Sanford Meisner

Sanford Meisner is an American director who studied Stanislvaski, but then created a theory of his own. He believed that the actor should not relive the situation with memories but experience it first hand in the situation. (The following quote illustrates this).

"Acting is the ability to live truthfully under imaginary circumstances."

We practiced this through exercises such as only reacting when something makes you to.
Also Meisner believed that the actor should listen and pay attention to what the other actor is saying, even though it is expected. We also tried this though exercises where we would repeat what our partner says such as "you're wearing black." (This exercise was done in Meisner's classes as well) We had to be careful in adding variety. If we add variety, according to Meisner, we are thinking and not acting on impulse.

In the theater, silence is an absence of words, but never an absence of meaning


We also worked from this quote. We tried seeing what meaning we could put into silences. Each of us would ask Mr. Evans "Will I get a 7 in IB?" and he wouldn't respond in words but rather in gestures, facial expressions, putting meaning into the silence, which made it powerful.


I think that if we had, perhaps, included these ideas into, for example, Tina!, it could have improved it and made it more authentic, and convincing. For example, the secretary scene where Zebub first comes on, the secretaries were expecting that, and it may have not been as convincing (luckily we had the mask to cover some of this).