Research Review #1 - An Actor Prepares/My Life in the Russian Theatre

Hey ya’ll, hope you’re doing well!

Progress is coming together very well on the Haruspex video! Scripting is still in progress, but I’ve wrapped up my preliminary research and learned a great deal in the process.

Spent a lot of time watching plays and reading this month, most notably working my way through An Actor Prepares by Konstantin Stanislavski (for the first time since college) and My Life In The Russian Theatre by Vladimir Nemirovitch-Dantchenko (the co-founder of the Moscow Arts Theatre).

One of the big things I want to explore in the actual analysis chunk of video is the parallels between the act of being a player versus being an actor, and the ways I feel Pathologic utilizes certain ideas and techniques developed by Konstantin Stanislavski and the Moscow Arts Theatre in order to help immerse the player into the roles of the respective healers. All of this will then be getting worked into a broader discussion of the parallels between theater and acting as art in contrast to games as art, and what they could possibly learn from each other, as evidenced by Pathologic’s unique strengths.

As such, I wanted to do something a little different today and share what I’ve been reading, along with some of the ideas and history I’ve picked up that’ll be informing this project. Bit of an overview along with some things of interest I found in my read. Not quite a full essay of course, saving that for the main script, but some key takeaways and thoughts I have from my time with each.

If this is something ya’ll enjoy or even simply read all the way, please leave a like or let me know and I’ll be happy to do something like this for all the major texts I work through in the future. So without further ado~

An Actor Prepares

For those who might not know, An Actor Prepares is more or less THE foundational text for modern acting as a craft. When I started studying acting while getting my theatre degree, this was the first text I was assigned, as has been the case with literally every actor I’ve ever met or known. Even now, almost 100 years after it’s publication, it still remains one of the inevitable starting points for anyone trying to understand how to improve as an actor.

One thing I wanna clarify up top:

I’ve no doubt that many of you have heard of ‘Method Acting’, the approach to acting where you let the enter character subsume your personality by attempting to perpetually feel 1:1 with what the character feels, sometimes going as far to continue embodying the role even when not properly performing.

This book is where the method both does and does not come from.

What the hell does that mean?

Quite simply and to keep it brief: Stanislavski wrote this book to describe his own method of educating and instructing actors. The Group Theatre’s founder Lee Strasberg read it and began to incorrectly teach it to the group, yet the American company still found huge success and renown in utilizing and educating on The Method. One of his Group’s actresses eventually left to Russia to work with Stanislavski personally before coming back a to tell everyone Strasberg had the Stanislavski’s ideas complete wrong, leading to a decades long feud which resulted in the death of the Group Theatre and lead to the eventual rise of The Actor’s Studio, yes, the ‘Inside The Actor’s Studio’ Actor’s Studio.

In spite of all of this, the Group Theatre and Strasberg went on to be hailed as the founders of the method in America, with their theater later being hailed as "America's first true theatrical collective" by someone who I have to assume really, really did not want to think about the Krigwa Players, it’s founders W.E.B. Du Bois and Regina Anderson, or the Harlem Renaissance, for Some Reason.

I have opinions on the Group Theatre. We’ll get to that another time, I’m sure. Getting off topic!

Point is that I think it’s really important to clarify right away that Method Acting, while directly descended from (a misinterpretation of) Stanislavski’s System, is decidedly NOT Stanislavski’s System. Indeed, it can often run directly counter to The Method in a number of ways. Method Acting is all about getting in character and staying there for as long as you can, living as though you ARE the character even off-stage/set. For his part, Stanislavski condemned this approach pretty vigorously as being both self-destructive and just kind of hacky, ironically describing such an approach as ‘Pathological.’

You better believe I’m gonna have fun with that in the video.

Which brings me quite well to the reason why I’ve been rereading this.

Outside of it just being a useful refresher for a big part of my own creative endeavors as someone who now has a bit of practical acting experience under her belt, I also had a strong hunch that I’d find a few parallels between Stanislavski’s System and Pathologic. After all, guessing that a game made by a Russian studio, headquartered in Moscow, and founded by someone who had extensive theater experience from childhood, may have been influenced by the near legendary Moscow Arts Theatre and it’s founder felt like a pretty safe bet. And I do believe it’s paid off.

