I’ve always worked in both live and recorded media so I don’t think twice about using Stanislavsky’s toolkit for stage, screen, commercials and radio. As a teacher, however, I find my student actors need overt clarification of how their training with theatre scripts is directly relevant for their work in film. They want to know why it will help them become betters actor on the camera to use the full capacity of their voice in a theatre, or to break down a scene into its ‘bits’ of action. Stanislavsky, K. S. (1980), An Actor Prepares, trans. Elizabeth Reynolds Hapgood, London: Methuen. (Original year of publication 1937)

This rehearsal process – that shifted from discussion to immediate, active embodiment – became known as the Method of Physical Actions, and at its heart lay improvisation. Stanislavsky had come to realize in his practice-based research that to ‘create the living word’:

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So the perennial challenge for us as actors is how to take our audience on a credible journey whereby they might actually believe in the possibility of what they’re watching. This is particularly the challenge with the psychological realism that tends to dominate western theatre and film, whether we’re talking superintendents or superheroes. How can we convince our audience that what we’re saying as actor/characters is the spontaneous expression of feelings provoked by the chain of fictional events? To do that, we have to ‘own’ the words and Stanislavsky called this process ‘the creation of the living word’. He likens the process to the organic growth of a plant. The living word is ‘one in which the roots run down deep into one’s soul. They feed on one’s feeling; but the stem reaches into the consciousness where it puts forth luxuriant foliage of eloquent verbal forms, conveying all the deep emotions from which they draw their vitality.’ [5] The so-called iGeneration (a term coined by sociologist Jean Twenge) is uniquely placed in the history of civilization, in that they’ve been born into technology. The most intimate relationship they often have is with their electronic devices, and their world can shrink to the size of a cellphone. While there’s no denying that cellphone leads them to a wealth of information, they might not raise their heads and see the real clouds rather than the iClouds. Heritage: How did Stanislavsky’s practice-based research bring him to ‘the creation of the living word’?

If, therefore, there is a reluctance – even a resistance – in young students to experience narratives that may unsettle them, maybe we can help them as actor trainers to reset the start button. What if they came to celebrate the role they can play as social storytellers? What if they found that enacting unsettling situations – within the safe structure of a script – enables them to become richer contributors to their broader society? And maybe even heal others by taking them on cathartic, therapeutic journeys? California, Riverside, and in theaters, studios, and institutions across the globe, and has written Each stage of the process is explored with sequences of practical exercises designed to help today's actors and students become thoroughly familiar with the tools in Stanislavsky's toolkit. Barrett, E. & Bolt, B. (eds.) (2010), Practice as Research: Approaches to Creative Arts Enquiry, New York: I. B. Tauris, p. 4. (My emphasis.) We have to provide safe spaces in our classrooms where our students can (a) express their own emotions; (b) consider other perspectives through scripts and dramas that may bring out challenging emotions for them; and (c) handle, within the safe structures of a dramatic text and an actor-training environment, issues of conflict, risk and emotional discomfort.The impact of a first reading is surprising intuitive and creatively lucrative. We will look at a handful of scenes to discover and discuss the impact of the first reading, the text, the seven planes of a text and the given circumstances.