Prague Playhouse

Meisner Acting Class Blog on “Connection” (part 2)

May 19th, 2009 at 01:50pm boris

Hi everyone!

I’m Boris Wilke and member of the Prague Playhouse Meisner acting group. I blog about our class activities.

On Monday, May 18th, our teacher Ben Steel reminded us to mind about connection in Meisner exercises.

Click on the “ACTING CLASS” button above to read more about the class itself and where we meet!

Click the “(more…)”-button below to read about last night’s class!

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Last night I finally had an exercise that felt good, worked well and was appreciated by our teacher, too.

Whot hath gone right?

First of all, my exercise had meaning. It wrenches my heart out to think about it even now. It had a strong connection to the most important of my real life worries. It had an imaginary element. It was physically difficult. And I let it drop enough to connect to my partner.

Now, connection: What is that exactly?

First timers in Meisner class connect by looking at their respective partners and commenting on something existing, non-mental, such as: “Your pants are torn.” or: “You have a scar across your biceps.”

When one repeats those obvious facts, the connection consists of your partner’s reaction to these trivialities, which is mostly smiling, blushing, going blank or stiff.

The words don’t carry any meaning, really. One uses them just as a transfer medium, as a bridge to your partner. This is the most important and basic means of connection.

When one starts to comment on one’s partner’s behavior, a few steps higher on the 20-year-or-more-staircase of Meisner training, the words flavor this basic connection. They add an element of feeling. It does make a difference if your partner tells you: “Your hair is green.” or if they yell at you: “You are green with envy!”

But connection remains something non-verbal. You still just use the words as a medium that carries connection.

Try to repeat with eyes closed. You will see, that a lot has to do with your senses. With your eyesight gone for a moment, your hearing and sense of space all of a sudden become really important. Blind repetition is a valuable addition to exercises, in that it strengthens your connection. The link through words is even stronger. But you might find out, that their meaning really only flavors the link, rather than, that the link consists of the words.

I wonder what it would be like to constrain oneself to a non-sensical call such as: “Unni wenno, whooz.” or anything that comes to mind and does not carry any meaning whatsoever. How hard would it be to connect? And what would the connection be like? I bet, the way, one would say “Unni wenno, whooz.” would alter dramatically during the exercise. One would laugh, get angry, frustrated or worried just like with “real” words.

Ben mentioned silence as well. Taking the above example to extremes would mean, not to say anything at all during an exercise. And silence can carry meaning. One can remain connected during a period of silence. It works in real life when you run out of words to say or just get tired saying them, when you are too happy to speak or overwhelmed with some other feeling.

Go figure that this works in acting, too!

Go figure what a great moment silence can be to an audience, when this silence is bristling with the most intense connection between the partners on stage.

Now that is awesome and leaves the audience breathless and connected to the play.

That is Meisner magic!

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General stuff:

Our acting class consists of some ten active members, who meet every Monday and Wednesday from 6.30 pm to about 8.30. We do Meisner. And the Meisner-technique really rocks!

If you want to connect with your inmost feelings, expressing them freely in an acting environment and thus getting to know yourself better and better, feel free to join us!

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About the author:

I am Boris Wilke, a German expat in Prague. I am a writer at large and have been studying Meisner since January 2008. If any of you know of any kind of acting work, that befits a laddish, tall 40-year-old, please leave a note!

Acting,Classes,Theatre