Specifics of interpretation of traditional eastern practices in European acting training

The purpose of the article is to identify the features of adaptation of oriental theatrical, physical, and spiritual practices by representatives of the European theater in the process of developing methods of actor training based on the analysis of acting training of leading directors of the twentieth century. - K. Stanislavsky, E. Grotovsky, E. Barba. Methodology. A typological method was used (to determine the specifics of acting training methods by K. Stanislavsky, E. Grotovsky, and E. Barba; interpretive method and method of comparative analysis (to identify common and different aspects of interpretation of Eastern practices by European directors); phenomenological method (to identify features of Eastern and spiritual practices and their adaptation to acting training), etc. Scientific novelty The specifics of borrowing and interpretation of traditional in East, Southeast, and Central Asia elements of actor training by Russian and European theater directors of the twentieth century are considered. K. Stanislavsky, E. Grotovsky, and E. Barba and revealed the peculiarities of adaptation by theater directors and teachers of elements of hatha yoga and Raja Yoga in accordance with their own understanding of the purpose of training in the art of acting. Conclusions. Various elements of traditional Western and Eastern cultural practices have been the focus of twentieth-century theater directors. in the process of developing innovative methods and techniques of educating the actor. Their research of local theatrical cultures contributed to the search for universal laws of stage conventionality, new acting methods of self-knowledge, and the disclosure of their own creative potential. In their own search for methods of educating the actor theater directors of the twentieth century. turn to the Eastern worldview, because the extraordinary method and a special view of the nature of consciousness and its functioning in the world contributes to the creation of training to solve a number of applied problems in the context of the specifics of acting. Translating material (Eastern practices) into a Western conceptual structure or any kind of synthesis of Eastern and Western concepts, simplifying, does not reveal the full depth of Eastern practices and religious orientations, but contributes to the actor's mastery of innovative methodological approaches, including intuitive insights, contemplation, contemplation. etc.

PROSES KREATIF SUTRADARA RACHMAN SABUR DARI TEATER PAYUNG HITAM BANDUNG

Abstrak: Rachman Sabur adalah salah seorang sutradara teater dari kelompok Teater Payung Hitam Bandung. Sejak kecil ia sudah mulai suka menonton berbagai pertunjukan seperti sandiwara sunda, tari, wayang dan reog. Proses kreatif Rachman Sabur menyutradarai drama verbal dan teater non verbal mendapat pujian dari berbagai tokoh teater dan mempunyai banyak penonton. Penelitian ini menggunakan pendekatan proses kreatif Graham Wallas yang dikemukakan oleh Irma Damayanti dalam buku Psikologi Seni (2006) yang meliputi Preparation (persiapan), Incubation (pengeraman), Ilumination (ilham, inspirasi), verification (pembuktian atau pengujian). Metode yang digunakan adalah deskritif analisis, dengan teknik pengumpulan data melalui wawancara dengan Rachman Sabur, para pemeran, para pendukung dan pengamat teater dari Bandung. Selain itu juga data diambil dari berbagai ulasan tentang karya-karya penyutradaraannya, ulasan dari surat kabar dan Website dari para pengulas pertunjukan teater yang terpercaya. Dari pendekatan dan metode tersebut akan terurai proses kreatif Rachman Sabur dalam melahirkan karya-karyanya. Kata kunci: Proses Kreatif, Rachman Sabur, Teater Payung Hitam, Graham Wallas Abstract: Rachman Sabur is one of the theater directors of the Bandung Black Payung Theater group. Since childhood, he has started to like watching various performances such as Sundanese plays, dance, wayang and reog. Sabur's creative process in directing verbal dramas and non-verbal theaters has received praise from various theater figures and has a large audience. This study uses the creative process approach of Graham Wallas proposed by Irma Damayanti in the book Psychology of Art (2006) which includes Preparation (preparation), Incubation (incubation), Illumination (inspiration, inspiration), verification (proof or testing). The method used is descriptive analysis, with data collection techniques through interviews with Rachman Sabur, actors, supporters and theater observers from Bandung. In addition, data is also taken from various reviews of his directing works, reviews from newspapers and websites from trusted reviewers of theater performances. From these approaches and methods, Sabur's creative process in producing his works will be unravelled. Keywords: Creative Process, Rachman Sabur, Payung Hitam Theatre, Graham Wallas