See, the thing is that, whereas Method Acting is about losing yourself in the character completely, Stanislavski’s System is actually almost the opposite, far more fixated on analysis, action, and circumstance informed by YOU.

It all starts with Stanislavski’s famous ‘Magic If’, the ‘What If’ question which should serve as the foundation. You ask ‘What if I was this character?’ and closely analyze how you think you’d respond in such a circumstance, before playing out your answer informed by that analysis. ‘What if I was a young Doctor in a plague-ridden town? How would I, personally, act in that circumstance?’

This is why ‘Yes, but what’s my motivation?’ is such a cliche and common phrase to hear from actors - It’s all about turning a character and their circumstances into action, so that you might authentically experience the character.

A good microcosm of this is how Stanislavski insisted that quality set design and mise en scène wasn’t for the benefit of the audience, but rather the actor, so that it might better immerse them in their role and its circumstances while giving them an expand range of options to portray the character. I find this both charmingly close to the premise of LARPing and useful, because I feel like it kind of sums up how he viewed the way an actor and character’s relationship:

You aren’t the character, but rather you are creating them by pulling from both your own emotional memory and by communing with the other actors, as well as communing with yourself. Rather than losing yourself to the role, you are instead meant to be hypervigilant in many ways, staying keenly aware of what muscles you’re using, what emotions you're feeling, why you are feeling them, what settings and circumstances surround you, etc. so that you might react appropriately and react as is sincerely appropriate in that given circumstance. And, should you practice that long enough, then in time a great deal of those thoughts eventually become subconscious, allowing you to more naturally embody and experience the character.

In The Method, Personal Experience informs Action. You think of emotions you’ve had, and then live them for the play/camera.

In Stanislavski’s System, Action begets Experiencing. You analyze and then Act, and in the moment of Action, authentically experience what the character is, and thus portray it appropriately, as yourself.

YOU are not the character. Rather, the character is You, for a while, and it’s the responsibility of You, as an actor, to use the tools at your disposal in order to experience and thereby embody them. By doing so, you will give a naturalistic and believable performance, as you aren’t just acting the role, nor getting lost in it, but experiencing it in real time in front of the audience as you let your actions be informed by the circumstances of that ‘Magic If’ and your analysis of the character.

If you have the same brain worms as me though, then this might spark the same question -

‘Wait, isn’t this how character-driven games immerse you too?’

Yeah, kind of tbh.

Ever play a long standing D&D character and choose to fail an important roll on purpose, not because You want to, but because you’ve analyzed and lived in your character long enough to know in your heart that it’s the action they would fail at in that given circumstance, regardless of the mechanical or material consequence?

If you’ve ever sabotaged your own character for the sake of weaving a compelling narrative then Congrats, you’ve taken a step into Stanislavski’s System, whether you knew it or not.

There’s is A LOT to be said about it’s relationship to Roleplaying broadly, enough that I would sincerely recommend An Actor Prepares to anyone looking to become a better TTRPG or LARP player, but given that we’re talking bout Pathologic, I’m gonna stay locked in on single-player character-driven narrative games specifically and yes, every one of those adjectives is required because otherwise I think the relevancy of all of this often deteriorates really fast.

Thing is, single-player character-driven narrative games are uniquely situated to utilize Stanislavski’s ideas. Or, perhaps more accurately, Stanislavski’s idea pair very well with how narrative games have often ended up attempting to immerse the player.

See, the core of Stanislavski’s System is to take Units of action (i.e. ‘haggle with store keep for smoked meat’, ‘eat smoked meat or don’t’, ‘walk across town whilst not getting stabbed’) so that you might fulfill the larger Objectives (i.e. ‘don’t bleed out or starve to death in front of Daniil’), in order to progress towards an even greater Super Objective (i.e. ‘Save the Town’), all to create a clear Through Line of action. This could describe experiences as disparate as Zero Escape and Morrowind.

