1st Edition
Meisner and Mindfulness Authentic and Truthful Solutions for the Challenges of Modern Acting
Meisner and Mindfulness: Authentic and Truthful Solutions for the Challenges of Modern Acting is the first book that reveals how Meisner and mindfulness can be united to create strong results for actors and help them navigate the challenges of the digital age.
The twenty-first century has created an entirely new set of demands and pressures on the working actor, including an acceleration of the digital age and the complications of COVID-19, which have led to auditions, rehearsals, and even whole performances happening entirely in isolation. This book combines a modern rethinking of the Meisner technique with a complementary set of tools from mindfulness meditation to offer profound solutions to these growing challenges, addressing the demands of a post-coronavirus industry as well as the pressures of acting in the digital era. In this ground-breaking expansion of the technique, readers will discover how it is possible to train some of the deepest values of living truthfully under a given set of circumstances, both with other actors and whilst alone. Since the 1950s the Meisner technique has aided the actor in navigating the demands unique to their time. This book is a powerful reminder that, even in the midst of so many changes and challenges, the truthfulness that has defined outstanding performances across generations is still within reach.
Full of easily accessible mindfulness and Meisner exercises and principles for practice-based support, Meisner and Mindfulness will be illuminating to working actors, directors, students and instructors of acting, and practitioners of the Meisner technique looking to develop the authenticity, immediateness, and closeness essential to great acting.
The book also includes access to an online supplement featuring additional exercises and concepts, including new ways to incorporate Meisner exercises into training sessions, suggestions for how Meisner-oriented companies can use exercises such as repetition in rehearsals, and discussions for how to set up a facilitated Meisner group.
1. When Pandemics Become Acting Teachers 2. This One Moment 3. An Audience Within 4. Miru Me, or the Eyes That See 5. The Ounce You've Been Waiting For 6. There's Wisdom in Forgetting Your Head 7. Riding the Non-Wave 8. Arising Before Thought 9. Floating Moments 10. Losing I Within You 11. Circle Without Beginning or End 12. What Burns Deeply Within 13. One Bright Pearl 14. The Two Dimensional Reality 15. Maybe So. Maybe Not. We'll See.
Biography
Royce Sparks is an internationally recognised teacher of the Meisner technique. He has taught it in Canada, Europe, and the United States at institutions such as UCL and the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, and has presented his research on it and other approaches to acting at international conferences. His practice focus is on the interdisciplinary applications of Meisner to camera work, physical approaches including martial arts, classical texts, devising, and leadership development. He is also the author of The Authentic Leader: Using the Meisner Technique for Embracing the Values of Truthful Leadership (Routledge/Productivity Press 2020).
