Prague Playhouse

Meisner Acting Class Blog on beginnings

September 17th, 2009 at 03:44pm boris

Hi everyone!

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

This entry is about how the new quarter started with new students at a new location with new possibilities.

Click on the “CLASSES” button above and then choose “ACTING FOR PROFESSIONALS” to read more about the class itself and where we meet!

Welcome back!

Times and ways of teaching and learning remain the same. Basically the magic of mastering the Meisner technique  still lies with us students and our willingness to really dedicate ourselves to “the work”. But we are paying four times as much, which has a certain “ouch!”-factor.

The good thing is that we will be at a warm place in winter and a cool place in summer. Nobody will get gassed or burned to death. And we certainly won’t trip over cables or slip in the dark on wet or icy steep and broken steps. For we are now congregating in a real class room in a real building with real lighting and real heating. Awesome!

The start of the new quarter already brought new thrills. First of all there are quite a few new members, most of which are women. I daresay, that we might have reached parity genderwise. That’ll provide for less testosterone-driven yelling spells and more estrogen-bound soul-searching, I presume. I am looking forward to a good mix of both male and female energy!

We also lost a member from class due to a too high amount of misunderstandings. It’s a shame. But Meisner is no laughing matter, a thing that Brian aptly pinpointed when he said: “Sorry guys! But this is no fun acting class where we try out things in a light way. This is Meisner. And Meisner takes discipline and dedication.”

Which takes me to the term “beginnings”:

I think none of us members from class, who are slightly more experienced, really have taken that discipline and dedication into the summer. One can have different opinions about that. I, for my part, badly needed a break. I gave slack and reaped some fruits of my labors of the previous quarters by having had the chance to play in my first two TV commercials.

But now with the summer a thing of the past, and that we are paying more, reside at a much better place to do “the work” and have loads of “newbees” to impress, I am getting the feeling that slack is not an option for the new quarter.

I have two metaphors for that:

1) Meisner is a lot like throwing clay at a wall. You throw and throw. The lumps seem to always fall back down. But then, when you do not expect it any more, the clay sticks and dries. And you can occupy yourself with a new lump. It will fall off the wall again a 1000 times. But that one, too, will eventually stick. If you do not dedicate yourself to the tedium of mundane things like repetition, if you don’t have the patience to go through weeks and months of seemingly being stuck, you won’t progress at all.

2) Meisner is like sailing. In order to move forward, you need a taught sail. And for that you need two forces that keep it in place: Intuition and letting go on the one hand and focus and a clearly set mind on the other. When you do Meisner, all your attention is supposed to be on your partner. But for doing that you must be truly centered in yourself. Seeing the two forces at work is a beautiful sight to behold. And when they are, the sails of the Meisner vessel can take you quite far quite fast.

I wish everyone in the boat a fast and groovy journey!

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General stuff:

Our acting class consists of some fifteen new and not so new 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! But beware! This quarter is all new and full of promises. So buckle up and get ready for some serious thrills!

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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