Getting at "the truth": A feminist consideration of American actor training.
Item
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Title
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Getting at "the truth": A feminist consideration of American actor training.
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Identifier
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AAI3008848
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identifier
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3008848
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Creator
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Malague, Rosemary.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Jill Dolan
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Date
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2001
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Theater | Women's Studies | Education, Language and Literature
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Abstract
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"Truth on the stage" is generally agreed to be the central mission of Stanislavskian acting theory and of those American acting teachers who have based their work on its tenets. But in the wake of postmodern, poststructuralist, and feminist thinking and theory, words like "truth" can no longer be presumed to have fixed, universal meaning. What happens, then, to the notion of "truthful acting" when one considers that "truth" is relative and subject to gender-based assumptions and prejudices? Might the "truth" produced by Stanislavskian acting be socially constructed, reflecting a patriarchal world view?;This dissertation uses the apparatus of feminist criticism to study a relatively unexamined phenomenon, the effects of the predominant methodologies of American actor training on the (female) actor, specifically through an investigation of both the theoretical and practical elements of Stanislavsky-based techniques. I analyze the "American approach" (a.k.a. "Method acting"), exposing gender biases endemic to that tradition and uncovering (or recovering) elements which might serve to empower rather than oppress its female practitioners.;Using as case studies the work of four master teachers, Lee Strasberg, Stella Adler, Sanford Meisner, and Uta Hagen, I explore these issues: Does training that purports to "free" the actor and his or her "impulses" actually do so---or does it require him or her to play the accepted cultural role in the expected way? In acting based on psychological identification, what happens when a women is asked to align herself with an unhealthy gender role and to search for self-revelations that are demeaning? Might actresses be damaged by playing the role of victim---or object? Once the notion of truth is destabilized, how does the acting teacher judge the actor's "honesty"? What are the criteria? What are the material effects of power and control in the acting classroom? I hope that by assessing the ways in which gender biases have (perhaps unconsciously) been a part of American actor training, this study might contribute to the "consciousness raising" of actors, teachers, and scholars who continue to be engaged in the theory and practice of Stanislavskian technique.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