Stage design of the modern Ukrainian director theater

The purpose of the article is to identify and analyze the leading directions in the development of stage design in modern domestic director's theater, as well as to explore the problem of director's search in stage design. Methodology. A systematic method was applied, aimed at theoretical and artistic, and practical comprehension of the main aspects of the process of solving a stage work in the complex of organizing stage action and stage space; the method of artistic-critical analysis in the process of studying the modern theatrical repertoire, made it possible to study the stage design of the domestic director's theater in the variety of its forms; the typological method, helped to systematize traditional and innovative approaches to the development and implementation of stage design, as well as to determine its features in modern Ukrainian theater; the method of figurative and stylistic analysis, thanks to which the specifics of the stage design of modern productions of Ukrainian theater directors have been identified and analyzed; the hermeneutic method helped to identify and interpret the meanings laid down by the director in the rhythm-chronotopic configuration of the stage design. Scientific novelty. The directing-staging and scenographic activity of the leading Ukrainian directors (B. Polishchuk, D. Kostyuminsky, S. Masloboyshchikova) has been investigated, the variable variety of approaches to solving stage design in modern Ukrainian drama theater has been revealed and their influence on the artistic structure of the performance has been characterized; the specifics of the design solution for a modern theatrical performance by Ukrainian stage designers, as well as production directors, have been determined. Сonclusions. The transformations of the functions and vocabulary of stage design in Ukrainian directing theater XXI century are directly related to changes in the visual aesthetics of modern theatrical art, the problems of interpretation of the literary source, and its stage embodiment. Taking over the functions of a theatrical artist, stage directors strive to create a unique author's environment for a dramatic situation, visualizing a literary text in the space-time continuum of presentation in accordance with the individual definition of the meaning of the production, in an effort to accurately illuminate their own concept. But in the production, carried out by theatrical artists, the dominant position is occupied by the image - the performance is a series of visual images, and visual symbols exert an emotional impact on the viewer, which is usually stronger than a dramatic text and acting.

PECULIARITIES OF COMPREHENSION OF CHEKHOV’s WORKS IN SPAIN

The article deals with the process of comprehension of A.P. Chekhov's works in the Spanish culture. It’s based on Russian and foreign sources. The author of the article demonstrates the most significant moments in the understanding of the Russian writer by Spanish literary critics, theater directors and film directors. The article contains a brief overview of key periodicals and books, plays and film adaptations that illustrate the evolution of comprehension of Chekhov's works. Citations of Spanish culture figures, critics, translators and journalists are given by author's translation from their works and interviews. The article illustrates the period from the first mention of Chekhov's name in the Spanish press in 1894 to the nowadays. The author pays special attention to the first screen versions of the Russian playwright’s plays and the most eccentric experimental staging in the capital and provincial theaters of Spain.

Nadezhda Bromley and Boris Sushkevich: Actors, Directors, Vakhtangov Followers (Materials for a Creative Biography)

Boris Sushkevich and Nadezhda Bromley (Sushkevich-Bromley) are remarkable theatrical figures, actors and directors whose lot was connected with the bright and dramatic periods of our country’s theatrical life from the beginning to the middle of the 20th century. They devoted a part of their professional life to the 1st Studio of the Moscow Art Theatre (from 1919 — Moscow Art Academic Theatre), which later became a separate theater (Moscow Art Academic Theatre II, 1924—1936). Since the middle of the 1930s, they worked in leading Leningrad theaters — the Leningrad State Academic Drama Theater (Alexandrinsky Theatre) and the New Theater (1933—1953, now the Saint Petersburg Lensoviet Theatre). This article introduces little-studied archival sources of biographical nature related to the work of these outstanding cultural figures.Nadezhda Nikolayevna Bromley was a heiress of the Bromley — Sherwood creative dynasties, which had made a significant contribution to Russian culture. She joined the troupe of the Moscow Art Theater in 1908, performed on the stage of the 1st Studio (1918—1924), was one of the leading actresses of the Moscow Art Academic Theatre II after its separation, participated in its Directing Department being in charge of the literary part. Generously gifted by nature, N. Bromley wrote poems, short stories, novels; her fictional works “From the Notes of the Last God” (1927) and “Gargantua’s Descendant” (1930) earned critical acclaim. Two plays by N. Bromley were staged in the Moscow Art Academic Theatre II. One of them — the full of hyperbole and grotesque “Archangel Michael” — was passionately accepted by E.B. Vakhtangov and A.V. Lunacharsky, though never shown to a wide audience. At the Leningrad State Academic Drama Theater and the New Theater, N. Bromley not only successfully played, but also staged performances based on the works by A.P. Chekhov, A. Tolstoy, M. Gorky, F. Schiller, and W. Shakespeare.Boris Mikhailovich Sushkevich, brought up by the Theater School of the Moscow Art Academic Theatre and in the Vakhtangov tradition of the playing grotesque, is one of the most interesting and original theater directors of his time. His directorial work in the play “The Cricket on the Hearth” based on a Christmas fairy tale by Charles Dickens became the hallmark of the 1st Studio (and later of the Moscow Art Academic Theatre II as well). This play remained in the theatre’s repertoire until January 1936. B. Sushkevich was a recognized theatre teacher — with his help, the Leningrad Theater Institute (now the Russian State Institute of Performing Arts) was established in 1939. Together with N. Bromley, he managed to fill the New Theater with bright creative content and make it a favorite of the Leningrad audience.This research expands the understanding of a number of yet unexplored aspects of the history of theater in our country and recreates the event context of the era.

