Circle of attention
Stanislavski was concerned with actors getting distracted by the audience while performing
on stage. He sought ways to counteract this distraction. He however did not advocate that the actor
forget the audience, or tries to believe it did not exist. That, he felt, would be contradictory to the art
of theatre, because the audience was an important ‘co-creator’ of the performance.
Stanislavski’s main need was in finding a way to get the actor sufficiently interested in something (for example, an object) on stage so as to not find the presence of the audience a crippling factor. He felt that if his actors observed the object intensively enough, a desire would arise in them, to do something with it. This would, in turn intensify the observation and help develop an action with it.
Importantly, Stanislavski realized that actors lost control of their basic faculties on stage, and had to be re-taught how to achieve this in public. According to Sonia Moore, on stage an actor’s ‘natural psycho-physical union’ is broken, causing ‘paralysis of faculties’ 30). This is especially apparent in beginning actors. Stanislavski realized this early on in his experiments:
All of our acts, even the simplest, which are so familiar to us in everyday life, become strained when we appear behind the footlights before a public of a thousand people. This is why it is necessary to correct ourselves and learn again how to walk, move about, sit or lie down. It is essential to re-educate ourselves to look and see, on the stage, to listen and to hear.
Believing rightly or wrongly that concentration was the key to ‘re-educating’ the actor, Stanislavski created ‘Circles of Concentration’(of attention). These circles varied in size and had different -Microsoft word-Stanislavski textbook
Stanislavski’s main need was in finding a way to get the actor sufficiently interested in something (for example, an object) on stage so as to not find the presence of the audience a crippling factor. He felt that if his actors observed the object intensively enough, a desire would arise in them, to do something with it. This would, in turn intensify the observation and help develop an action with it.
Importantly, Stanislavski realized that actors lost control of their basic faculties on stage, and had to be re-taught how to achieve this in public. According to Sonia Moore, on stage an actor’s ‘natural psycho-physical union’ is broken, causing ‘paralysis of faculties’ 30). This is especially apparent in beginning actors. Stanislavski realized this early on in his experiments:
All of our acts, even the simplest, which are so familiar to us in everyday life, become strained when we appear behind the footlights before a public of a thousand people. This is why it is necessary to correct ourselves and learn again how to walk, move about, sit or lie down. It is essential to re-educate ourselves to look and see, on the stage, to listen and to hear.
Believing rightly or wrongly that concentration was the key to ‘re-educating’ the actor, Stanislavski created ‘Circles of Concentration’(of attention). These circles varied in size and had different -Microsoft word-Stanislavski textbook
Circle of Attention Exercise
we were made to close our eyes and imagine we were at a bus-stop ear where we lived.I chose the only which stand at while waiting for the bus to come.
We were told that we were chewing gum and we were holding our backpack over one shoulder.
I imagined chewing all sorts of different flavored gum and wearing my purple back pack.
Here My attention is solely focused inside of me.Concentrating on the flavor of the gum and chewing it.
My circle of attention is rather small.
We were next informed that there is a newspaper by our feet.
My reaction was to pick it up but to start brushing it along the floor with my foot as naturally i would be very bored waiting for my bus to come.
My circle of attention has slightly expanded.
Next we were told that you could see your bus coming but when it reaches its very packed and the back door of the bus opens but the front door doesn't and once some people get off it drives off not letting anyone on.
This would certainly annoy me.
When seeing the bus coming my Circle of attention would of expanded as i look out into the distance spotting the bus.
Where the train is in the picture above that's about how far i would look into the distance and recognise my bus.
We were then told that on the other side of the road a man and a woman are arguing in a car.We don't know what relation they have to each other and then she suddenly gets out the car and storms off.The man doesn't chase after her but after a couple of minutes drives off in a different direction.
Opposite my bus stop is another bus stop so above is a picture of another bus stop near where i live.
As you can see its rather packed so not only would this of caught my attention but it would of caught other peoples who were around the us stop.
I would spontaneously look at whats happening across the road but also do secretively so that involves making sure people at my bus stop aren't watching me watching them.
My Circle of attention would dramatically keep increasing and decreasing.
