The Lee Strasberg Notes

233 Pages·2010·11.35 MB·English

by  Lola Cohen

THE LEE STRASBERG NOTES

What can Lee Strasberg teach the modern actor? The Lee Strasberg
Notes reproduces the original teachings of a unique voice in actor
training for the very fi rst time, presenting an enlightening approach
to today’s practitioners.
Compiled and edited by Lola Cohen, an acting teacher at the Lee
Strasberg Theater and Film Institute and one his former pupils, the
book is based on unpublished transcripts of his own classes on
acting, directing and Shakespeare, re-creating his theoretical
approach, as well as the practical exercises used by his students.
The book features Strasberg’s teachings on:

Training and exercises

•
Characters and scenes

•
Directing and the Method

•
Shakespeare and Stanislavski

•
The theater, acting and actors.

•

Including a Preface by Anna Strasberg and a Foreword by Martin
Sheen, this illuminating book brings the reader closer to Strasberg’s
own methods than any other, making it a phenomenal resource for
students, actors, and directors.

Lola Cohen has taught acting for over twenty three years at the Lee
Strasberg Theater and Film Institute and for the last eleven years as
adjunct professor for NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts Acting
Program. She has directed productions of plays with student and
professional actors including A Midsummer Night’s Dream for the
Woodstock Youth Theater, Jean Genet’s The Maids at the Stras-
berg Institute and Lewis John Carlino’s Snowangel while 2009
Artist-in-Residence at SUNY-Ulster.

THE LEE STRASBERG
NOTES

Edited by
Lola Cohen

First published 2010 by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an inform business

Text © 2010 The Strasberg Estate
Selection and editorial material © 2010 Lola Cohen

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Strasberg, Lee.
The Lee Strasberg Notes / [compiled and edited by] Lola Cohen.
p. cm.
Summary: Never before published transcripts from Lee Strasberg’s teachings
at his school in New York City in the last seven years of his life.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Method (Acting) 2. Strasberg, Lee. 3. Acting--Study and teaching.
4. Theater--Production and direction. I. Cohen, Lola. II. Title.
PN2062.S7953 2010
792.02’8--dc22)

ISBN10: 0-415-55185-4 (hbk)
ISBN10: 0-415-55186-2 (pbk)
ISBN10: 0-203-86313-5 (ebk)
ISBN13: 978-0-415-55185-4 (hbk)
ISBN13: 978-0-415-55186-1 (pbk)
ISBN13: 978-0-203-86313-8 (ebk)

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010.

To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s
collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.

ISBN 0-203-86313-5 Master e-book ISBN

The Method is an amalgam of the work of Stanislavski, Vakhtan-
gov, Meyerhold, and the Group Theater. Observing and analyzing
their work is essential in forming a practical comprehension of the
theoretical approach of our work, the training, and its use in diverse
forms of production. People would be mistaken if they looked to
any of these sources as independently embodying the Method. For
example, Vakhtangov believed the audience should be made aware
that they were in the theater. In the Group Theater, we believed
that the audience can forget where they are and be transported to
the imaginary place of the play, a place that doesn’t have to be
purely realistic. It has to be a place spiritually, physically, and emo-
tionally on a deeper, higher more intense level of reality where emo-
tions are revived for the purpose of art.
What developed into the Method at the Group Theater has been
kept alive at the Strasberg Institute where we have retained the basic
discoveries of Stanislavski as I understand them and to which I have
contributed additional elements. Our purpose is to create a perma-
nent place where this work would be systematically taught, fostered
and interpreted in order to create the foundation for the training of
actors and directors. Today, our work is shared with actors all over
the world, not just with student actors but with professional actors
and directors which is essentially for whom the work is intended.
Lee Strasberg

vii

CONTENTS

List of Illustrations xi
Preface by Anna Strasberg xv
Note from Adam Strasberg xvii
Note from David Lee Strasberg xviii
Foreword by Martin Sheen xix
Acknowledgements xxi
Introduction by Lola Cohen xxv

