IV. IMAGINATION
19. . G.
Today, due to Tortsov’s ill health, the lesson was scheduled in his apartment. Arkady Nikolaevich comfortably seated us in his office.
“You know now,” he said, “that our stage work begins with the introduction to the play and the role, the magical “if,” which is the lever that transfers the artist from everyday reality to the plane imagination. The play, the role is the author’s invention, it is a series of magical and other “ifs”, “suggested circumstances” invented by him. The true “was”, real reality does not exist on stage, real reality is not art. The latter, by its very nature, needs artistic fiction, which, first of all, is the author’s work. The task of the artist and his creative technique is to transform the fiction of the play into art. stage story. Our imagination plays a huge role in this process. Therefore, it is worth dwelling on it longer and taking a closer look at its function in creativity.
Tortsov pointed to the walls, hung with sketches of all kinds of decorations.
All these are paintings by my favorite young artist, who has already died. He was a great eccentric: he made sketches for plays that had not yet been written. Here, for example, is a sketch for the last act of Chekhov’s non-existent play, which Anton Pavlovich conceived shortly before his death: an expedition buried in ice, an eerie and harsh north. A large steamer, squeezed by floating boulders. Smoky pipes turn ominously black against a white background. Bitter frost. An icy wind stirs up snow whirlwinds. Rising upward, they take the shape of a woman in a shroud. And here are the figures of a husband and his wife’s lover, huddled together. Both left life and went on an expedition to forget their heartfelt drama.
Who would believe that the sketch was written by a person who has never traveled outside of Moscow and its environs! He created a polar landscape, using his observations of our winter nature, what he knew from stories, from descriptions in fiction and scientific books, from photographs. From all the collected material a picture was created. In this work, the imagination played the main role.
Tortsov led us to another wall, on which a series of landscapes were hung. More accurately, it was a repetition of the same motif: some dacha place, but modified each time by the artist’s imagination. The same row of beautiful houses and pine forests at different times of the year and day, in the sun, in a storm. Further on is the same landscape, but with the forest cut down, with ponds dug in its place and with new plantings of trees of various species. The artist enjoyed dealing with nature and people’s lives in his own way. In his sketches, he built and destroyed houses, cities, re-planned the area, tore down mountains.
Look how beautiful it is! Moscow Kremlin on the seashore! someone exclaimed.
All this was also created by the artist’s imagination.
And here are sketches for non-existent plays from “interplanetary life,” said Tortsov, leading us to a new series of drawings and watercolors. Here is a station for some devices that support communication between the planets. You see: a huge metal box with large balconies and figures of some beautiful, strange creatures. This is the train station. He hangs in space. In its windows you can see people passengers from the ground... The line of the same stations, going up and down, is visible in infinite space: they are maintained in balance by the mutual attraction of huge magnets. There are several suns or moons on the horizon. Their light creates fantastic effects unknown on earth. To paint such a picture, you need to have not just imagination, but good imagination.
What is the difference between them? someone asked.
Imagination creates what is, what happens, what we know, and fantasy what does not exist, what in reality we do not know, what has never been and never will be.
And maybe it will! Who knows? When popular imagination created the fabulous flying carpet, who could have imagined that people would soar in the air on airplanes? Fantasy knows everything and can do everything. Fantasy, like imagination, is necessary for an artist.
What about the artist? Shustov asked.
Why do you think an artist needs imagination? Arkady Nikolaevich asked a counter question.
How for what? To create a magical “if only”, “proposed circumstances,” Shustov answered.
Shustov was silent.
Is everything the actors need to know about the play given to them by the playwright? asked Tortsov. Is it possible to fully reveal the lives of all the characters in one hundred pages? Or is there a lot left unsaid? So, for example: does the author always talk in sufficient detail about what happened before the play began? Does he talk exhaustively about what will happen at the end of it, about what is happening behind the scenes, where the character comes from, where he goes? The playwright is stingy with this kind of commentary. Its text only says: “The same and Petrov” or: “Petrov is leaving.” But we cannot come from unknown space and go into it without thinking about the purpose of such movements. Such an action cannot be trusted “at all.” We also know other remarks by the playwright: “got up”, “walks around in excitement”, “laughs”, “dies”. We are given laconic characteristics of the role, like: “A young man of good appearance. He smokes a lot.”
But is this enough to create the entire external image, manners, gait, habits? What about the text and words of the role? Do they really only need to be memorized and spoken by heart?
And all the poet’s remarks, and the director’s demands, and his mise-en-scène and the entire production? Is it really enough to just memorize them and then formally perform them on the stage?
Does all this depict the character of the character, determine all the shades of his thoughts, feelings, motives and actions?
No, all this must be supplemented and deepened by the artist himself. Only then will everything given to us by the poet and other creators of the performance come to life and stir different corners of the soul of those creating on stage and watching in the auditorium. Only then will the artist himself be able to live to the fullest inner life the person being portrayed and act as the author, director and our own living feeling commands us.
In all this work, our closest assistant is the imagination, with its magical “if only” and “suggested circumstances.” It not only proves what the author, director and others did not say, but it revives the work of all the creators of the play, whose work reaches the audience primarily through the success of the artists themselves.
Do you now understand how “it is important for an actor to have a strong and vivid imagination: he needs it at every moment of his artistic work and life on stage, both when studying and when playing a role.”
In the creative process, imagination is the forefront, which leads the artist himself.
The lesson was interrupted by an unexpected visit from the famous tragedian U***, who is currently touring in Moscow. The celebrity talked about her successes, and Arkady Nikolaevich translated the story into Russian. After the interesting guest left, and Tortsov saw him off and returned to us, he said, smiling:
Of course, the tragedian is lying, but, as you can see, he is an enthusiastic person and sincerely believes what he writes. We, artists, are so accustomed on stage to supplement facts with details of our own imagination that we transfer these habits from stage to life. Here they are, of course, superfluous, but in the theater they are necessary.
Do you think it’s easy to compose so that people listen to you with bated breath? This is also creativity, which is created by magical “if only”, “proposed circumstances” and a well-developed imagination.
You probably can’t say about geniuses that they lie. Such people look at reality with different eyes than we do. They see life differently than we mortals. Is it possible to blame them for the fact that their imagination places pink, blue, gray, and black glasses in front of their eyes? And will it be good for art if these people take off their glasses and begin to look at both reality and artistic fiction with unobstructed eyes, soberly, seeing only what everyday life gives?
I confess to you that I often lie when I, as an artist or director, have to deal with a role or a play that does not interest me enough. In these cases, I wither and my creativity is paralyzed. Need a backing. Then I begin to assure everyone that I am passionate about the work, the new play, and praise it. To do this, you have to invent something that is not in it. This necessity pushes the imagination. In private I would not do this, but in front of others, willy-nilly, I have to justify my lies as best as possible and give advances. And then you often use your own inventions as material for the role and for the production and bring them into the play.
If imagination plays such an important role for artists, then what about those who don’t have it? Shustov asked timidly.
We must develop it or leave the stage. Otherwise, you will fall into the hands of directors who will replace the imagination you lack with their own. This would mean for you to abandon your own creativity, to become a pawn on the stage. Isn't it better to develop your own imagination?
This. It must be very difficult! I sighed.
Depending on your imagination! There is an imagination with initiative that works independently. It will develop without much effort and will work persistently, tirelessly, in reality and in dreams. There is an imagination that is devoid of initiative, but easily grasps what is suggested to it, and then continues to independently develop what is suggested. This kind of imagination is also relatively easy to deal with. If the imagination grasps, but does not develop what is suggested, then the work becomes more difficult. But there are people who themselves do not create and do not grasp what they are given. If an actor perceives only the external, formal side of what is shown, this is a sign of a lack of imagination, without which one cannot be an artist.
With initiative or without initiative? Does it grasp and develop or not? These are the questions that haunt me. When there was silence after evening tea, I locked myself in my room, sat down comfortably on the sofa, surrounded myself with pillows, closed my eyes and, despite my fatigue, began to dream. But from the very first moment my attention was diverted by circles of light, glare of different colors that appeared and crawled in complete darkness in front of my closed eyes.
I turned off the lamp, assuming that it was causing these phenomena.
"What is there to dream about?" I came up with it. But the imagination did not sleep. It depicted to me the treetops of a large pine forest, which swayed measuredly and smoothly from the quiet wind.
It was nice.
There was a smell of fresh air.
From somewhere: into the silence: the sounds of a ticking clock snuck in.
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I dozed off.
“Well, of course!” I decided, perking up. “You can’t dream without initiative. I’ll fly in an airplane! Over the tops of the forest. Here I am flying over them, over fields, rivers, cities, villages... over... the tops of the trees. .. They sway slowly and slowly... It smells fresh air and pine... The clock is ticking...
