P. 39–56. http://gitis.net/rus/label/almanack/2011.shtml
8. Tcherkasski S. D. Sistema Stanislavskogo i Metod Strasberga: opyt sravnitel'nogo analiza (The
Stanislavsky System and Strasberg's Method: An Approach To Comparative Analysis) // Izvestija RGPU
im. A.I. Gercena. 2011. 143. P. 143–150.
9. Tcherkasski S. D. Sojuz baleta I dramy: pantomima "Brachnoe pokryvalo" Shniclera v
Laboratornom teatre Richarda Boleslavskogo (The Wedding of Ballet and Drama: Schnitzler's
Pantomime "The Bridal Veil" at the American Laboratory Theatre of Richard Boleslavsky) // Vestnik
Akademii Russkogo baleta imeni A.Y. Vaganovoj. 2011. 2 (26). P. 253–269.
10. Tcherkasski S. D. "Madam" i Sistema Stanislavskogo: chetvert' veka amerikanskoj teatral'noj
pedagogiki M.A. Uspenskoj (Madame & the Stanislavsky System: a Quarter of a Century Theater
Teaching of Maria Ouspenskaya in America) // Voprosy teatra. Proscaenium. 2011. 3–4. P. 254–263.
http://sias.ru/publications/magazines/voprosyteatra/551.html

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11. Tcherkasski S. D. Trening po Stanislavskomu v teatral'noj pedagogike Lee Strasberga perioda teatra
"Grup" (nachalo 1930-h godov) (The Stanislavsky System Training in Lee Strasberg’s Teaching at
Group Theatre (early 1930s)) // Vestnik Cheljabinskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. 2011. 37
(252). Filologija. Iskusstvovedenie. Issue. 61. P. 181–187. http://www.lib.csu.ru/vch/252/vcsu11_37.pdf
12. Tcherkasski S. D. Razvitie sistemy Stanislavskogo v amerikanskih urokah Richarda Boleslavskogo
(The Stanislavsky System's Development in Acting Lessons of Richard Boleslavsky) // Vestnik
Moskovskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta kul'tury i iskusstva. 2011. 6 (44). P. 219–224.
13. Tcherkasski S. D. Dialog dramaturga i rezhissera: TorntonUajlder v Laboratornom teatre Richarda
Boleslavskogo (The Dialogue of the Playwright and the Theater Director: Thornton Wilder at Richard
Boleslavsky’s American Laboratory Theater) // Amerikanskaja dramaturgija: novye otkrytija. Materialy
mezhdunarodnoj nauchno-prakticheskoj konferencii 25–27 nojabrja 2011. SPb: Izd-vo SPBGATI, 2012.
P. 26–40.
14. Tcherkasski S. D. Affektivnaja pamjat' v tvorchestve aktera: Ribo – Stanislavskij – Strasberg
(Affective Memory in Acting: Ribot – Stanislavsky – Strasberg) // Voprosy teatra. Proscaenium. 2013.
1–2. P. 256-274.
In English:
15. Tcherkasski S. The Stanislavsky System – first 100 years // Stanislavsky in Finland. Colloquium
Program, 4–5 April 2009. Tampere: Center for Practice as Research in Theatre, 2009. P. w/n.
16. Tcherkasski S. D. Fundamentals of the Stanislavsky System and Yoga Philosophy and Practice //
Stanislavsky Studies. 2012. 1 http://Stanislavskystudies.org/wp-
content/uploads/Sergei_Tcherkasski_Stanislavsky_studies_1.pdf
17. Tcherkasski S. D. Fundamentals of the Stanislavsky System and Yoga Philosophy and Practice
(Part 2) // Stanislavsky Studies. 2012. 2 : http://Stanislavskystudies.org/issues/issue-2/issue-2-
article-1/

Afterword

In the present publication we had to omit the overview of the dissertation’s bibliography which
consists of 1500 titles in Russian and English and includes nearly all publications on the subject of
the research published before 2012. At the same time I would like to mention the names of the
authors whose books, researches and immediate help were especially important in the process of my
work. I would like to start with expressions of heartfelt gratitude to my Russian colleagues
A. M. Smeliansky, A. V. Bartoshevich, I. N. Solovyova, V. V. Ivanov, I. S. Tsimbal,
I. V. Stupnikov, V. I. Maximov, Y. M. Shor, M. A. Litavrina, T. V. Butrova (1952–2010),
A. L. Dunaevsky, E. A. Artemyeva, V. M. Filshtinsky. Special thanks go to the staff of the Moscow
Art Theatre Archive and to M. F. Polkanova in particular for their support in archival research they
have provided me with for many years. I am also deeply grateful to my foreign colleagues
Ron Willis, Jerry Roberts (1940–1990), Nicholas Barter, Maria Shevtsova, Rose Whyman,
Jonathan Pitches, Andrew White, el Gordon, David Krasner, Bella Merlin, Wendy Smith,
Marie-Christine Autant-Mathieu, Laurence Senelick.
Besides that, I would like to extend particular gratitude to two American scholars – Robert
Ellermann and Sharon Carnicke. Any English speaking expert might be surprised to see these two
names mentioned together as they think very differently on the subject of the Stanislavsky and
Strasberg relationship. However, meetings with them had a definitive impact on my research and
me personally. Getting acquainted with Sharon and her outstanding book Stanislavsky in Focus in
1998 helped me, for the first time, to discover the drama and greatness of Stanislavsky’s story in the
US and encouraged me to start my research. Its logic brought me in 2007 to the Lee Strasberg
Theatre & Film Institute where a meeting with Robert overturned many of my notions about
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Strasberg’s teaching, and archive materials which Robert generously and selflessly introduced me
to turned out to be invaluable – without them my research would have been totally different. And in
2009 conversations with Sharon when we both participated in the conference Stanislavsky in
Finland prompted me to deal closely with the subject of the influence of yoga on Stanislavsky
which resulted in my articles in the Stanislavski Studies journal (Issues 1 and 2) and my book
Stanislavski and Yoga published in 2013.
And, of course, it would be impossible not to mention the generosity of the Lee Strasberg Institute
and not to thank its Artistic Director Anna Strasberg and President Victoria Krane, who gave me the
opportunity to work with Lee Strasberg’s archives and attend classes of the Institute’s leading
professors.
It also became crucial for my research to meet in person the outstanding scholar and translator of
Stanislavsky’s texts into English Jean-Norman Benedetti (1930–2012); this meeting took place
during the colloquium Stanislavsky Technique in Britain and Russia, which we co-chaired in 2007.
Enriching dialogue with David Chambers which is going on for almost twenty years is also of great
value to my work and for me personally. Besides that, I am grateful to a great number of American
directors and teachers, who shared with me their reflections on professional training of actors –
Michael Howard, Zelda Fichandler, William Esper, Tom Oppenheim, and, of course, Estelle
Parsons, who opened to me the doors of the celebrated Actors Studio where I not only attended the
sessions, but was also honored to actually lead one of them.
I regret not being able to mention all the colleagues who helped me in my archival research,
answered my questions, and shared with me their knowledge. It seems to me that the number of
people who provided me with generous help once again proves the importance of the subject this
work is dedicated to.
Sergei Tcherkasski,
St. Petersburg, November 2013

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