You can’t artistically induce a physical or emotional state (e.g., hunger, anger, sorrow, drunkenness), because they are not within your control. The action must be something it is possible to fail at you cannot fail at an errand.Ħ) An action cannot presuppose any physical or emotional state, either in you or in your partner. Too quickly and easily accomplished, an errand is boring both for you to perform and for the audience to watch. If you pick an action that keeps you working off the other person to achieve it, you will be brought to life throughout the scene. Also, it can be accomplished in one line, leaving you with nothing to do for the rest of the scene.
“Delivering a message” is not a good action because you do not have to look at your partner to see if you have accomplished it. An errand is an action that has no test in the other person. If your action is “forcing an enemy to do my bidding,” at any moment you should be able to tell how close he is to doing your bidding, and only when he has done your bidding will you have completed the action.ĥ) An action cannot be an errand. This will also make you less self-conscious and allow you to concentrate on something infinitely more interesting than how well you are performing – that person across from you. In other words, by looking at your partner, you should be able to tell how close you are to completing your action.
An action is the physical pursuance of a specific goal, and that specific goal must have to do with the other person. The specificity of an action such as “extracting a crucial answer” will bring you to life much more than the vagueness of “finding out something.” Furthermore, a specific action will provide you with a clear, specific path to follow when playing the scene.Ĥ) The test of the action must be in the other person. If your action is in general, then everything you do on stage will be in general. Stanislavsky said, “Generality is the enemy of all art,” and nothing could be truer. If you are clear, specific, and strong with yourself, then, chances are that that is how you will be onstage.ģ) An action must be specific. The way you speak to yourself is the way you will act. What gets you going? What gets you hot? Only you know. The point is to find the action you want to do. How much more fun is it to “talk a friend into spilling the beans” than to “get someone to give me information.” There will occasionally be times when a seemingly mundane action is perfectly correct for a scene. The more vital, active, and gutsy your language is, the more Life you will bring to the stage because your action will be that much more exciting to you. If you’ve ever really wanted to tell someone off, for instance, here’s your chance. This includes things you might never actually do offstage, but that appeal to your sense of play. By fun we don’t necessarily mean something that makes you laugh, but something that is truly compelling to you. Common sense dictates that you figure out the one you as an actor will want to do, since you are the one who will have to do it every night of the week. As you will discover in scene analysis, any number of actions can be correct for a particular scene. An action must be something that you, the actor, can actually accomplish onstage.Ģ) An action must be fun to do. Pleading for help can be accomplished while sitting absolutely still in a chair. To say something is physically capable of being done does not necessarily involve intense physical activity such as jumping up-and-down or assaulting someone. On the other hand, “pursuing the American dream” is not something you can pick up and do at a moment’s notice. For example, “pleading for help” is something you can begin to do immediately. At any moment you should be able to begin doing it.
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