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Who's snoring? Am I really myself?! Did you fall asleep?.. How long?.."
There was a shoal in the dining room... they were moving furniture... The morning light was breaking through the curtains.
The clock struck eight. Initiative... wa... a..... a...
19. . G.
My embarrassment from the failure of my home dream was so great that I could not stand it and told Arkady Nikolaevich everything at today’s lesson, which took place in Malletkov’s living room.
“Your experiment failed because you made a number of mistakes,” he told me in response to my message. The first of them was that you were forcing your imagination instead of captivating it. The second mistake is that you dreamed “without a rudder and without sails”, how and where chance would push you. Just as you cannot act just for the sake of doing something (to act for the sake of the action itself), so you cannot dream for the sake of dreaming itself. There was no meaning in the work of your imagination, no interesting task necessary for creativity. Your third mistake is that your dreams were not effective, not active. Meanwhile, the activity of imaginary life is of absolutely exceptional importance for the actor. His imagination should push him, causing first internal and then external action.
I acted because I was mentally flying over the forests at breakneck speed.
Do you really act when you are lying on a courier train, which is also rushing at breakneck speed? asked Tortsov. The locomotive, the driver this is who works, and the passenger is passive. It would be another matter if, while the train was running, you had an exciting business conversation, an argument, or were writing a report, then you could talk about work and action. It's the same in your airplane flight. The pilot was working, and you were inactive. Now, if you were driving the car yourself or if you were taking photographs of the area, you could talk about activity. We need an active, not a passive imagination.
How to cause this activity? Shustov interrogated.
I'll tell you my six-year-old niece's favorite game. This game is called "If only" and consists of the following: "What are you doing?" the girl asked me. "I'm drinking tea." I answer, “And if it were not tea, but castor oil, how would you drink it?” I have to remember the taste of the medicine. In those cases when I succeed and I wince, the child bursts into laughter throughout the room. Then a new question is asked. "Where are you sitting?" “On a chair,” I answer. "If you were sitting on a hot stove, what would you do?" You have to mentally sit yourself on a hot stove and with incredible efforts save yourself from burns. When this succeeds, the girl feels sorry for me. She waves her arms and shouts: “I don’t want to play!” And if you continue the game, it will end in tears. So you come up with a game for yourself that would provoke active actions.
It seems to me that this is a primitive, rude technique, I noticed. I would like to find a more sophisticated one.
Take your time! You'll have time! For now, be content with simple and most basic dreams. Don’t rush to get carried away too high, but live with us here on earth, among what surrounds you in reality. Let this furniture, the objects that you feel and see, participate in your work. Here, for example, is a sketch of a madman. In it, the fiction of the imagination was introduced into the real life that surrounded us then. Indeed: the room in which we were, the furniture with which we barricaded the door, in a word, the whole world of things remained untouched. Only a fiction was introduced about a madman who does not actually exist. Otherwise, the sketch was based on something real, and did not hang in the air.
Let's try to do a similar experiment. We are now in class having a lesson. This is the true reality. Let the room, its furnishings, the lesson, all the students and their teacher remain in the form and condition in which we now find ourselves. With the help of “if” I transfer myself to the plane of a non-existent, imaginary life and for this purpose I only change the time and say to myself: “Now it’s not three o’clock in the afternoon, but three o’clock in the morning.” Use your imagination to justify such a long lesson. It is not hard. Let's assume that you have an exam tomorrow, and a lot of things are still unfinished, so we are delayed in the theater. Hence new circumstances and worries: your family is worried because, due to the lack of a telephone, it was impossible to notify them about the delay in work. One of the students missed a party to which he was invited, another lives very far from the theater and does not know how to get home without a tram, and so on. Many more thoughts, feelings and moods are generated by the introduced fiction. All this affects the overall state, which will set the tone for everything that happens next. This is one of the preparatory steps for experiences. As a result, with the help of these fictions we create the ground, the proposed circumstances for the sketch, which could be developed and called “Night Lesson”.
Let's try to do one more experiment: let's introduce into reality, that is, into this room, into the lesson that is happening now, a new “if”. Let the time of day remain the same - three o'clock in the afternoon, but let the season change, and it will not be winter, not a frost of fifteen degrees, but spring with wonderful air and warmth. You see, your mood has already changed, you are already smiling at the thought that you will have a walk outside the city after class! Decide what you will do, justify it all with fiction, and you will have a new exercise for developing your imagination. I give you one more “if”: the time of day, the year, this room, our school, the lesson remain, but everything is transferred from Moscow to Crimea, that is, the scene of action outside this room changes. Where Dmitrovka is, there is a sea in which you will swim after the lesson. The question is, how did we end up in the south? Justify this with the proposed circumstances, whatever fiction of your imagination you want. Maybe we went on tour to Crimea and did not interrupt our systematic schoolwork there? Justify the various moments of this imaginary life according to the introduced “ifs”, and you will receive a new series of reasons for imaginative exercises.
I’m introducing another new “if” and transferring myself and you to the Far North at a time of year when it’s daylight there 24 hours a day. How can such a relocation be justified? At least because we came there for filming. It requires great vitality and simplicity from the actor, since any falsehood spoils the film. Not all of you will be able to do without playing the tune, and therefore I, the director, have to take care of school activities with you. After accepting and believing each of the “if”s, ask yourself, “What would I do under these conditions?” By resolving the question, you thereby stimulate the imagination.
And now, in a new exercise, we will make all the proposed circumstances fictitious. real life, now surrounding us, we will leave only this room, and then greatly transformed by our imagination. Let’s assume that we are all members of a scientific expedition and are setting off on a long journey by plane. During a flight over impassable wilds, a disaster occurs: the engine stops working, and the airplane is forced to land in a mountain valley. We need to fix the car. This work will delay the expedition by for a long time. It’s good that there are food supplies, but they are not too abundant. You have to get your food by hunting. In addition, it is necessary to arrange some kind of housing, organize the cooking of food, and security in case of attack by natives or animals. So, mentally, a life is formed, full of worries and dangers. Each of its moments requires necessary, expedient actions, which are logically and consistently outlined in our imagination. We must believe in their necessity. Otherwise, dreams will lose meaning and attractiveness.
However, the artist’s creativity does not lie in the internal work of the imagination alone, but also in the external embodiment of his creative dreams. Turn the dream into reality, play me an episode from the life of members of a scientific expedition.
Where? Here? In the setting of Malletkov’s living room? we were perplexed.
Where else? Don't order us special decorations! Moreover, we have our own artist for this case. He fulfills all requirements in one second, free of charge. It costs him nothing to instantly transform the living room, corridor, hall into whatever we want. This artist is our own imagination. Give him the order. Decide what you would do after the airplane descended if this apartment was a mountain valley and this table was a big stone. a lamp with a lampshade of a tropical plant, a chandelier with glass pieces of a branch with fruits, a fireplace of an abandoned furnace.
What will the corridor be like? Vyuntsov became interested.
Gorge.
Wow!: The expansive young man rejoiced. What about the dining room?
A cave in which some primitive people apparently lived.
This is an open area with a wide horizon and a wonderful view. Look, the light walls of the room give the illusion of air. Subsequently, it will be possible to take off from this site by airplane.
What about the auditorium? Vyuntsov did not let up.
Bottomless abyss. From there, as well as from the side of the terrace, from the sea, one cannot expect attacks from animals and natives. Therefore, guards must be placed there, near the doors of the corridor depicting the gorge.
What is the living room itself like?
She needs to be taken to repair the airplane.
Where is the airplane itself?
“Here he is,” Tortsov pointed to the sofa. The seat itself the place for passengers; window draperies wings. Spread them wider. Table motor. First of all, you need to inspect the engine. The damage to it is significant. In the meantime, let the other members of the expedition settle down for the night. Here are the blankets.
Tablecloths.
Here are some canned goods and a barrel of wine. Arkady Nikolaevich pointed to thick books lying on the bookcase and to a large flower vase. Look around the room more closely, and you will find many items necessary in your new home.
Work began to boil, and soon we began the harsh life of an expedition delayed in the mountains in a cozy living room. We navigated it and adapted.
It’s not that I believed in the transformation; no, I simply didn’t notice what I shouldn’t have seen. We had no time to notice. We were busy. The untruth of fiction was obscured by the truth of our feelings, physical actions and belief in them.
After we played the given impromptu quite successfully, Arkady Nikolaevich said:
In this sketch, the world of imagination entered even more deeply into reality: the fiction of a disaster in the mountains squeezed into the living room. This is one of countless examples of how, with the help of imagination, you can internally regenerate the world of things for yourself. There is no need to push him away. On the contrary, it should be included in the life created by the imagination.
