The Development of the Emotion of Stage Truth

Recorded during a symposium on the Moscow Art Theatre held at the United Nations Plaza, the speakers discuss their experience working with Konstantin Stanislavski. According to an October 26th, 1964 article in the New York Times, the speakers visiting from the Soviet Union are:

Victor Manyukov, Theater Director and Teacher
Vladimir Prokofyev, Historian and Theoretician
Angelina Stepanova, Actress
Vasily Toporkov, Actor

The speakers focus on "the development of the emotion of stage truth."

According to Toporkov, the audience is upset by amateur actors that have not been properly trained. Actors must live their parts and develop an ear for truth and authenticity, which can be accomplished using Stanislavski's method. He illustrates this point with anecdotes from Stanislavski's directorship of the Moscow Art Theatre. For example, in following Stanislavski's recommendation to "learn from the low forms," Toporkov recounts how he began watching his pet parakeet who would only imitate his actions that happened naturally. When Toporkov tried to stage an action to duplicate the response, the parakeet was not inspired to imitate.

Manyukov speaks next about how he practices Stanislavski's teachings through exercises with his actors, especially when the objective of the exercise is not immediately clear. For example, he will hide an object on set without one actor's knowledge. Then the rest of the cast guides the actor to the object by giving "hot" or "cold hints. After the actor finds the object, Manyukov tells the actor to look for the object again despite knowing its exact hiding place. As the actor "looks" for the object, the cast responds whether the performance is as truthful as when he did not know where the object was.

[Toporkov] returns to discuss "artistic truth" and that it can sometimes seem illogical in the narrative of a scene. However, actions will seem truthful if the audience is lead to the action logically, for example, Charlie Chaplin eating his shoe in The Gold Rush.

Manyukov then answers questions from the audience about commercial theater versus theater in a socialist economy and the effectiveness of exercises in preparing for a performance.

Translations by Tanya Derugeen and Ross Levroff.

Audio courtesy of the NYC Municipal Archives WNYC Collection

WNYC archives id: 151043
Municipal archives id: T7029