Stanislavski Task

Stanislavski's system is a progression of techniques used to train actors to add believable emotions to their performances.

The key technique behind all the others is Stanislavski's idea of 'the magic if.'  He wanted the same level of truth, that appeared off stage, to appear on stage as well. In order to do this, he encourages actors to use 'the magic if' in which they ask themselves as many questions about the character as they can, asking what 'if' that happened, and what' if' I found myself in this situation  allowing them to really relate to the character and make them seem more believable to the audience. 

A technique leading off of 'the magic if' is one of Visualization. This is something Stanislavski believed actors should do as it helps them to again, get more into character. If they can picture, they can see what's around them it'll change how they act and therefore how realistic their performance is.For example, how they'd speak (projection, pitch etc...) , their facial expressions, their body language etc... if they were on top of a frozen mountain in The Alps compared to if they were in a shopping mall in L.A.

The use of Emotional memory is the next key technique he put across in which actors recreate an event form their past to regenerate feelings they felt at the time. This again helps the to really connect, but this time emotionally with their character, helping the actor to really understand them.

Subtext, Circle of Attention and Given Circumstances are the final three techniques Stanislavski encouraged actors to use. He believed that giving the character a back story, having the actors always thinking about where their characters mind, their attention is at and ensuring they had more human, everyday characteristics would help both the actors and the audience members to connect with the characters a lot better.

These techniques are good for these reasons  but I also feel they can hinder the performance in some ways as they  may cause some actors to make it to realistic for the personally. So, they may go out of character as they maybe thinking more of what they should do or over- thinking certain things, like some given circumstances  if they focus on the techniques too much.

From personal experience, I can say that as a learning actor, I find Stanislavski's techniques to be very helpful. They taught me a lot about realism and how there are so many ways I can make any character seem and be more realistic with his key techniques. 

The idea of adding both Subtext and Given Circumstances to my performances adds a lot more depth the character I'm playing as they have both a back story and 'a present story' outside of the main plot. This applies well to play of 'Gotcha' as all of the 4 main characters have a lot of other things to think about, for example the kid with all the stress of having to leave school with no career prospects at all to follow, and it's hidden things like this ( which do sometimes, like in this case, become more apparent) that make the characters, and so the entire play seem more life like.

The two techniques of Visualization and Emotional Memory help me, and I'm sure most other actors, help me to picture and therefore understand a lot more of what's going on. This being both physically around my character, for example, where they are, what's around them etc..., and also emotionally what affect their situation has had, is having, and sometimes will have.  These techniques help particularly with a production of Gotcha as quite often the stage design and layout is quite minimalist, leaving a lot up to the imagination. This is where visualization needs to come in and help the actors see where they are so they can respond accordingly. It also helps them feel what their characters feel a lot better, which in Gotcha is hard to do, particularly for the actors playing the Kid and Ton as, from what I understand, they're very confused themselves.  

This then leads us onto the final technique, from Stanislavski's  'magic if.' Circle of attention, this fits nicely with Gotcha in the sense that all the character's circles of attention change  a lot through the play, and we can see this clearly when it's done right. All the characters go through a lot both emotionally, and some physically (particularity the character of Lynn) and at often their focus, their circle of attention is on someone else to who it wasn't on prior.