This process constantly takes place in our intimate rehearsals. In fact, we make from Viennese chairs everything that the author and director’s imagination can come up with: houses, squares, ships, forests. At the same time, we do not believe in the authenticity of the fact that the Viennese chairs are a tree or a rock, but we believe in the authenticity of our attitude towards the fictitious objects if they were a tree or a rock.
19. . G.
The lesson started with a small introduction. Arkady Nikolaevich said:
Until now, our exercises in developing the imagination have, to a greater or lesser extent, come into contact either with the world of things around us (room, fireplace, door), or with genuine life action (our lesson). Now I take my work out of the world of things around us and into the realm of imagination. In it we will act just as actively, but only mentally. Let us renounce this place, this time, let us be transported to another environment that is well known to us, and we will act as the fiction of our imagination tells us. Decide where you would like to mentally transport yourself. Arkady Nikolaevich turned to me. Where and when will the action take place?
In my room, in the evening, I said.
Excellent, approved by Arkady Nikolaevich. I don’t know about you, but in order to feel like I’m in an imaginary apartment, I would first mentally climb the stairs, call front door, in a word perform a series of sequential logical actions. Think of a doorknob that needs to be pressed. Remember how she turns, how the door opens and how you enter your room. What do you see in front of you?
Straight wardrobe, washbasin:
And to the left?
Sofa, table...
Try to walk around the room and live in it. Why did you wince?
I found a letter on the table, remembered that I had not yet answered it, and I felt ashamed.
Okay. Apparently you can now say: “I am in my room.”
What does “I am” mean? asked the students.
“I am” in our language says that I “left myself at the center of imaginary conditions, that I feel myself to be among them, that I exist in the very thick of imaginary life, in the world of imaginary things and begin to act from my own name, for your own fear and conscience. Now tell me what do you want to do?
It depends on what time it is.
Logical. Let's agree that it is now eleven o'clock in the evening.
“This is the time when there is silence in the apartment,” I noticed.
What do you want to do in this silence? Tortsov pushed me.
Make sure that I am not a comedian, but a tragedian.
It’s a pity that you want to waste your time so unproductively. How will you convince yourself?
I will play some tragic role for myself, I revealed my secret dreams.
Which one? Othello?
Oh, no. It is no longer possible to work on Othello in my room. Every corner there encourages you to repeat what has been done many times before.
So what will you play?
I did not answer because I had not yet resolved the question myself.
What are you doing now?
I look around the room. Could some object suggest an interesting topic for creativity... For example, I remembered that there is a gloomy corner behind the closet. That is, it is not gloomy in itself, but appears so in the evening light. There, instead of a hanger, there is a hook sticking out, as if offering his services to hang himself. So, if I really wanted to commit suicide, what would I do now?
What exactly?
Of course, first of all I would have to look for a rope or a sash, so I sort through things on my shelves, in my drawers...
Yes... But it turns out that the hook is nailed too low. My feet touch the floor.
It's inconvenient. Look for another hook.
There is no other.
If so, then wouldn’t it be better for you to stay alive!
“I don’t know, I’m confused and my imagination has run out,” I admitted.
Because fiction itself is illogical. In nature, everything is consistent and logical (with some exceptions), and the fiction of the imagination should be the same. No wonder your imagination refused to draw a line without any logical premise to a stupid conclusion.
Nevertheless, the experience of dreaming about suicide that you just had accomplished what was expected of it: it clearly demonstrated to you the new kind dreams. With this work of imagination, the artist detaches himself from the real world around him (in in this case from this room) and is mentally transferred to an imaginary one (that is, to your apartment). In this imaginary setting, everything is familiar to you, since the material for dreaming was taken from your daily life. This made it easier to search your memory. But what to do when, while dreaming, you are dealing with an unfamiliar life? This condition creates a new kind of imagination.
To understand it, again detach yourself from the reality surrounding you now and mentally transport yourself to other, unfamiliar conditions that do not exist now, but that can exist in real life. For example: hardly anyone sitting here has traveled around the world. But this is possible both in reality and in imagination. These dreams must be fulfilled not “somehow”, not “in general”, not “approximately” (any “somehow”, “in general”, “approximately” are unacceptable in art), but in all the details that make up any great company.
During the journey you will have to deal with a wide variety of conditions, with the way of life and customs of foreign countries and nationalities. You are unlikely to find everything in your memory required material. Therefore, you will have to draw it from books, paintings, photographs and other sources that provide knowledge or reproduce the impressions of other people. From this information you will find out exactly where you will have to mentally visit, at what time of year, month; where you will have to mentally sail on the ship and where, in what cities you will have to make stops. There you will also receive information about the conditions and customs of certain countries, cities, etc. Let the imagination create the rest of what is missing to mentally create a trip around the world. All this important data will make the work more grounded, and not groundless, which is always the case with dreams “in general” that lead an actor to play and craft. After this extensive preliminary work, you can already draw up a route and hit the road. Just remember to be in touch with logic and consistency at all times. This will help you bring your shaky, unstable dream closer to an unshakable and stable reality.
Moving on to a new type of dreaming, I mean the fact that the imagination is given by nature more possibilities than reality itself. In fact, the imagination pictures what is impossible in real life. So, for example: in a dream we can be transported to other planets and kidnap fairy-tale beauties there; we can fight and defeat non-existent monsters; we can go down to the bottom of the sea and take the water queen as our wife. Try to do all this in reality. It is unlikely that we will be able to find ready-made material for such dreams. Science, literature, painting, stories give us only hints, impulses, starting points for these mental excursions into the realm of the unrealizable. Therefore, in such dreams, the main creative work falls on our imagination. In this case, we even more need those means that bring the fabulous closer to reality. Logic and consistency, as I have already said, have one of the main places in this work. They help bring the impossible closer to the probable. Therefore, when creating fabulous and fantastic things, be logical and consistent.
Now,” continued Arkady Nikolaevich after a short thought, “I want to explain to you that the same studies that you have already done can be used in different combinations and variations. So, for example, you can say to yourself: “Let me see how my fellow students, led by Arkady Nikolaevich and Ivan Platonovich, conduct their school classes in the Crimea or the Far North. Let me see how they make their expedition on an airplane." At the same time, you will mentally step aside and watch how your comrades are baking in the sun of the Crimea or freezing in the north, how they are repairing a broken airplane in a mountain valley or preparing to defend themselves from an attack by animals. In this case, you are a simple spectator of what your imagination draws to you, and do not play any role in this imaginary life.
But you yourself wanted to take part in an imaginary expedition or in lessons transferred to the southern beret of Crimea. “What do I look like in all these positions?” you say to yourself and again step aside and see your fellow students and yourself among them at a lesson in the Crimea or on an expedition. This time you are also a passive spectator.
In the end, you got tired of looking at yourself and wanted to act, for this you transfer yourself into your dream and begin to study in the Crimea or in the north, and then repair an airplane or guard a camp. Now, as a character in an imaginary life, you can no longer see yourself, but see what surrounds you, and internally respond to everything that happens around you as a true participant in this life. At this moment of your active dreams, the state that we call “I am” is created in you.
19. . G.
Listen to yourself and say: what happens in you when, as in the last lesson, you think about school activities in Crimea? Arkady Nikolaevich asked Shustov at the beginning of today's lesson.
What is happening in me? Pasha thought. For some reason I imagine a small, inferior hotel room, an open window to the sea, cramped conditions, many students in the room and some of them are doing exercises to develop their imagination.
And what is happening inside you. Arkady Nikolaevich turned to Dymkova, at the thought of the same company of students transported by imagination to the far north?
I imagine icy mountains, a fire, a tent, we are all in fur clothes:
Thus, Tortsov concluded. As soon as I assign a topic for dreaming, you already begin to see corresponding visual images in the so-called inner eye. They are called in our acting jargon visions of inner vision.
If you judge by your own feeling, then imagining, fantasizing, dreaming means, first of all, looking, seeing with your inner vision what you are thinking about.
What was going on inside you when you were mentally planning to hang yourself in a dark corner of your room? Arkady Nikolaevich turned to me.
When I mentally saw the familiar surroundings, well-known doubts immediately arose in me, which I was accustomed to processing within myself in my loneliness. Feeling a nagging melancholy in my soul and wanting to get rid of the doubts gnawing at my soul, out of impatience and weakness of character, I mentally looked for a way out in suicide, I explained with some excitement.
Thus, Arkady Nikolaevich formulated, as soon as you saw a familiar situation with your inner eye, felt its mood, and immediately familiar thoughts associated with the place of action came to life in you. From thoughts, feelings and experiences were born, and behind them came internal urges to action.
What do you see in your mind’s eye when you remember the sketch with the madman? Arkady Nikolaevich addressed all students.
