The old Stanislavsky Strasberg debate again

A great man once said “history is written by the victors”. He forgot to add the word ‘present’ before the word ‘victors.‘

According to all my fan/hate-mail and various authors there has been a change in the historical landscape, I am corrected again and again by zealots of a new faith, who BELIEVE. Oh they really do. Of course, this simply contradicts what others have been writing for years, but apparently, it’s overturned.

They say that they now have facts to indicate that Stanislavski never really changed his ideas, the Method of Physical Action has been mostly proven to be little more than Father banging the Master’s Red Drum.

Stella Adler they discredit as a naive, hysterical child that didn’t understand Father’s advice. Well, she would have to be, otherwise Strasberg is wrong and she becomes Mother, and Father’s inheritance passes onto her. I guess a 1930s American would seem strange to a 1930s Russian.

Which means of course that if Stanislavki didn’t change his central ideas and it was only a ploy of the Red Menace, that must mean that Strasberg was the truest heir in America. Conveniently the new truth makes Strasberg the straightest line.

This means that MOPA and all work leading from it can be dismissed as the incorrect, politically coloured propaganda of the Soviets. This is a mighty neat way to square it all away and leave Strasberg the only true son. But they say there are facts and so…

It seems that the Method people are in possession of new facts, and they are busy now writing history.

The trouble is that Debate 101 teaches us that any intelligent mind can string together a collection of facts and posit them as an argument.

The courthouse has taught us that it is not those who are in possession of the facts that win the day, nor is the truth ever conveniently on the side of the good. But those that can offer a palatable viewpoint may have their perspective accepted as the truth.

Being in possession of the facts or a perspective on the facts in the great Stanislavsky v Strasberg debate is an endless conversation. Neither side will persuade the other to lay down their arms, the real battle is not for converts but for conscripts and volunteers.

And so now they comfortably say Method and system, Strasberg and Stanislavsky, and mean the same thing. Now they are the only true disciples of Father’s heir. They have the direct line to the source. Finally they are vindicated.

This leads to an awful conclusion of facts for me. If the Red Menace force-created MOPA and Strasberg is the true connection, then Mamet’s criticisms of Stanislavsky that are traditionally batted away with the claim that it is misjudged aggression for Strasberg are infact justified. Because now when criticises father, he also means son too and vice versa.

It is now easy to swat away Practical Aesthetics as the bastard Commie son of a politically compromised school of acting. Summoning up the old fashioned distrust of everything Soviet as bad, and therefore everything Democratic and American as good, Practical Aesthetics becomes easily dismissed. If you think everything is black and white, or red and red, white and blue. It all becomes terribly simple. American = Method = System = Russia.

And yet, and yet, when I watch an actor that uses Practical Aesthetics and I see nuanced, moving, beautiful, powerful acting that people find captivating to watch. Even if Practical Aesthetics was inspired by Soviet-influenced philosophy, so what? It works. 

It never strays into self-indulgence, I see find the appropriate emotional pitch within the scene and not without it. Those who think that As-If takes you out of the scene, are just wrong, it is a way on inserting yourself into the scene, rather than taking you into it. Sure, you use a personal experience to identify analogous circumstances to understand how to go about doing the Essential Action, but once the scene begins, you’re back in the scene.

In the end, this debate has no end. All the scholars disagree, their facts disagree, so what can we trust? Only what works. Each time, every time, consistently.