Acting in Real Time

4. The Technique

4 The Technique Presence of the Actor The identity of an individual is de‹ned to a high degree by what she does, and what she does is in›uenced by character structure, temperament , and all mental characteristics. External events—political and social history, the time period, factors like class and education—all affect how her internal characteristics manifest themselves. From the outside, what we notice ‹rst about a character is her physical appearance. Then, looking more deeply, we identify all the idiosyncratic mental characteristics that distinguish her from others. Together with her actions, these elements comprise the character’s “behavior.” The actor himself also has such characteristics, just like any other human being. The audience can recognize him by his physical shape and facial expressions, but his other qualities contribute more to his real identity. As an actor, he uses his own personal qualities to play his roles. The very special thing about this is that he uses his own characteristics to embody another person, a person who has an identity of his own, with all his own idiosyncratic qualities and characteristics. The audience must be able to recognize this character’s identity as believable and truthful. To make the character truthful, the actor must ‹rst be truthful to himself, and for that he must know himself as an instrument, just as thoroughly as a musician knows his instrument. He must also com55 mand suf‹cient acting technique to play upon this self-instrument. And just like the musician, he plays not only the notes—he also puts his soul in the music. This is as true for the actor who performs within the tradition of realism as it is for the actor who performs in real time. The difference is that, due to the rules of the convention, the actor in realistic theater is forced to act as if he himself is virtually “absent,” whereas the real-time actor is present as himself. Double Function of the Actor The real-time actor is not a storyteller in the traditional sense of the word, nor is he a stand-up comedian. Real-time theater is not storytelling theater, which is a term used for a speci‹c genre of theater, nor is it a form of cabaret. However, the real-time actor does tell the story of the play: by playing it, by acting out his role(s), and by being present on the stage as himself. We can call the real-time actor a narrator of plays, dramatic situations , and characters. At one moment the actor is the pure “narrator of the play” by being present as himself; at the next, he is the “narrator who plays a role.” In real-time theater there are always two levels of action . That is the double function of the actor. His ‹rst “through-line of action” is the acting itself—his work as an actor. Brecht would call it the “gestus of the acting itself.” Through pure theater actions he stages himself in the actions of his character. This second level of action is most of the time not ongoing through the whole play, but is interrupted by actions of other characters and is therefore fragmented. The real-time actor steps into his role and out again, and watches the action of the play as it unfolds. He can even “watch” himself while he is acting his role. This is what the real-time actor does: Stanislavski’s ‹rst W, who, coincides with the second W, what. After all: we are what we do. And why—the ‹fth W—does he do this? That’s very simple: because it is his profession or his avocation, because he is passionate about it, because he enjoys it, and because the play demands it from him. And what for—the sixth W—for what purpose does he do this? So that he can tell the audience something that he wants to share, or that 56 ACTING IN REAL TIME he can entertain the audience, and give them a beautiful or meaningful experience. This doesn’t mean that the real-time actor doesn’t have to do his homework on the character he embodies. He still has to answer the questions posed by the four-plus-two W’s for the character he plays. The central task of the real-time actor is to maintain the separation of his two functions, so...