I see Malletkov’s apartment, a lot of young people, there’s dancing in the hall, there’s dinner in the dining room. Light, warm, fun! And there, on the stairs, at the front door, a huge, emaciated man with a disheveled beard, in hospital shoes, in a robe, frozen and hungry, said Shustov.
Do you only see the beginning of the sketch? Arkady Nikolaevich asked the silent Shustov.
No, I also think of a closet. which we carried to barricade the door. I also remember how I mentally talked on the phone to the hospital from which the madman had escaped.
What else do you see?
To tell the truth nothing more.
Not good! Because with such a small, patchy supply of material from visions, you cannot create a continuous string of them for the entire etude. How to be?
“We need to invent, complete what is missing,” Pasha suggested.
Yes, exactly, finish it! This should always be done in cases where the author, director and other creators of the play have not explained everything that the creating artist needs to know.
We need, firstly, a continuous line of “suggested circumstances”, among which the life of the sketch passes, and secondly, I repeat, we need a continuous string of visions associated with these proposed circumstances. In short, we need a continuous line of not simple, but illustrated proposed circumstances. Therefore remember well, once and for all; at every moment of your stay on the stage, at every moment of external or internal development of the play and its actions, the artist must see either what is happening outside him, on stage (that is, the external proposed circumstances created by the director, artist and other creators of the performance), or what is happening inside, in the imagination of the artist himself, that is, those visions that illustrate the proposed life circumstances of the role. From all these moments, a continuous endless string of internal and external moments of visions, a kind of film, is formed, either outside or inside us. While creativity lasts, it stretches on non-stop, reflecting on the screen of our inner vision the illustrated proposed circumstances of the role, among which the artist, the performer of the role, lives on stage, at his own peril and conscience.
These visions will create the appropriate mood within you. It will have an impact on your soul and cause a corresponding experience.
Permanent viewing of a film of internal visions, on the one hand, will keep you within the life of the play, and on the other, will constantly and faithfully guide your creativity.
By the way, but about internal visions. Is it correct to say that we feel them inside ourselves? We have the ability to see what is not really there, what we only imagine. It is not difficult to test this ability of ours. Here's the chandelier. She is outside of me. She exists, she exists in the material world. I look and feel that I am releasing, so to speak, “the tentacles of my eyes” at her. But now I took my eyes away from the chandelier, closed them and want to see her again mentally, “from memory.” To do this, it is necessary, so to speak, to draw back the “tentacles of your eyes” and then from the inside direct them not at a real object, but at some imaginary “screen of our inner vision,” as we call it in our acting jargon.
Where is this screen, or rather, where do I feel it - inside or outside myself? According to how I feel, he is somewhere outside of me. in the empty space in front of me. The film itself definitely passes inside me, and I see its reflection outside of myself.
To be fully understood, I will say the same thing in other words, in a different form. The images of our visions arise within us, in our imagination, in our memory, and then, as it were, mentally rearranged outside of us, for our viewing. But we look at these imaginary objects from the inside, so to speak, not from the outside, but with my inner eyes(sight).
The same thing happens in the area of hearing: we hear imaginary sounds not with the outer ears, but with the inner ear, but in most cases, we feel the sources of these sounds not inside, but outside ourselves.
I’ll say the same thing, but I’ll turn the phrase around: although imaginary objects and images are drawn to us outside of us, they nevertheless first appear inside us, in our imagination and memory. Let's check all this with an example.
Named! Arkady Nikolaevich turned to me. Do you remember my lecture in the city of ***? Do you now see the platform on which we were both sitting? Do you now feel these visual images inside or outside of us?
“I feel them outside of myself, just as I did then in reality,” I answered without hesitation.
With what eyes do you now look at the imaginary stage internal or external?
Internal.
Only with such reservations and explanations can the term “inner vision” be accepted.
Create visions for all moments of a large play. This is terribly complicated and difficult! I was scared.
“Complicated and difficult”? As punishment for these words, take the trouble to tell me your whole life, from the moment you remember yourself, Arkady Nikolaevich unexpectedly suggested to me.
My father used to say: “Childhood is remembered for a whole decade, youth for years, maturity for months, and old age for weeks.”
This is how I feel about my past. At the same time, much of what is captured is seen in all the smallest details, for example, the first moments from which the memories of my life begin, the swing in the garden. They scared me. I also clearly see many episodes from the life of a child’s room, in the mother’s room, in the nanny’s room, in the yard, on the street. New stage adolescence was imprinted on me with particular clarity, because it coincided with entering school. From that moment on, visions illustrate to me shorter, but also more numerous pieces of life. So large stages and individual episodes go into the past from the present in a long, long line.
And you see her?
What do I see?
A continuous string created from stages and episodes stretching through your entire past.
I see, although intermittently. I admitted.
You heard! Arkady Nikolaevich exclaimed triumphantly. In a few minutes, Nazvanov created the film of his entire life and cannot do the same in the life of the role for some three hours required to convey it at the performance.
Did I really remember my whole life? A few of her moments!
You have lived your whole life, and all that remains are the memories of the most important moments. Live the role for the rest of your life, and let the most significant, milestone moments remain from it too. Why do you find this work so difficult?
Yes, because real life itself, in a natural way, creates a film of visions, but in an imaginary life, the role must be done by the artist himself, and this is very difficult and complex.
You will soon see for yourself that this work is not so difficult in reality. Now, if I suggested that you draw a continuous line not from the visions of your inner vision, but from your spiritual feelings and experiences, then such work would turn out to be not only “complex” and “difficult,” but also impossible.
Why? The students did not understand.
Yes, because our feelings and experiences are elusive, capricious, changeable and cannot be fixed, or, as we say in our acting jargon, “fixation, or fixation.” Vision is more accommodating. His images are more freely and firmly imprinted in our visual memory and are resurrected again in our imagination.
In addition, the visual images of our dreams, despite their illusory nature, are still more real, more tangible, more “material” (if that is how one can speak about a dream) than ideas about feelings that are vaguely suggested to us by our emotional memory.
Let more accessible and accommodating visual visions help us resurrect and consolidate less accessible, less stable spiritual feelings.
May the film of visions constantly support in us the corresponding moods, similar to the play. Let them, enveloping us, cause corresponding experiences, urges, aspirations and the very actions.
This is why we need in each role not simple, but illustrated proposed circumstances,” concluded Arkady Nikolaevich.
So, I wanted to reach an agreement to the end, if I create inside myself a film reel of visions for all moments of Othello’s life and will pass this tape on the screen of my inner vision...
And if, picked up Arkady Nikolaevich, the illustration you created correctly reflects the proposed circumstances and the magical “if” of the play, if the latter evoke in you moods and feelings similar to those of the same role, then you will probably be infected every time your visions and correctly experience Othello’s feelings every time you watch the film internally.
Once this tape is made, it is not difficult to skip it. The whole question is how to create it! I didn't give up.
About this and next time, said Arkady Nikolaevich, getting up and leaving the class.
19. . G.
Let's dream and create films! suggested by Arkady Nikolaevich.
What will we dream about? asked the students.
I deliberately choose an inactive topic because an effective one can in itself arouse activity, without the prior assistance of the dreaming process. On the contrary, an ineffective topic requires intensive preliminary work of imagination. At the moment, I am not interested in the activity itself, but in the preparation for it. That's why I take the least effective topic and invite you to live the life of a tree with its roots deeply rooted in the ground.
Great! I am a tree, a hundred-year-old oak! Shustov decided. However, although I said this, I don’t believe that this can happen.
In this case, tell yourself this: I am this is me, but if I were an oak tree, if such and such circumstances developed around and inside me, then what would I do? Tortsov helped him.
However. Shustov doubted, how can one act in inaction, standing motionless in one place?
Yes, of course, you cannot move from one place to another, or walk. But besides this there are other actions. To call them, first of all you need to decide where you are? In the forest, among the meadows, on a mountain top? Choose whichever excites you the most.
Shustov imagined that he was an oak tree growing in a mountain clearing, somewhere near the Alps. To the left, in the distance, rises a castle. All around there is a wide expanse. Snow chains are silvery in the distance, and closer are endless hills that seem like petrified sea waves from above. Villages are scattered here and there.
Now tell me what you see up close?
I see a thick head of foliage on myself, which makes a lot of noise when the branches sway.
Of course! Up there, it often happens strong wind.
I see some birds’ nests on my branches.
This is good if you are alone.
No, there is not much good here. These birds are difficult to get along with. They make noise with their wings, sharpen their beaks on my trunk and sometimes make trouble and fight. This is annoying... A stream flows next to me - my best friend and interlocutor. He saves me from drought, Shustov continues to fantasize.
Tortsov forced him to complete every detail in this imaginary life.
Then Arkady Nikolaevich turned to Pushchin, who, without resorting to the increased help of imagination, chose the most ordinary, well-known things that easily come to life in memory. His imagination is underdeveloped. He imagined a dacha with a garden in Petrovsky Park.
