The actor and the character: explorations in the psychology of transformative acting by Vladimir Mirodan (Routledge, 2019). A critical response by Julian Jones

Abstract

At least since Denis Diderot’s 18 century essay, Paradoxe Sur Le Comedien (c.1773), the question about what, precisely, constitutes the nature of acting has been hotly debated, both within the acting profession itself (as part of an actor’s practice) and, more theoretically, within academia. Indeed, a concern relating to the actor’s apparent transformation into someone else is already present in Plato – a concern that led to the philosopher’s distrust of the theatre and mimesis more generally. A central question in the debate is this: does the actor experience a dual consciousness, where (s)he is both “living character” and “controlling artist” at one and the same time, OR does the actor identify so completely with the written character that a new entity, the actor-character, is born – Ya Esm “I am being” – as Stanislavsky puts it (Stanislavski 2008, p.684)? Vladimir Mirodan’s The Actor and the Character: Explorations in the Psychology of Transformative Acting continues this discussion on the nature of acting, comparing, specifically, the “actor-in-action”model – where what the audience sees is the experiencing, emotionally authentic actor “living truthfully under the imaginary circumstances” of the play (see Meisner et al.) – versus the “transformative actor”, where the actor’s personality and that of the character remain distinct. This, according toMichael Chekhov, allows for an acknowledgement of the actor as “artist”, who transcends his/her own personality through a process of transformation, thus creating a character, who is “other” than them (p.3). Mirodan’s particular approach here is to employ insights gained from the study of both Psychoanalysis (a staple of acting theory and practice since the first half of the 20 century) and the more recent findings from Scientific Psychology (or Cognitive Science), as a frame for analysing the actor’s method of creating character. Terms such as “body-mind” are used throughout, in recognition of the rejection of a Cartesian duality – a move also reflected in the contemporary popularity, and ubiquitous use of, the term psycho-physicality in actor training (see, for example, Zarrilli 2009). ‘What happens when one of us “becomes somebody else”, Mirodan asks, provocatively, at the outset. The application of current thinking in neuroscience to the discipline of acting and, consequently, to the development of methodological approaches in actor training was a central theme at the recent S-Word Symposium held at the University of Malta in April 2019, where Mirodan was one of the key speakers. It is also the subject of several recent studies, notably Rick Kemp’s Embodied Acting: What neuroscience tells us about