Personally, I feel as though some achievements or incredibly talented people are only able to see the light of day through our assignments. Take for instance our theorist reports. Now the theorist I was assigned with this time around was François Delsarte. Ring a bell at all? Not for me, anyways, but perhaps for those more cultured than I in the realms of the theater. If you're in any way culturally deficient like me, then let me fill you in on Monsieur Delsarte.
Born on November 9, 1811, Delsarte was raised in the French city of Solesmes. Delsarte's father, a practicing physician, was also often characterized as an eccentric inventor. Whenever his father did happen to produce some mechanical novelty, however, some swindler always seemed to be at hand to bilk his father out of any profits. Delsarte's education consequently suffered, and so he was directed towards an apprenticeship with a china painter. Though Delsarte's life was plagued by misfortune, this was an extremely trying time in his life considering the toll his younger brother's death took on him. With the death of his only friend, Delsarte fell into an almost comatose state soon after the funeral only to awaken later in a religious epiphany. Believing music to be his calling, Delsarte ended his apprenticeship to enroll at the Paris Conservatory. Through his vocal classes, however, Delsarte ended up damaging his voice from faulty method and direction. Hanging up his role as the actor, Delsarte became a professor at the Conservatory only to be frustrated by the arbitrary and prosaic way in which acting was taught.
From that point, Delsarte went on to create his own method in which he promoted connecting between inner emotional experiences with a prescribed set of gestures or movements. To do so, Delsarte studied and recorded how humans behaved, moved, and responded to emotional and real life situations or stimuli. As Delsarte enhanced performance through pose and gesture, he believed they were governed by some natural laws of the body and its movement. Delsarte especially emphasized the integration of speech, movement, and gesture in relation to the three major zones in the body. Through specialization of the head, trunk, and limbs, Delsarte helped actors to develop control, grace, poise, and carriage. This Delsarte Method or Delsarte System surprisingly became quite popular only to eventually decline to little more than melodramatic posing as inexperienced teachers attempted such instruction. Delsarte's innovations were late evolved to include gymnastics as his contemporary, Steel Mackaye, brought the process to the United States. What's interesting is that although Delsarte's theories seemingly replicate those of Stanislavsky, it is scientifically impossible considering that Delsarte preceded Stanislavsky in the time space continuum. Delsarte's career included other various accomplishments from creating and refining the aesthetic science to training singers and actors vocally.
When in came time to actually put Delsarte's theories into action through leading the class in an exercise, I found it particularly difficult to locate any pre-exsisting activities. In the end, I was forced to create my own, albeit somewhat lame, I thought it to be quite effective. As I fed lines to students, I encourage each individual to interpret the line personally and relate it to one of the many zones of the body in relation to the notions of life, soul, and mind. To see people actually utilizing Delsarte's theories really emphasized how difficult it was to implement his method into our own actions. At that point all I could think about was how I was going to do all this within my own monologue. Yikes!
Once done with our daily dose of theorist reports, our class when back to discussing the contents of Everyman. As we each summarized the moral of the play, I interpreted it as though the only thing that accompanies a person in death are the intangibles of life. Almost as though when all your physical possessions have lost their value, you are only left with your good deeds and knowledge. Throughout Everyman, there is a sense that Everyman was cognizant of his lack of good deeds in life, yet he continued in his ways.
With that, we moved on to discussing possibilities within creating our own morality play. As my teacher put it, we attempted to "present a moral for good's sake" instead of simply consequences governing good action. As we bounced ideas around, I found it quite interesting to explore the anti-morality play where a negatively connoted euphemism could be turned around and presented as a moral. This alternative morality play could even propose that affluence, though often frowned upon, is beneficial in the sense that it can get you places. We all know its true.
Born on November 9, 1811, Delsarte was raised in the French city of Solesmes. Delsarte's father, a practicing physician, was also often characterized as an eccentric inventor. Whenever his father did happen to produce some mechanical novelty, however, some swindler always seemed to be at hand to bilk his father out of any profits. Delsarte's education consequently suffered, and so he was directed towards an apprenticeship with a china painter. Though Delsarte's life was plagued by misfortune, this was an extremely trying time in his life considering the toll his younger brother's death took on him. With the death of his only friend, Delsarte fell into an almost comatose state soon after the funeral only to awaken later in a religious epiphany. Believing music to be his calling, Delsarte ended his apprenticeship to enroll at the Paris Conservatory. Through his vocal classes, however, Delsarte ended up damaging his voice from faulty method and direction. Hanging up his role as the actor, Delsarte became a professor at the Conservatory only to be frustrated by the arbitrary and prosaic way in which acting was taught.
From that point, Delsarte went on to create his own method in which he promoted connecting between inner emotional experiences with a prescribed set of gestures or movements. To do so, Delsarte studied and recorded how humans behaved, moved, and responded to emotional and real life situations or stimuli. As Delsarte enhanced performance through pose and gesture, he believed they were governed by some natural laws of the body and its movement. Delsarte especially emphasized the integration of speech, movement, and gesture in relation to the three major zones in the body. Through specialization of the head, trunk, and limbs, Delsarte helped actors to develop control, grace, poise, and carriage. This Delsarte Method or Delsarte System surprisingly became quite popular only to eventually decline to little more than melodramatic posing as inexperienced teachers attempted such instruction. Delsarte's innovations were late evolved to include gymnastics as his contemporary, Steel Mackaye, brought the process to the United States. What's interesting is that although Delsarte's theories seemingly replicate those of Stanislavsky, it is scientifically impossible considering that Delsarte preceded Stanislavsky in the time space continuum. Delsarte's career included other various accomplishments from creating and refining the aesthetic science to training singers and actors vocally.
When in came time to actually put Delsarte's theories into action through leading the class in an exercise, I found it particularly difficult to locate any pre-exsisting activities. In the end, I was forced to create my own, albeit somewhat lame, I thought it to be quite effective. As I fed lines to students, I encourage each individual to interpret the line personally and relate it to one of the many zones of the body in relation to the notions of life, soul, and mind. To see people actually utilizing Delsarte's theories really emphasized how difficult it was to implement his method into our own actions. At that point all I could think about was how I was going to do all this within my own monologue. Yikes!
Once done with our daily dose of theorist reports, our class when back to discussing the contents of Everyman. As we each summarized the moral of the play, I interpreted it as though the only thing that accompanies a person in death are the intangibles of life. Almost as though when all your physical possessions have lost their value, you are only left with your good deeds and knowledge. Throughout Everyman, there is a sense that Everyman was cognizant of his lack of good deeds in life, yet he continued in his ways.
With that, we moved on to discussing possibilities within creating our own morality play. As my teacher put it, we attempted to "present a moral for good's sake" instead of simply consequences governing good action. As we bounced ideas around, I found it quite interesting to explore the anti-morality play where a negatively connoted euphemism could be turned around and presented as a moral. This alternative morality play could even propose that affluence, though often frowned upon, is beneficial in the sense that it can get you places. We all know its true.
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