What do you see? Arkady Nikolaevich asked him.
Petrovsky Park.
You can’t cover the whole of Petrovsky Park at once. Choose a specific place for your dacha... Well, what do you see in front of you?
Fence with bars.
Pushchin was silent.
What material is this fence made of?
Material?: Bent iron.
With what pattern? Sketch it to me.
Pushchin moved his finger on the table for a long time, and it was clear that this was the first time he had come up with what he was talking about.
I don’t understand! Draw clearer. Tortsov squeezed his visual memory to the end.
Well, okay... Let's say that you see this... Now tell me what is behind the fence?
Driving road.
Who walks and drives on it?
Summer residents.
Cab drivers.
Dray.
Who else is driving along the highway?
Horses.
Maybe bicycles?
Here, here! bicycles, cars...
It was clear that Pushchin did not even try to disturb his imagination. What is the use of such passive daydreaming, since what kind of student is the teacher working for?
I expressed my bewilderment to Tortsov.
There are several points worth noting in my method of activating the imagination. - he answered. When a student's imagination is idle, I ask him a simple question. It’s impossible not to answer it, since they’re asking you. And the student answers, sometimes at random, to get rid of it. I do not accept this answer; I prove its inconsistency. To give a more satisfactory answer, the student has to either immediately stir up his imagination, force himself to see with his inner vision what he is being asked about, or approach the question from the mind, from a series of consistent judgments. The work of the imagination is very often prepared and directed by this kind of conscious, mental activity. But finally the student saw something in his memory or imagination. Certain visual images appeared before him. Created a brief moment of daydreaming. After that, with a new question, I repeat the same process. Then there is a second short moment of insight, then a third. In this way I support and prolong his dreaming, causing a whole series of animated moments that together give a picture of an imaginary life. Let her be uninteresting for now. It’s good that it is woven from the inner visions of the student himself. Having awakened his imagination once, he can see the same thing twice, or three, or many times. From repetition, the picture becomes more and more embedded in the memory, and the student gets used to it. However, there is a lazy imagination, which does not always respond even to the most simple questions. Then the teacher has no choice but to ask a question and suggest the answer himself. If what the teacher proposes satisfies the student, he, accepting other people’s visual images, begins to see something in his own way. Otherwise, the student directs what is suggested according to his own taste, which also forces him to look and see with his inner vision. As a result, this time too, some semblance of an imaginary life is created, woven partly from the material of the dreamer himself... I see that you are not very satisfied with this result. Nevertheless, even such tortured dreaming brings something.
What exactly?
At least that before dreaming there were no figurative ideas for the life being created. There was something vague, vague. And after such work, something living is outlined and determined. The soil is created into which the teacher and director can plant new seeds. This is the invisible primer on which you can paint a picture. In addition, with my method, the student himself adopts from the teacher the technique of spurring his imagination, learns to excite it with questions that the work of his own mind now suggests to him. A habit is formed of consciously struggling with the passivity and lethargy of one’s imagination. And this is already a lot.
19. . G.
And today Arkady Nikolaevich continued the exercises on developing the imagination.
At the last lesson, he said to Shustov, you told me, Who You, Where you are in your dream and what see around you... Tell me now what you do you hear with your inner hearing in the imaginary life of an old oak tree?
At first Shustov heard nothing. Tortsov reminded him of the fuss of the birds that had built their nests on the branches of the oak tree and added:
Well, all around you, in your mountain clearing, what do you hear?
Now Shustov heard the bleating of sheep, the mooing of cows, the ringing of bells, the sound of shepherds' horns, the conversation of women resting under an oak tree from hard field work.
Tell me now, When Is everything happening that you see and hear in your imagination? In what historical era? In what century?
Shustov chose the era of feudalism.
Okay. If so, will you, as an old oak tree, hear any other sounds characteristic of that time?
Shustov, after a pause, said that he heard the songs of a wandering singer, a minnesinger, heading for a holiday in a neighboring castle: here, under an oak tree, by the stream, he rests, washes, changes into formal clothes and prepares for a performance. Here he tunes his harp and for the last time rehearses a new song about spring, about love, about heartfelt longing. And at night the oak tree overhears the courtier’s love affair with a married lady, their long kisses. Then frantic curses are heard from two sworn enemies, rivals, the clang of weapons, the last cry of a wounded man. And towards dawn, the alarming voices of people are heard looking for the body of the deceased, then, when they found it, a general hubbub and individual sharp cries fill the air. The body is lifted; heavy, measured steps are heard carrying it away.
Before we had time to rest, Arkady Nikolaevich asked Shustov a new question:
Why?
What why? we were perplexed.
Why Shustov oak? Why does it grow on a mountain in the Middle Ages?
Tortsov gives this question great importance. By answering it, you can, according to him, choose from your imagination the past of the life that was already created in the dream.
Why are you growing alone in this clearing?
Shustov came up with the following assumption regarding the past of the old oak. Once upon a time, the entire hill was covered with dense forest. But the baron, the owner of that castle, which can be seen not far away, on the other side of the valley, had to constantly fear an attack from the warlike feudal neighbor. The forest hid the movement of his troops from view and could serve as an ambush for the enemy. That's why they brought him down. They left only the mighty oak tree, because right next to it, in its shadow, a spring was breaking out from under the ground. If the spring dried up, the stream that serves as a watering place for the baron's herds would not exist.
New question For what, proposed by Tortsov, again led us to a dead end.
I understand your difficulty, since in this case we are talking about a tree. But, generally speaking, what is this question for? is very important: it forces us to understand the purpose of our aspirations, and this goal outlines the future and pushes us to activity, to action. A tree, of course, cannot set goals for itself, but it can also have some purpose, a semblance of activity, serve something.
Shustov came up with the following answer: the oak is the highest point in the area. Therefore, it can serve as an excellent tower for observing the enemy neighbor. In this sense, the tree has great merits in the past. It is not surprising, therefore, that it enjoys exceptional respect among the inhabitants of the castle and nearby villages. A special holiday is held in his honor every spring. The feudal baron himself appears on this holiday and drinks a huge cup of wine to the bottom. They decorate the oak tree with flowers, sing songs and dance around it.
“Now,” said Tortsov, “when the proposed circumstances have taken shape and gradually come to life in our imagination, let’s compare what was at the beginning of our work with what has happened now. Before, when we only knew that you were in a mountain clearing, your inner vision was general, clouded, like the undeveloped film of a photograph. Now, with the help of the work done, it has cleared up to a large extent. It became clear to you when, where, why, for what You are at. You can already discern the contours of some new life, hitherto unknown to you. I felt the ground under my feet. You have mentally healed. But this is not enough. On stage you need action. It is necessary to evoke it through the task and the desire for it. This requires new “suggested circumstances” with a magical “if”, new exciting inventions of the imagination.
But Shustov did not find them.
Ask yourself and answer the question sincerely: what event, what imaginary catastrophe could bring you out of a state of indifference, excite you, frighten you, make you happy? Feel yourself in a mountain clearing, create “I am” and only after that answer, Arkady Nikolaevich advised him.
Shustov tried to do what he was told, but he couldn’t come up with anything.
If so, we will try to approach the solution of the problem in indirect ways. But to do this, answer first, what are you most sensitive to in life? What worries you most often, scares you, makes you happy? I ask you without regard to the topic of dreaming itself. Having understood your organic natural inclination, it will not be difficult to bring the already created fiction to it. So, name one of the organic traits, properties, interests that are most typical of your nature.
I am very excited about any struggle. Are you surprised by this discrepancy with my humble appearance? Shustov said after some thought.
That's it! In this case: enemy raid! The army of the hostile duke, heading towards the possessions of your feudal lord, is already climbing the mountain where you are standing. Spears glisten in the sun, throwing and battering machines move. The enemy knows that sentries often climb to your top to keep an eye on him. You will be cut down and burned! Arkady Nikolaevich scared.
They won't succeed! Shustov responded vividly. I will not be extradited. I am needed. Ours are not asleep. They are already running here, and the horsemen are galloping. The watchmen send messengers to them every minute...
Now a battle will take place here. A cloud of crossbow arrows will fly at you and your watchmen, some of them wrapped in burning oakum and coated with tar: Hold on and decide before it’s too late what you would do under these circumstances if all this happened in real life?
It was clear that Shustov was internally rushing about in search of a way out of the “if” introduced by Tortsov.
What can a tree do to save itself when its roots have grown into the ground and are unable to move? he exclaimed with annoyance at the hopelessness of the situation.
I've had enough of your excitement. approved by Tortsov. The task is unsolvable, and it is not our fault that you were given a topic to dream about that is devoid of action.
Why did you give it? we were perplexed.
