The First thing I want to say (or scream!) is that "There is no such thing as "the Stanislavski Method"!

I have studied Stanislavski for over 30 years, and nothing makes me grind my teeth and come out in a cold sweat of rage more than finding an interesting book on the man, and then discovering it blathers on about his "method".

The "method" is Lee Strasburg's watered down version of the system. Comparing the method with the System is like comparing Pot Noodle to Haute Cuisine! It is not even the bare bones.

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The System is a series of exercises geared to helping the actor become the role. It is a rehearsal system to enable you to get into the mind of the character, understand his driving forces, what has made him or her who they are; everything from the way the character the playwright has created thinks, speaks, acts, moves. The object of the system is to put "you" aside and bring the character to life. 

The weak method goes completely against what Stanislavski wanted: it is not about becoming that character but about that character becoming you. It is you on stage/in front of the camera, as a taxi driver, sheriff, warrior. That is why Clint Eastwood is always Clint Eastwood, why Jack Nicholson is always Jack Nicholson. You don't see the "character" the author created, but them in the role.

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This has led to the acclaim of so many weak actors, by American media, that people just don't understand what "ACTING" is these days. You always hear people spouting on about how great an actor Pacino is, but all he ever portrays is himself.

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Compare that to somebody like Alec Guinness, or Ben Kingsley; Peter Sellers or Laurence Olivier ; Even the American film industry has produced some really fine actors; Johnny Depp and Dustin Hoffman are prime examples of actors who were dissatisfied with the method they had been force fed and spread their wings, studying how to really get into the skin of the character.

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In our workshops we will examine the System piece by piece. Using the book An Actor Prepares as our workshop manual, I will guide you through the system, putting each aspect into practice and experimenting with the steps.

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We shall go from reading the script and identifying the clues the writer has provided about the character, to the Units and Objectives, to the Magic If, and on to the culmination of the character "I Am".

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It is worth noting that Stanislavski himself acknowledged that it is not always possible to recreate the character 100%, that sometimes pieces of information are missing, or that the actor cannot relate to how the character is feeling, and for this reason we will also use his "fill in" ideas, such as "emotion memory".

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In each workshop we will cover at least two of the elements of the system. You have the option of coming for particular sessions that you would like to better understand, or coming to the entire series of workshops to experience the complete system, from start to finish.

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We will use such texts as Ibsen, Chekov and Gorky for the general rehearsal of the system

Also, we will have special sessions looking at the use of the System to create Shakespeare's plays as the Bard would have wanted.

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For details of upcoming sessions, or to contact us for further information please click here ,  or to arrange private sessions (Audition preparation help is available) please click here