An Actor Prepares

by Constantin Stanislavsky

  ‘As with human beings, there is an analogous, embryonic stage.

  ‘In the creative process there is the father, the author of the play; the mother, the actor pregnant with the part; and the child, the role to be born.

  ‘There is the early period when the actor first gets to know his part. Then they become more intimate, quarrel, are reconciled, marry and conceive.

  ‘In all this the director helps the process along as a sort of matchmaker.

  ‘Actors, in this period, are influenced by their parts, which affect their daily lives. Incidentally the period of gestation for a part is at least as long as that of a human being, and often considerably longer. If you analyse this process you will be convinced that laws regulate organic nature, whether she is creating a new phenomenon biologically or imaginatively.

  ‘You can go astray only if you do not understand that truth; if you do not have confidence in nature; if you try to think out “new principles”, “new bases”, “new art”. Nature’s laws are binding on all, without exception, and woe to those who break them.’