Let this prove to you that even with an inactive topic, the fiction of the imagination is capable of producing an internal shift, exciting and causing a living inner call to action. But most of all, all our dreaming exercises were supposed to show us how the material and the inner visions of the role itself, its film reel, would be created and that this work is not at all as difficult and complex as you imagined.
19. . G.
At today's lesson, Arkady Nikolaevich only managed to explain to us that an artist needs imagination not only in order to create, but also in order to renew what has already been created and worn out. This is done by introducing new fiction or individual details that refresh it.
You will understand this better with a practical example. Let's take, for example, the sketch that you, not having had time to finish, have already torn up. I'm talking about a sketch with a madman. Refresh it in whole or in part with a new fiction.
But none of us came up with a new invention.
“Listen,” said Tortsov, “where did you get the idea that the man standing behind the door is a violent madman?” Maloletkova told you? Yes, she opened the door to the stairs and saw the former tenant of this apartment. They said that he was taken to mental asylum in a fit of violent insanity... But while you were here barricading the doors. Govorkov ran to the phone to talk to the hospital, and he was told that there was no madness, but that it was a matter of simple seizure delirium tremens, as the tenant drank heavily. But now he is healthy, discharged from the hospital and returned home. However, who knows, maybe the certificate is not correct, maybe the doctors are mistaken.
What would you do if this really happened?
Maloletkova should go out to him and ask why he came. said Veselovsky.
What passion! My darlings, I can’t, I can’t! I'm afraid, I'm afraid! Maloletkova exclaimed with a frightened face.
Pushchin will go with you. “He’s a healthy man,” Tortsov encouraged her. One, two, three, start! he commanded, addressing all of us. Take aim at new circumstances, listen to the urges and act.
We acted out the lifting etude, with genuine excitement, and received the approval of Tortsov and Rakhmanov, who was present at the lesson. The new version of fiction had a refreshing effect on us.
Tortsov dedicated the end of the lesson to the results of our work on developing creative imagination. Having recalled the individual stages of this work, he concluded his speech as follows:
Every invention of the imagination must be precisely substantiated and firmly established. Questions: who, when, where, why, for what, how, which we set for ourselves in order to stimulate our imagination, help us create a more and more definite picture of this illusory life itself. There are, of course, cases when it forms itself, without the help of our conscious mental activity, without leading questions, but intuitively. But you yourself could see that you cannot count on the activity of the imagination, left to its own devices, even in cases where you are given a specific topic for daydreaming. To dream “in general,” without a definite and firmly established theme, is fruitless.
However, when we approach the creation of fiction with the help of reason, very often, in response to questions, pale images of the mentally created life arise in our minds. But this is not enough for stage creativity, which requires that in a person-artist his organic life bubble up in connection with fiction, so that his whole nature surrenders to the role - not only mentally, but also physically. How to be? Put a new question that is now well known to you:
“What would I do if the fiction I created became reality?” You already know from experience that due to the quality of our artistic nature, you will be drawn to answer this question with action. The latter is a good stimulant that stimulates the imagination. Let this action not even be realized yet, but remain for the time being an unresolved urge. It is important that this urge is caused and felt by us not only mentally, but also physically. This feeling anchors the fiction.
It is important to realize that incorporeal dreaming, devoid of dense matter, has the ability to reflexively evoke the genuine actions of our flesh and matter - the body. This ability plays a big role in our psychotechnics.
Listen carefully to what I'm about to say: our every movement on stage, every word must be the result true life imagination.
If you said a word or did something on stage mechanically, without knowing who you are, where you came from, why, what you need, where you will go from here and what you will do there, you acted without imagination. And this piece of your time on stage, small or large, was not true for you - you acted like a running machine, like an automatic machine.
If I ask you now about the simplest thing: “Is it cold today or not?” you, before answering “cold”, or “warm”, or “didn’t notice”, mentally visit the street, remember how you walked or drove, check your feelings, remember how passersby wrapped themselves up and raised their collars, how crunched there is snow under your feet, and only then will you say this one word you need.
At the same time, all these pictures may flash before you instantly, and from the outside it will seem that you answered almost without thinking, but the pictures were there, your feelings were there, there was also verification of them, and only as a result of this complex work of your imagination you and answered.
Thus, not a single etude, not a single step on stage should be performed mechanically, without internal justification, that is, without the participation of the imagination.
If you strictly adhere to this rule, all your school exercises, no matter what department of our program they belong to, will develop and strengthen your imagination.
On the contrary, everything you do on stage with a cold soul (“cold way”) will ruin you, as it will instill in us the habit of acting automatically, without imagination, mechanically.
And the creative work on the role and on the transformation of the playwright’s verbal work into a stage reality, from beginning to end, proceeds with the participation of the imagination.
What can warm and excite us internally, if not a fantasy of the imagination that has taken possession of us! In order to meet all the requirements placed on it, it is necessary that it be mobile, active, responsive and sufficiently developed.
Therefore, pay extreme attention to developing your imagination. Develop it in every possible way: both with the exercises with which you have become acquainted, that is, engage in imagination as such, and develop it indirectly: by making it a rule not to do anything on stage mechanically, formally.
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Stage freedom
Muscle release exercises begin with the first lessons in mastering acting technique. Every lesson begins with them, until the habit of monitoring and filming muscle clamps will not be brought to automaticity. Clamping is physical tension, a spasm of the face and hands. May appear in the diaphragm and cause shortness of breath, etc. All this affects the artist’s well-being. It is very important to be able to notice the small tensions that arise during any exercise: someone has tension in their facial expressions, someone has a tense gait, their neck, arms, back are tense, etc.
To develop the ability to move expressively and beautifully, you need to learn how to free your muscles from tightness and tension, i.e. subordinate to the will of man. Psychophysical well-being is also closely related to muscle freedom. Very often, internal and external pressures prevent us from achieving any goal. The type of training exercises is aimed at developing free psychophysical well-being and relieving various tensions.
To relieve physical stress you need to:
1. Development of a muscle controller (which would automatically give the command “I’m tight”)
2. Determination of the center of gravity and fulcrum.
3. Developing skills and the ability to direct muscle work. The ability to use muscles for one action or another.
4. Justification of a pose, gesture, movement.
Classes are conducted both group and individual. Special attention is given and independent work above oneself. The ability to determine which muscles bear the load during a given physical action, and to use them exactly as much as is necessary in everyday life when performing this action. You must always achieve the correct physical sensation. Every movement and posture must be justified, expedient, and productive.
This is the ability not only to fantasize, but also the ability to use your imagination to influence the surrounding stage life and change it in the right direction. In performing arts, we need fantasy that is not abstract, but actually comes from the real feeling of what is happening on stage. Imagination and fantasy play a huge role in the work of an actor. “The task of the artist and his creative technique is to transform the fiction of the play into artistic stage reality” (Stanislavsky T-2 p. 57). The more developed the artist’s fantasy and imagination, the wider and richer the artist’s creativity, the richer and more varied his capabilities, the deeper and more meaningful it is. The imagination has the ability to reproduce images previously experienced in reality. That is why the artist’s ability to imagine and fantasize must be strong and vibrant.
Fantasy- these are mental representations that transport us to exceptional circumstances and conditions that we did not know, did not experience and did not see, which we did not have and do not have in reality.
Imagination– resurrects what has been experienced or seen by us, familiar to us. Imagination can create a new idea, but from an ordinary real-life phenomenon.
An artist must develop imagination. Not to force him, but to captivate him with your plan, the visual series of visions. Imagination must be, firstly: active, that is, it must actively push the actor to internal and external action, and for this it is necessary to find and draw with the imagination such conditions, such relationships that would interest the artist and push him to active creativity; secondly: imagination must be logical and consistent; thirdly: you need clarity of purpose, an interesting task, so as not to dream for the sake of dreaming itself - “without a rudder and without sails.”
“As soon as you saw a familiar situation with your inner eye, felt its mood, immediately familiar thoughts associated with the place of action came to life in you. From thoughts, feelings and experiences were born, and behind them came internal urges to action” (K.S. Stanislavsky).
In classes, it is necessary to give more new exercises to develop fantasy and imagination - such an important element in the work of an actor.
An artist needs imagination not only in order to create, but also in order to update what has already been created. This is done by introducing new fiction to refresh it. After all, in the theater you will have to play each role in the play dozens of times, and so that it does not lose its freshness and reverence, a new invention of the imagination is needed.
5. Sense of truth, logic and consistency
The more faith, the more sincerely the artist lives on stage. At every moment of our stay on stage, we must believe in the truth of the feeling we experience and in the truth of the actions we perform. K.S. Stanislavsky paid attention to this element great value. “The stage truth must be genuine, not tinted, but cleared of unnecessary everyday details. It should be truthful in reality, but poeticized by creative fiction” (K.S. Stanislavsky).