Part 1 Training and exercises
1
Lee Strasberg on training 1
Lee Strasberg on relaxation and concentration 5
Lee Strasberg on habits and conditioning 6
Relaxation exercise 7
Relaxing in the chair 7
Releasing tension 8
Use of sound 11
Abstract or additional movement 12
Sense memory exercises 13
Lee Strasberg on sense memory 14
Sequence of sense memory exercises 16
Breakfast drink 17
Mirror/make-up or shaving 17
Three pieces of material 18
Putting on and taking off shoes and socks or
stockings 19
Sunshine 19
Sharp pain 20
Sharp taste and sharp smell 20
Overall sensations 21
Personal objects 22

CONTENTS

viii

Combinations of exercises 23
Private moment exercise 24
Emotional memory exercise 26
Lee Strasberg on emotional memory 26
Choosing the experience or event 29
Performing the exercise 31
The distinction between sense memory and emotional
memory 33
Animal exercise 34
Song and dance exercise 36
Song 37
Dance 39
Movement with sound exercise 39
Voice exercises 39
Voice exercise 1 41
Voice exercise 2 41
Voice exercise 3 41

Part 2 Characters and scenes
43
Creating the character 43
Given circumstances 45
Creating imaginary realities with sense and emotional
memory 45
Words and lines 47
Anticipation 51
Speaking out 51
Improvisation 52
The problem of repetition 55
Working with the director 56

Part 3 Scene critiques
59

Part 4 Directing and the Method
81
Introduction 81
Achieving your vision 83
Working with the actor 86
Casting 91
The set 96
Lighting 103
Music 104
The process of rehearsal 107
Week 1: Reading rehearsals 109

CONTENTS

ix

Week 2: Blocking and memorizing lines 111
Week 3: Line rehearsals and run throughs 112
Week 4: Dress rehearsal 112
Opening nights 113
Group/mass scenes 113
Directors’ work with amateur actors 114
Directors’ work with playwrights 116
Directing in the cinema 118
Lee Strasberg on great directors 118
Eugene Vakhtangov 118
Vsevolod Meyerhold 121
David Belasco 122
Lee Strasberg on fi lm directors 123
Avant-garde directors 125
Directing dance 127
Books on directing 128

Part 5 Lee Strasberg on Shakespeare and Stanislavski
137
Shakespeare 137
Stanislavski 144

Part 6 Lee Strasberg on the theater, acting, and actors 157
The origin of the Method 157
Historical controversy over Method acting 158
The origin of the Method in American theater 159
Edmund Kean 160
William Macready 160
Edwin Booth 160
Henry Irving 161
The Italians: Tommaso Salvini and Giovanni Grasso 161
Eleanora Duse and Sarah Bernhardt 163
Anton Chekhov 165
Michael Chekhov 166
Emil Jannings 167
John Barrymore 167
Louise Brooks 168
Paul Muni 168
Bertolt Brecht 169
Kim Stanley 170
Patricia Neal 170
Recognition of talent in the theater 171
Poetry 173

CONTENTS

x

Acting: cinema vs stage 174
Courage in the theater 175

Lee Strasberg Theater and Film Institute recommended
reading on theater 185

Index 191

xi

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Lee Strasberg conducting an Acting Class/Sense Memory
Exercises at the Lee Strasberg Theater and Film Institute,
New York, 1977
4

Lee Strasberg addressing acting students in Bochum,
W. Germany, 1978
4

Lee Strasberg demonstrating an exercise in Bochum,
W. Germany, 1978
35

Lee Strasberg’s father, Baruch Strasberg. Strasberg family
photo
71

Lee Strasberg’s mother, Ida Strasberg. Strasberg family
photo
71

Paula Miller Strasberg and Lee Strasberg at the Stanislavski
Centennial, Moscow 1963. Strasberg family photo
72

John Strasberg and his father, Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio,
c.1966. Photo by Peter Basch, courtesy of Staley-Wise Gallery 72

Lee Strasberg and his daughter Susan Strasberg, c. 1961.
Strasberg family photo
73

Lee Strasberg and Clifford Odets in Fire Island, c.1950.
Strasberg family photo
74

Lee Strasberg holding his dog Cherie in Fire Island, 1967.
Photo courtesy of Syeus Mottel
74

Anna and Lee Strasberg at an Actors Studio session, c. 1968
75

Lee Strasberg in a bookstore in Japan, 1975. Strasberg family
photo
75

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

xii

Lee Strasberg with his granddaughter Jennifer, daughter of
Susan Strasberg, c.1968. Strasberg family photo
76

