Definitions of Acting

Hi to All Blog Readers

One of the first exercises that I ask new acting students to do is to come up with a definition of what acting is. I’m always fascinated by the wide ranging results from this exercise, it inevitably includes the words ‘emotion’, ‘portrayal’ and ‘become’ at some point. These are logical, even without any training in acting, the students on an introductory acting class have innate presumptions about acting that have been passed on through our culture.

I find definitions useful because they often reveal the basis behind the approach to acting the person is proposing.

“falsehood, pretense” (my least favourite from a dictionary).

“to be in the process of doing” (my favourite from a dictionary, the closest to my own understanding of acting, and the way that I find it’s best to start beginning actors thinking about acting. It strips the idea bear of emotion, portrayal, becoming and of course, ‘belief and imagination’. I understand that those readers that subscribe to Method based systems will not like this but I’ve added one underneath for you too.)

“reacting to imaginary stimuli’ Lee Strasberg (this comes from Carnicke, so if it’s wrong tell me please) this doesn’t suit my purposes, because it is too focused on the imaginary.

“Acting is living truthfully under Imaginary Circumstances” Sanford Meisner

I’ve also heard and seen this written as:

“Acting is living truthfully under the imaginary given circumstances”

AND

“Acting is living truthfully under the imaginary circumstances of the play”

AND

“Acting is living truthfully under the imaginary circumstances of the scene” 

Whilst I was at Atlantic we were asked who said this, I said ‘Sanford Meisner’ and was told that I was wrong, that this was a quote from Stanislavski, but I still doubt that. I still think of it as Meisner’s quote. If there’s someone out there (as there invariably is) who can point out when and where Stanislavski said this, I would be grateful. I’m sure NAME DELETED or ANONYMOUS or someone will know.  Actually, I’ve even seen this quote in someone’s book on acting attributed to the director/producer Bryan Singer… hmmm.

For what I teach, I would like to play with the definition a little. I would like to take the basic Meisner structure of the sentence and add to it:

“Acting is living truthfully under (both) the immediate circumstances of the moment and the imaginary circumstances of the scene”

If you have any of your own, please add comments and I’ll acknowledge you and add them into this article as an update.

To you, the Best

Mark