This course introduces students to the craft of acting through a combination of theory and practice. Throughout the semester, students learn about the history of modern acting and train as actors in order to become better screenwriters and directors.

We begin with an overview of Konstantin Stanislavsky’s work at the Moscow Art Theatre and the development of his foundational System of acting. Subsequent classes chart the System’s legacy in American theatre and film, with a focus on the methods of three of the country’s most revered—and sometimes controversial—acting teachers: Lee Strasberg, Stella Adler, and Sanford Meisner. Significant class time is also devoted to studying the performances of actors trained by these luminaries, including James Dean, Al Pacino, Marlon Brando, and Diane Keaton. 

These seminar-style lectures alternate with acting workshops, in which we put the teachings of Stanislavsky and his heirs into practice in a safe and collaborative classroom environment. Through sensory awareness and affective memory exercises, improvisations, and scene studies, students learn to use their bodies and inner lives to play off of each other intuitively and create truthful, compelling characters. By immersing themselves in the actor’s process, students come out of the class as more knowledgeable and sensitive directors. The course culminates in a public performance of scenes. —Yonca Talu

Films studied include: Michael Curtiz’s Four Daughters (1938), starring John Garfield; Elia Kazan’s East of Eden (1955), starring James Dean; Sidney Lumet’s The Fugitive Kind (1960), starring Marlon Brando; and Warren Beatty’s Reds (1981), starring Diane Keaton.