The Benefits and Challenges of Method Acting
A personal assessment of Hollywood’s favourite acting buzzword
Method acting is a derivative of Stanislavski’s System that was taught to American students — Lee Strasberg, Stella Adler, Sanford Meisner and Robert Lewis, to name a few — by two of Stanislavski’s best students, Richard Boleslavsky and Maria Ouspenskaya.
There are several interpretations of The Method, inspired by Stanislavski’s System of acting, developed by many actors and theatre practitioners.
The three main versions of The Method — Lee Strasberg’s, Stella Adler’s and Sanford Meisner’s.
Robert Lewis, another of Strasberg’s colleagues at The Group Theatre, also developed his own version, albeit slightly less well-known.
Each focuses on different aspects of Stanislavski’s original works.
For example, Strasberg concentrates on the psychological development of the character to create a believable scene onstage, whereas Adler focuses on the sociological considerations in the process of building a character.
Meisner, with his somewhat unorthodox methods, concentrated upon the behavioural forming of a character.
Lewis, Meisner and Adler all veered away from Strasberg’s emphasis upon the use…