THE ROLE OF PLASTIC SYMBOLS IN A DRAMATIC PERFORMANCE (TO THE EXPERIENCE OF COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS)

In modern drama theater directing, there is a tendency to translate literary or verbal idioms into the language of the stage. In the space of the scene, every day, familiar expressions are recreated in the literal sense, and are read in the figurative sense. Drama theater directors strive to give symbolic meanings to the associative characteristics of certain events and situations. The theater has long used plastic and/or dance in its arsenal of artistic means to symbolize artistic images. Symbolists of stage art affirm the search for inner meanings in expression and attempts to make super reality visible. The desire of dramatic art to form a new stage language, which is based on the reorganization of the action, character, time and space, and the speech component of the play, becomes natural. The appeal of directors to the plastic nature of the actor, as one of the bright means of artistic expression in the structure of a dramatic performance, is supported by the nature of the multi-valued artistic and figurative specificity of the choreographic art’s language, which is a set of visual signs. Such visual and acoustic forms of stage action make it possible to trace the process of transformation of visible objects in the mind of the viewer before their projection into the subconscious. A symbol expressed in plastic language and focused on identifying internal emotional processes that are usually summarized in a dramatic performance by a word can be called the main typological characteristic of the interweaving of plastic and dance in the canvas of stage action. The modern theater considers the role of semantic physical activity, plastics and dance fundamental in the formation of the language of symbols. The authors offer an attempt to comprehend and compare the works of "Othello" by the Lithuanian director E. Nyakroshus and "Block" by the Kazakh director D. Zhumabayeva, where the role of plastic symbols in the formation of a special semantic performance’s structure is revealed through the prism of multi-episode, open play and physical actors action. The expressive symbol’s language of the analyzed performances of each director has its own characteristics and way of expression. The active appeal to the principles of performance organization and plastic symbolization of artistic images remains common for all. The completeness and autonomy of each individual scene together make the multi-episode performance, where there is no causal relationship between such independent acts. Involving the viewer in the situation of an open game used in the works of the mentioned directors allows the viewer to see the material in an unexpected angle, to engage in a situation of meaningful activity, in which the motive is not the result, but the gameplay itself. Specific physical actions of actors aimed at their direct application, without any additional subtext or intent, allow the actor to live these feelings in performances as their own, without any artificial addition. This all shows the similarity of directing techniques of Lithuanian and Kazakh theater figures. Along with acting, metaphors and symbols in plastic embodiment act as a constructive and semantic means in the context of the dramatic canvas. Appealing to the viewer's subconscious through plastic symbols, which play a huge role in creating the performance, contributes to the generation of complex associations, it appeals to the feelings of the viewer.

THEATER AND THEATRICALITY IN THEIR RELATION TO HISTORY AND THE ARTS IN THE NOVELS OF VLADIMIR SHAROV

Vladimir Sharov (1952–2018), a distinguished contemporary Russian writer, published nine quasi historical novels. Each of his novels suggests a different semi-fantastical version of Russian history that is locked into continuing cycles or - to use Sharov’s preferred word - “rehearsals” of violence. Theater and performance are a recurring theme in Sharov’s prose. In Before and During [До и во время], one of the main characters is Alexander Scriabin. In The Rehearsals [Репетиции] Patriarch Nikon orders a play – a mystery-play about Easter — in which the amateur peasant actors are assigned roles from the Bible and replay these roles for generations. In Should Not I Spare [Мне ли не пожалеть], the opening section shows characters participating in Chekhov’s plays, and the main part of the narration tells the story of staging an oratorio. In the last two novels, several of the protagonists are theater directors. This article argues that for Sharov, theater is an apt metaphor for history and a basic ontological principle, because theater is an experience that can be documented but is never reproduced in exactly the same form. The article examines how Sharov brings out the power of the playwright, director, and actor to implement multiple and different scripts and life stories. Life and art in his works imitate each other through a constant multiplication of versions or rehearsals - “rehearsals” in its expanded sense as reinterpretations, revisions, rewritings, and continuations.

Female directors of contemporary Polish theater and cinema (selected examples)

The issue of artistic careers is rarely tackled by Polish sociologists. The article is an analysis of the work of selected contemporary Polish female film and theater directors. The present study exploits secondary sources (monographs and scientific studies, press and internet publications, interviews with directors) and primary sources: interviews with creators of Polish drama theaters conducted as part of the authors’ own research. Women in Polish theater and film are slowly breakingthe glass ceiling and they are taking their rightful place in the pantheon of artists who have a lot to say about our difficult modern times. Polish directors are true individuals however they raise important social problems. Their creativity is not feminist. They have their own signature style and their sex is of secondary importance.

