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--I still have no clue what method acting is lots of issues | leave me a message 16:32, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
--I think this article would be greatly improved by referencing ariticles on alternative actice styles. [n00b]
There's a very good (and funny) anecdote which would go well in the section about derision of method acting -- Lawrence Olivier (I think?) saying to Dustin Hoffman (again, not sure) "try acting, it's so much easier". If someone can pin down the specifics... -- Tarquin
I have removed a request to E-mail someone (perhaps an author of the article) from the article, on the basis that this could be abused. What is Wikipedia policy on putting E-mail addresses in pages? -- Anon.
I read this article and I still don't know what method acting is. Philwelch 22:13, 27 Mar 2004 (UTC)
It's been a year, almost to the day, that I last complained about this article. I just read it again. Once again, I fail to comprehend what method acting is. Philwelch 02:45, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
149.99.155.34...why did you change it from "This approach..." to "This stupid approach??
I read many articles on this method and others. It seems like every site i go to I can't seem to find out what the methods actually are. I have a paper due tomorrow and i can't seem to figure out what to write!!!! (~*ELeNa*~)
I've added Daniel Day-Lewis to the list of method actors. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.164.125.89 (talk) 05:55, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
I don't know what method acting is, but even after reading the Wikipedia page I felt none the wiser. Could someone in the know improve the page so that Philistines like myself are enlightened. Thanks!
There is also a page entitled "Method" - is this the same thing described differently?
This subject area is unknown to me, but I find it odd that there can't be any categories for it... Cburnett 04:31, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Method isn't really a style of acting, now, is it? It's how the actor is trained and how they learn to act. If anything, the acting style related to the Method is naturalism, and the page title should reflect that. Cigarette 14:29, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I agree with Phil-- I still have no clue what method acting is.
The article seems to be overly enthusiastic about Method Acting. Perhaps it could be a little more NPOV?
Reading this article a few months after my first anniversary complaint, I now know what method acting is. Good work. — Phil Welch 22:00, 13 August 2005 (UTC)
I met an actor (Orson Beene ) who said that he was able to act drunk using this method: pretending to roll a ball in an imaginary mexican hat while he acted. When a play about Browning was produced on Broadway, it was said that a desk belonging to Browning with a note penned by him was placed on stage to help the actor summon the spirit of Browning. When Al Pacino worked on Richard III in Looking For Richard (a fine video introduction to the play), he said that he went to the stage that Richard had been performed in the 17th Century to help him pick up the spirit of the play -- and he called it method. I take it that using a conscious method or strategy to reach an acting goal is method acting. LF.MATC..
If I have to cry, I try to remember those things that made me cry in the past. That's THE METHOD. I might as well use my imagination and pretend I'm at my little sister's funeral.(WormE)
OK - I have (again) removed the references to Jason Bennett in this entry and I hope Mr. Bennett and/or his subordinates will leave it alone. I have no beef with Mr. Bennett (other than his presence here.) I am not a disgruntled former student. He may well be a very qualified teacher. He just does not - cannot - be considered in the same league as Michael Chekhov, Eugeny Vakhtangov, Uta Hagen, Richard Boleslawski, Stella Adler, Lee Strasberg, Sanford Meisner or Robert Lewis (who I added.) His insistence on being included in this august roster smacks of self promotion at best and delusions of grandeur at worst. Please. Whatcape 15:06, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
I'm quite confused... If all the techniques described in this article are method acting, then what exactly constitutes non-method acting? I have no formal acting training, but I do have some acting experience (I guess you could say I'm self-taught) and I can't imagine any other acting techniques. Marksman45 10:22, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
Someone who knows more about it than I do should add something about Kazan's contribution to Method Acting in American film.