Lee Strasberg with sons, Adam and David, 1982. Photo
courtesy of Ken Regan, Camera 5
76

Anna and Lee Strasberg at Joe Allen’s Restaurant,
Los Angeles, 1980. Strasberg family photo
77

Lee Strasberg cooking at home in New York City, 1977.
Photo courtesy of Ken Regan, Camera 5
77

Lee Strasberg with sons, David Lee and Adam in front of
the Actors Studio. 1976
78

Lee and Anna Strasberg at their home in Los Angeles, 1975.
Photo courtesy of Elyse Lewin
79

Three great directors, David Belasco, Konstantin
Stanislavski, and Max Reinhardt
129

Eugene Vakhtangov, Russian actor and director
(1883–1922)
130

Gorki’s Yegor Bulichev and Others at the Vakhtangov
Theater, 1932
131

Vsevolod Meyerhold, Russian actor and director
(1874–1940)
131

Vsevolod Meyerhold’s production of Ostrovksi’s
The Forest, 1924
132

Vsevolod Meyerhold’s production of Dumas’
The Lady of the Camellias, 1933
132

Alexander Kirkland and J. Edward Bromberg in the Group
Theater’s Pullitzer Prize winning production of Sidney
Kingsley’s Men in White, directed by Lee Strasberg, 1933.
Photo courtesy of Billy Rose Theater Division, New York
Public Library for the Performing Arts, Astor, Lenox
and Tilden Foundations
133

Skipper Next to God playbill, starring John Garfi eld,
directed by Lee Strasberg, 1948. PLAYBILL® Used by
permission
134

Anton Chekhov’s The Three Sisters, Actors Studio
production, directed by Lee Strasberg, 1964
135

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

xiii

Kim Stanley as Masha in Anton Chekhov’s The Three
Sisters, Actors Studio production directed by
Lee Strasberg, 1964
135

Francis Ford Coppola and Lee Strasberg, on location of
The Godfather Part II, 1974
136

Elia Kazan and Lee Strasberg at the Strasberg apartment,
NYC c. 1981. Photo courtesy of Alon Reininger
136

Edmund Kean, English actor (1787–1833) as six of
Shakespeare’s characters at the Drury Lane Theater
152

John Barrymore, American actor (1882–1942) as Hamlet,
1922
153

Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya at the Moscow Art Theater,
directed by Konstantin Stanislavski, 1899
154

Anton Chekhov’s The Three Sisters at the Moscow Art
Theater directed by Konstantin Stanislavki, 1901
154

Lee Strasberg at the Stanislavski Centennial, Moscow, 1963
155

Edmund Kean, English Actor (1789–1833), as Shylock in
The Merchant of Venice
177

Othello playbill, starring Tomasso Salvini, Italian actor
(1829–1915)
178

Eleanora Duse, Italian actress (1858–1924). Photo courtesy
of Lebrecht Music & Arts
179

Giovanni Grasso, Italian actor (1873–1930).
Photo courtesy of Billy Rose Theater Division,
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts,
Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations
180

Anton Chekhov, Russian dramatist (1860–1904).
Courtesy of Lebrecht Authors
181

Maria Ouspenskaya in Hans Weirs-Jenssen’s The Witch,
1926. Lee Strasberg’s teacher at the American Laboratory
Theater. Photo courtesy of Maurice Goldberg
181

Lee Strasberg as the pedlar in Green Grow the Lilacs,
Garrick Theater, NY, 1931. Photo courtesy of
Billy Rose Theater Division, New York Public Library for
the Performing Arts, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations
182

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

xiv

Feodor Chaliapin, Russian opera singer (1869–1942)
182

Edward Gordon Craig, English director and designer
(1872–1966)
183

Cheryl Crawford, Lee Strasberg, and Harold Clurman,
founders of the Group Theater, 1931
184

Bertolt Brecht letter to Lee Strasberg – letter dated
January 27, 1936. Courtesy of the Brecht Estate
184

Cheryl Crawford and Lee Strasberg at the announcement
of the Actors Studio Theater, 1962. Photo courtesy of
Billy Rose Theater Division, New York Public Library for the
Performing Arts, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations
185

On the set of Going in Style, directed by Martin Brest,
starring George Burns, Art Carney, and Lee Strasberg,
1979. Photo courtesy of Ken Regan, Camera 5
185