Schulz na scenie

The aim of this paper is to answer the question why theatrical performances based on the literary works of Bruno Schulz usually turn out disappointing. It was first posed by Jerzy Jarzębski 25 years ago. The author of the present paper discusses Jarzębski’s theses and proposes his own explanation. He disagrees with a claim that Schulz’s fiction is “unstageable” by nature. In the era of post-dramatic theatre, the idea of “unstageability” is evidently anachronistic. Therefore, the author demonstrates that there must be something wrong in the theater directors’ approaches to Schulz and his works. An analysis of several performances from the recent decade – directed by Petr Boháč, Robert Drobniuch, Konrad Dworakowski, Edyta Janusz-Ehrlich, Tomasz Kajdański, Jacek Krawczyk, Leszek Mądzik, Jan Szurmiej, Piotr Tomaszuk, Julia Wernio, Ingmar Villqist and Rudolf Zioło – leads to a conclusion that contemporary artists who deal with Schulz are unable to look at him from a distance and free themselves from his influence. They are simply too passive to create an autonomous theatrical vision in which Schulz’s literary world would be only a component and not the dominant substance. For this reason, their theatrical adaptations remain unsuccessful. In Polish theater there was only one artist who became a real partner for Schulz, strong enough to face his genius –Tadeusz Kantor. In his Dead Class (1975), Kantor managed to “utilize” the poetics of Schulz’s stories to create his own, original, and totally independent narrative. Since that time, each director who wants to stage Schulz’s literary works has had to struggle not only with the author of The Cinnamon Shops, but also with the leader of the Theater of Death. And this is, indeed, a very difficult task.

Antonin Artaud sur la scène espagnole (1969-2016)

La influencia de las teorías de Artaud en el mundo del teatro es, a día de hoy, una realidad indiscutible. En efecto, Artaud representa uno de los pilares sobre el que reposan los grupos colectivos de teatro independiente surgidos en los años 60-70 (Living Theater, etc.); las teorías más innovadoras de directores teatrales de renombre como Jerzy Grotowski o Peter Brook; el teatro posdramático (la performance, entre otros) y el nuevo rango otorgado a la palabra en la representación teatral. En la actualidad, Artaud es una referencia ineludible en el ámbito teatral: Artaud y El teatro y la peste; Artaud y El teatro de la crueldad; escritos teóricos recogidos en El teatro y su doble. Este artículo se propone abordar la recepción de Artaud en la escena teatral española. Nos interesa identificar qué representaciones de Artaud se han privilegiado – el hombre de teatro, el loco, el poeta, el enfermo… – y examinar la incidencia de dichos espectáculos en la divulgación de la obra de Antonin Artaud en España. The influence of Artaud's theories in the world of theatre is, today, an indisputable reality. Indeed, Artaud represents the pillar on which the collective groups of independent theatre arisen in the years 60-70 (Living Theater, etc.) rest; the most innovative theories of renowned theater directors such as Jerzy Grotowski or Peter Brook; the postdramatic theatre (the performance, among others) and the new rank granted to the word in the theatrical representation. At present, Artaud is an inescapable reference in the theatrical field: Artaud and The theatre and the plague; Artaud and Theatre of cruelty; theoretical writings collected in Theatre and its double. This article aims to address the reception of Artaud on the Spanish theatre stage. We are interested in revealing what representations of Artaud have been privileged - the theatre man, the madman, the poet, the sick ... - and examine the incidence of these performances in the dissemination of the work of Antonin Artaud in Spain. La influencia de las teorías de Artaud en el mundo del teatro es, a día de hoy, una realidad indiscutible. En efecto, Artaud representa uno de los pilares sobre el que reposan los grupos colectivos de teatro independiente surgidos en los años 60-70 (Living Theater, etc.); las teorías más innovadoras de directores teatrales de renombre como Jerzy Grotowski o Peter Brook; el teatro posdramático (la performance, entre otros) y el nuevo rango otorgado a la palabra en la representación teatral. En la actualidad, Artaud es una referencia ineludible en el ámbito teatral: Artaud y El teatro y la peste; Artaud y El teatro de la crueldad; escritos teóricos recogidos en El teatro y su doble. Este artículo se propone abordar la recepción de Artaud en la escena teatral española. Nos interesa identificar qué representaciones de Artaud se han privilegiado – el hombre de teatro, el loco, el poeta, el enfermo… – y examinar la incidencia de dichos espectáculos en la divulgación de la obra de Antonin Artaud en España.