This entry has been repeatedly spammed by Jason Bennett and his supporters. If this spam appears again, it should be deleted. Mr. Bennett's Wikipedia entry has been deleted for not being notable and his spam has been removed many times. Please help keep Wikipedia a place for sharing information not advertising. Tree Trimer 10:54, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Is this the same thing as "manic acting"? --bakuyaku 05:38, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Either those books were used as sources for writing the article --> references Or they are links with further information --> external links Or they are books with more information --> Recommended reading. There's no such thing as external references. So which of those were used in the writing of this article? - Mgm|(talk) 23:10, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
This section is pretty horrible, and I think reflects a common misconception of method acting. If someone says method acting is "really doing something" onstage or on-camera, that refers to having an real intention or objective, not really waxing your chest. (No offense to Steve Carell.) And while Robert DeNiro is definitely a method actor, it isn't because he gained weight for a part. This whole article has citing problem, but I'm really thinking that this whole section should be deleted, and only actors who can be verifiably cited as claiming to be method actors, or using method techniques, should be added back in. There are only two citations right now, and the link for Paul Newman is broken, and the one for George Peppard goes to IMDB, which is kind of iffy (since anyone can add anything to IMDB, I believe). I'd like to get some comments before I go ahead and delete a whole section, though. Thoughts? --Brian Olsen 17:58, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
This article uses a very informal, even discussional tone, one quite definitely unencyclopedic. It requires a fair amount of cleanup to meet wikipedia's standards of quality. I might get around to it, or maybe someone else will (that would be great). The part where a second author interjects his opinion in the middle of the article requires cited sources as well as a definite change in wording.Jasper124c41 05:52, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
There are some misconceptions, I think, being promulgated in the above encapsulation of Method Acting.
Yes, it was brought to the fore of theatrical awareness by the the Actors Studio, it was utterly indebted to the groundbreaking thinking of Konstantin Stanislavski in his seminal work "An Actor Prepares". He was the first to really analize what a performer must do technically to prepare to step on stage. It is far more complex than simply understanding "motivations and emotions". It is about how to prepare oneself to step before an audience.
The act of standing up in front of other people to do anything, give a speech, lead a meeting, let alone to try and draw an audience into a completely different reality; is an un-natural act.
The person choosing to do this is beset by tension.
And it is the ability to develop a set of techniques that can reduce tension below the level where it will inhibit one's ablility to be creative in front of an audience; that is at the core of the exercises surrounding "The Method."
Tension is the enemy of creation.
The artist -- in whatever medium -- must be able to reduce tension to a level below which it will allow creativity, impulse, and imagination to flow freely. In the moment to moment circumstance of the a living stage performance this is life or death in terms of a successful performance.
From a stage performers point of view, which is all I know, technical mastery of tools to control and reduce tension are the first step in building a "method" which will allow one to act - characterization can only begin after tension has been managed through technique. -- (added to main article by Dbobr, 00:32, March 7, 2007)
Opposite to Hollywood legend, Marlon Brando never considered himself a method actor. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.192.243.207 (talk) 13:24, 5 April 2007 (UTC).
Brando never considered hiumself a method acotr, this is true. That does not mean that he wasn't one, or that it was Hollywood leggend. He nevr said "I am a Method Actor," but he was trained by Lee (Strasberg) and did use many of his techinques. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.4.21.71 (talk) 17:25, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
Hello all. Just a note to explain why I've removed Vakhtangov's name from the list of Method teachers in this article.
The 'Method,' in whichever form you consider it, is emphatically not identical with the 'system' that Stanislavski developed. One is an American acting tradition, the other a Russian one. Although they are related genealogically, thanks to the American tour of Stanislavski's Moscow Arts Theatre in the early twenties that left behind actors who began to teach the early stages of Stanislavski's development of his 'system', there are many important divergences between the two approaches. Given this, Vakhtangov, who is undoubtedly an important figure in the history of acting, more properly belongs on one of the pages describing the Russian approach. He did not, to my knowledge (and please feel free to correct me with a citation if I'm mistaken), ever teach in America, nor were his ideas about theatre and acting ever influenced by any of the American developers of the Method (Strasberg, Adler, Meisner et al.. It is inaccurate, therefore, to describe him as a teacher of 'Method Acting'. I have, therefore, removed his name.
DionysosProteus 17:16, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
Sense Memory My biggest problem with this artticle, as a Method Actor who studied 10 years at the Strasberg Institute, is that it makes no mention of Sense Memory. Sense Memory is the basic tenant of Lee's work. It's what the whole school is built on. Most excersizes done in "Method work" relate to sense memory. I could write an article on it, myself, given the time... but it really needs to be mentioned. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.4.21.71 (talk) 17:28, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
This section has recently been cut:
These actors have acknowledged using Method Acting as part of their technique:
Notes:
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