It is impossible to consider the sense of truth and faith as independent elements in isolation from the logic and sequence of action. Logic and consistency are the most reliable path to mastering these elements. The work on this element is based on the student’s work on memory of physical actions (PAM). Many of them don’t really like this section and try to avoid it. But by skipping this part of working with students, we deprive them of the opportunity to train their organics and body. In PFD exercises we create the preconditions for creativity in the areas of truth, faith, logic and consistency. We force students to actively work intellectually in these exercises, using imagination, attention and other elements of acting.
Two stages of working on an element:
Stage 1 – find, evoke and feel truth and faith in the area of the body, that is, physical action.
Stage 2 – develop logic and consistency.
For this there are a number simple exercises: “thread a needle”, “write a letter and seal the envelope”, “fix a pencil with a penknife” and so on.
Working with an imaginary object creates not only the truth of the physical action and faith in it, but develops logic and consistency, develops the correct attitude towards real objects, and disciplines stage attention.
Throughout each exercise, sketch, and then role, a continuous logic of action must be created, which is of exceptional importance, because the logic of action gives rise to the logic of experience, leading from the conscious to the subconscious. Each of our actions must have a cause and effect, that is, proceed from the previous action and give birth to a new one, which logically follows from it.
“You shouldn’t immediately jump “from the first floor to the third,” otherwise you may lose your sense of truth. Consistently move from step to step, without missing a single one” (K.S. Stanislavsky).
Our path: from truth to inspiration, but this path requires a lot of hard work from the actor.
PFD exercises require enormous concentration, keen observation, memory for previously experienced sensations, logic, and consistency. The teacher and students must carefully ensure that all actions are performed logically, sequentially, without skipping individual links, and achieve maximum accuracy.
Why can’t you study the logic and sequence of physical actions through exercises with real objects? This question is answered convincingly by K.S. Stanislavsky: “With real objects, many actions instinctively, due to the mechanical nature of life, slip by themselves so that the player does not have time to follow them. It is difficult to catch these slippages, and if you allow them, you get failures that violate the line of logic and the sequence of physical actions. In turn, broken logic destroys the truth, and without truth there is no faith and no experience itself, both for the artist himself and for the beholder. The absence of objects forces us to delve more carefully, deeper into the very nature of physical actions and study it.”
These exercises help to develop more subtle means of expressiveness for the actor; they require greater precision and observation from the performer, close attention, the finest muscle work, and instill in the beginning actor a taste for professional clarity and completeness of stage action.
6. Stage attitude and assessment of fact.
As we know, the art of theater is conditional. Stage attitude plays an important role in working on a sketch or a role. The actor must be able to establish and change his stage relationships in accordance with the assignment.
Working on a role means looking for a relationship. If the actor made a relationship image with your relationships- this means that he has mastered the inner side of the role. To play a role, an actor must correctly determine the relationships of the character, make these relationships his own, that is, cultivate them in himself, get used to them and act logically, expediently and productively on the basis of these relationships.
An actor must be able to truthfully and organically assess the facts that appear on stage. Stages of assessing a fact: 1) Perception of the fact 2) Double-checking 3) Developing an attitude 4) Adaptation 5) Action
An actor must be able to embrace the unexpected. What happens on stage should come as a surprise to the actor. To perceive what is known in advance as unexpected - this is the main difficulty of the art of acting, but it is precisely in this that the actor’s talent first of all manifests itself. So, the actor’s concentrated attention and his faith in the truth of fiction give rise to the necessary relationships in the actor, and these relationships serve as the soil on which action begins.
Conclusion: 1. An actor must be able to search, find and make his own the relationships that the role requires.
2. The actor must, based on established relationships, accept any fact of stage life as a surprise, and correctly evaluate this fact.
7. Faith and stage naivety.
“What a joy it is to believe yourself on stage, to feel that others also believe you” (K.S. Stanislavsky).
The more naivety an actor has, the greater the sense of faith, the easier it will be for him to believe in what is happening on stage, to forget the conventions of the theater. Naivety and faith give the actor the opportunity to lose stiffness and awkwardness.
To develop stage naivety, one must conduct life observations. Watch the children especially carefully; fortunately, they still retain this naivety and spontaneity.
Naivety gets along with intelligence, but not with rationality. Stage naivety must be protected in every possible way like a flower. Naivety and faith give rise to a wonderful feeling of contagion, without which an actor simply cannot exist.
8. Emotional memory.
Emotional memory is necessary for an actor, since on stage he lives with repeated feelings, that is, feelings previously experienced, familiar from life experience. Here you will be helped by imagination, fantasy, proposed circumstances, so-called “decoys” that evoke a response in emotional memory.
The actor must evoke (learn) the memories embedded in him - they turn into feelings with which the actor begins to live, transferring them to the proposed circumstances.
A strong impression in life is a brighter emotional memory, it does not require effort. Our task is to cultivate in the actor the ability to call into action the repeated memories of feelings and experiences inherent in him. He can only experience his own emotions and act from himself, a person - an artist. You need to train always and everywhere, every day. “The artist must be able to directly respond to “stimulants” (stimulants) and master them, like a virtuoso with the keys of a piano. Invent and get carried away by fiction. Not a single subject, not a single trigger of emotional memory can be neglected.” (K.S. Stanislavsky)
“Decoys” can be internal or external.
Internal: super task, cross-cutting action, proposed circumstances, actions, task, sensations, etc.
External: furnishings, lighting, music, noises, mise-en-scene, atmosphere, etc.
This means that emotional memory - memory of sensations - is of exceptional importance. This is the material that feeds the actor's creativity. The study of the elements of emotional memory should be carried out in two directions: developing the memory of the senses (sensory memory) and directly emotional memory. “Combined with fantasy and imagination, faith and stage naivety “create joy from everything that comes to hand” (K.S. Stanislavsky).
It is known that the process of fantasy in each art has its own specifics, depending on the characteristics of the given art. There is imagination required for the work of a writer; it is different from the imagination of a painter, and both are different from the imagination of a musician. There is also a specifically acting imagination. An actor, of course, can have not only acting, but also other types of imagination, and it’s even very good if he has them; The art of an actor is complex, and any kind of imagination will be useful to him, but he cannot do without specifically acting imagination in his work. Anyone who has no acting imagination should not be an actor. But what is an actor's imagination? How does it differ from all other types of artistic imagination? The fact is that for an actor to fantasize means to internally lose. When imagining, the actor does not draw the object of his imagination outside of himself (as a painter or sculptor would do), but feels himself acting as an image. We have not forgotten that the material in the art of an actor is his actions. Therefore, for an actor, to fantasize means to act, but not in reality, but for now only in the imagination, in one’s creative dreams. When imagining something from the life of his image, the actor does not separate himself from the image; he thinks about the image not in the third person - “he” - but always in the first person - “I”. While fantasizing, the actor, outside of himself, sees only what the image should see in the given circumstances (created by the actor’s imagination). For example, if an actor working on the role of Chatsky, fantasizing about the past in the relationship between Chatsky and Sophia, begins to draw in his imagination the scene of their farewell before Chatsky’s departure abroad, then the actor will “see” in his imagination only Sophia (and not his own eyes, but through the eyes of Chatsky), he will feel Chatsky himself in himself and, feeling himself as Chatsky, will act in his imagination as Chatsky. Based on what has been said, we can establish the following law: in order to merge with his image on stage in the future, the actor must first “merge” with him many times in his imagination. We see that the actor's imagination resembles that variety that is especially characteristic of a person in childhood and early youth, when he is inclined to daydream for a long time, imagining himself either as a great commander, or as a polar explorer, or as a pilot. But it must be said that the actor’s creative faith, which he achieves with the help of his imagination, also gives every reason to compare him with a child. It’s not for nothing that an actor’s work is called acting, and his most precious professional quality, which manifests itself in the ability to believe in the truth of fiction, is very often called acting naivety. To fully understand the specifics of acting fantasy, you should pay attention to one more feature of it. As is known, the human imagination can reproduce ideas created by all five senses, that is, visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory and gustatory. Moreover, the meaning of ideas associated with various organs feelings are different in different arts. Thus, in the art of painting, visual impressions are of paramount importance, in sculpture - tactile, in music - auditory, and in the work of a writer, ideas associated with all five senses are involved. What is the situation in this regard in the art of acting? There is no doubt that the creative imagination of the actor, like the imagination of the writer, deals with ideas of all five types. However, it is not these ideas that are dominant in the actor’s imagination, but those that are associated with the performance of actions. Every action, as we know, is a psychophysical act. Therefore, not a single action can be performed without the participation of the muscles of our body. And if we reproduce any action in our imagination, we certainly bring our muscle memory into an active state. When a person performs some action in his imagination - he declares his love, orders, asks, rejects, consoles, etc. - he certainly feels himself performing a series of movements necessary to perform this action - he mentally approaches his partner, takes him by the hand, sits him in a chair or, conversely, removes the partner, moves away from him, etc., while mentally pronouncing all kinds of speeches - tender, passionate, angry - and accompanying these speeches with various gestures. However, a person dreaming in this way actually remains silent and motionless. But it only looks like that from the outside. In fact, the human muscles are working at this time, but what they do is so insignificant in size that it is more correct to call it not movements, but the embryos of movements (or muscular representations). Accordingly, everything that arises in the actor’s psyche is more correctly called not feelings, but the germs of feelings (or emotional ideas). An actor, so to speak, fantasizes mainly with his muscles. Let us note, by the way, that he not only fantasizes, but also “observes” with his muscles, which is why it is so important for an actor to develop his muscle memory.
So with different sides, gradually, systematically, the ignorant lead the actor’s art to his destruction, that is, to the destruction of the essence of creativity due to the poor, conventional external form of acting “in general.”
As you can see, we have to fight with the whole world, with the conditions of public performance, with the methods of preparing an actor and, in particular, with established false concepts about stage acting.
In order to achieve success in all the difficulties ahead of us, first of all we must have courage, to realize that for many, many reasons, when we go out on the stage, in front of a crowd of spectators, and in the conditions of public creativity, we completely lose the feeling of real life in the theater, on the stage. . We forget everything: how we walk in life, and how we sit, eat, drink, sleep, talk, look, listen - in a word, how we act internally and externally in life. We need to learn all this all over again on the stage, just as a child learns to walk, talk, and look. listen.
During our school hours, I will have to remind you often of this unexpected and important conclusion. For now, we will try to understand how to learn to act on stage not like an actor - “in general”, but like a human being - simply, naturally, organically correctly, freely, as required not by the conventions of the theater, but by the laws of living, organic nature.
In a word, to learn how to drive, you know, theater out of the theater. - Govorkov added.
That's it: how to expel from the Theater (with capital letters) theater (with a small letter).
You cannot cope with such a task immediately, but only gradually, in the process of artistic growth and the development of psychotechnics.
For now, I ask you, Vanya,” Arkady Nikolaevich turned to Rakhmanov, “to persistently ensure that the students on stage always act authentically, productively and expediently and do not at all appear to be acting. Therefore, as soon as you notice that they are crazy about the game or, even more so, about the lomanis. stop them now. When your class gets better (I'm in a hurry with this matter), develop special exercises that force them to act on the stage at all costs. Do these exercises more often and for longer, day after day, in order to gradually, methodically accustom them to genuine, productive and purposeful action on stage. Let human activity merge in their imagination with the state that they experience on the stage in the presence of spectators, in the setting of public creativity or a lesson. By teaching them to be humanly active on stage day after day, you will fill them with good habit be normal people, not mannequins in art.
What kind of exercises? Exercises, I say, what?
Arrange the atmosphere of the lesson more seriously, strictly, in order to tighten up the players, as if at a performance. This is what you can do.
Eat! - accepted Rakhmanov.
Call him on stage alone and give him something to do.
Which one?
At least, for example, look through the newspaper and tell what it says.
Long for a mass lesson. We need to look at everyone.
Is the point really to find out the contents of the entire newspaper? It is important to achieve genuine, productive and meaningful action. When you see that such a thing has been created, that the student has gone into his own business, that the atmosphere of the public lesson does not bother him, call another student, and the first one is moved somewhere to the back of the stage. Let him practice there and get into the habit of vital, human action on stage. In order to develop it, to forever root it in yourself, you need to live for a long, “nth” amount of time on stage with genuine, productive and purposeful action. So you help me get this “nth” amount of time.
Finishing the lesson, Arkady Nikolaevich explained to us:
- “If only”, “proposed circumstances”, internal and external actions are very important factors in our work. They are not the only ones. We still need a lot of special, artistic, creative abilities, properties, gifts (imagination, attention, sense of truth, tasks, stage abilities, etc., etc.).
Let us agree for now, for brevity and convenience, to call all of them in one word, elements.
Elements of what? - someone asked.
I'm not answering this question yet. It will figure itself out in due time. The art of managing these elements and among them, first of all, “if only”, “proposed circumstances” and internal and external actions, the ability to combine them with each other, substitute, connect one with the other requires a lot of practice and experience, and therefore time. Let us be patient in this sense and for now we will turn all our concerns to the study and development of each of the elements. This is the main, great goal of the school course of this chapter
IMAGINATION
Today, due to Tortsov’s ill health, the lesson was scheduled in his apartment. Arkady Nikolaevich comfortably seated us in his office.
“You know now,” he said, “that our stage work begins with the introduction to the play and the role, the magical “if,” which is the lever that transfers the artist from everyday reality to the plane of imagination. The play, the role, is the author’s invention, it is a series of magical and other “ifs”, “suggested circumstances” invented by him. The true “was”, real reality does not exist on stage, real reality is not art. The latter, by its very nature, needs artistic fiction, which, first of all, is the author’s work. The task of the artist and his creative technique is to transform the fiction of the play into artistic stage reality. Our imagination plays a huge role in this process. Therefore, it is worth dwelling on it longer and taking a closer look at its function in creativity.
Tortsov pointed to the walls hung with sketches of all kinds of decorations.
All these are paintings by my favorite young artist, who has already died. He was a great eccentric: he made sketches for plays that had not yet been written. Here, for example, is a sketch for the last act of Chekhov’s non-existent play, which Anton Pavlovna conceived shortly before his death: an expedition buried in ice, an eerie and harsh north. A large steamer, squeezed by floating blocks. Smoky pipes appear ominously black against a white background. Bitter frost. The icy wind stirs up snow whirlwinds. Rising upward, they take the shape of a woman in a shroud. And here are the figures of a husband and his wife’s lover, huddled together. Both left life and went on an expedition to forget their heartfelt drama.
Who would believe that the sketch was written by a person who has never traveled outside of Moscow and its environs! He created a polar landscape, using his observations of our winter nature, what he knew from stories, from descriptions in fiction and scientific books, from photographs. From all the collected material a picture was created. In this work, the imagination played the main role.
Tortsov led us to another wall, on which a series of landscapes were hung. More accurately, it was a repetition of the same motif: some dacha place, but modified each time by the artist’s imagination. The same row of beautiful houses and a pine forest - at different times of the year and day, in the sun, in a storm. Next is the same landscape, but with a cleared forest, with ponds dug in its place and with new plantings of trees of various species. The artist enjoyed dealing with nature and people’s lives in his own way. In his sketches, he built and destroyed houses, cities, re-planned the area, tore down mountains.
Look how beautiful it is! Moscow Kremlin on the seashore! - someone exclaimed.
All this was also created by the artist’s imagination.
And here are sketches for non-existent plays from “interplanetary life,” said Tortsov, leading us to a new series of drawings and watercolors. “Here is a station for some
then devices that support communication between the planets. You see: a huge metal box with large balconies and figures of some beautiful, strange creatures. This is the train station. He hangs in space. In its windows you can see people - passengers from the ground... The line of the same stations, going up and down, is visible in infinite space: they are maintained in balance by the mutual attraction of huge magnets. There are several suns or moons on the horizon. Their light creates fantastic effects unknown on earth. To paint such a picture, you need to have not just imagination, but good imagination.
“What’s the difference between them?” someone asked.
Imagination creates what is, what happens, what we know, and fantasy creates what is not, what we actually do not know, what has never been and never will be.
And maybe it will! Who knows? When popular imagination created the fabulous flying carpet, who could have imagined that people would soar in the air on airplanes? Fantasy knows everything and can do everything. Fantasy, like imagination, is necessary for an artist.
What about the artist? - asked Shustov.
Why do you think an artist needs imagination? - Arkady Nikolaevich asked a counter question.
How for what? To create a magical “if only”, “proposed circumstances,” Shustov answered.
Shustov was silent.
Is everything the actors need to know about the play given to them by the playwright? - asked Tortsov. - Is it possible to fully reveal the lives of all the characters in one hundred pages? Or is there a lot left unsaid? So, for example: does the author always talk in sufficient detail about what happened before the play began? Does he talk exhaustively about what will happen at the end of it, about what is happening behind the scenes, where the character comes from, where he goes? The playwright is stingy with this kind of commentary. Its text only says: “The same and Petrov” or: “Petrov is leaving.” But we cannot come from unknown space and go into it without thinking about the purpose of such movements. Such an action cannot be trusted “at all.” We also know the playwright’s other remarks: “got up,” “walks around in excitement,” “laughs,” “dies.” We are given laconic characteristics of the role, like: “A young man of good appearance. He smokes a lot.”