It’s for that reason that I’ve tried really hard to not make any overly broad conclusions here, but it’s also nigh impossible for me to look at this and not immediately begin comparing it to the structure of many of the most immersive games I’ve ever played.

I’m not trying to say that every game with small goals leading into bigger ones is Stanislavski in disguise. Fortnite probably doesn’t owe much to the MAT other than whoever the voice director is. Games which use those goals in order to immerse you into the role of a specific character, however… I believe there’s some robust nuance to be found there, shall we say.

It’s hard to say whether or not Pathologic’s doing it deliberately, after I finish combing through the game again this month I will let you know), but it is still doing it. From it’s quest design to it’s resource management to the freedom it gives you within it’s dialogue and gameplay to define what kind of person your character is.

Are you playing Daniil, the cold-blooded Thanatologist with no regard for common people? Or are you playing Daniil, the smug-yet-overburdened public servant who really is trying his best, but remains impossibly doomed by bureaucracy and fate?

It simultaneously does and does not matter; the story will play the same either way, but the difference lies in You, and how You experience the character. Because regardless of which Daniil you choose to show, your experience will still be defined by the version of Daniil coaxed from you with those ‘Magic If’s, while also serving to immerse you within the circumstance of your given role.

Am I saying that Stanislavski would have been a gamer?

Yes, frankly, I think the man would have lost his goddamn mind at the idea that we could craft Action and Circumstance Simulators which we could immerse ourselves in ad infinitum, or at least found them a very useful tool for his system. Narrative games are, after all, Magic If Machines, a whole artistic form dedicated to asking the question ‘Well, what would you do if this were you?’

At minimum, I think this will be a useful avenue for figuring out how Pathologic is able to so famously and intensely immerse the players who stick with it in a way that few other games can compare to, despite all its shortcomings.

There’s a whole lot more I’d love to talk about, but this is getting dangerously close to becoming a rough draft for the actual analysis section of the Haruspex video, so I’ll just leave off with this final fact that I just cannot stop thinking about:

For those of you who don't know, An Actor Prepares isn’t your typical dry textbook, but rather is something of a midpoint between a fictionalized autobiography and a socratic dialogue. Whole thing is written from the perspective of an acting student (who is definitely just Young Stanislavski) writing in his journey about the acting lessons he’s received from The Director (who is definitely just Older Stanislavski).

Unsurprisingly, one of these lessons is about how to relax your muscles and extend your flexibility, an essential skill for any stage actor. What was surprising to me though was what the student writes about his primary method for practicing contorting and relaxing his body was by watching his pet cat and doing his best to mirror his movements.

He does this multiple times throughout the book.

So, if we take it for granted that this book is semi-autobiographical, and the main character is just a slightly fictionalized version of it’s author, then I can only really come to one, undeniable conclusion:

Catboy Stanislavski was real.

My Life In The Russian Theatre

If you’ve heard of the Moscow Arts Theatre before now, it was almost certainly because it’s indelibly attached to the name of Konstantin Stanislavski, and rightfully so. He founded the theater and very often used it as a laboratory of sorts for his theatrical system (much to the chagrin of many of the older actors). But as is often the case with these things, he did not do it alone.

Vladimir Nemirovitch-Dantchenko was at his side for all of it. Be it cofounding the theater, helping to develop his system and approach to theatrical production, giving writing advice to Chekhov and Gorky, or securing the plays which would lay the foundations for the MAT’s lasting legacy, Dantchenko was just as instrumental to it’s story as Stanislavski.

Dantchenko is likely undercut by the fact that, unlike his close collaborator, Dantchenko never put his theories into print, only sharing them personally with those at the company. But he did write an autobiography. I bought this on a bit of a lark last year and I’m very glad I did. it’s been an intensely interesting read, as well as a text that will likely become one of my primary historical source for a couple things.

The biggest thing I should likely mention is that Nemirovitch-Dantchenko might be the second most historically influential fanboy of Anton Chekhov to ever live. The first 5 chapters of this book are about his early friendship with Chekhov, and the remaining 16 chapters are also pretty consistently about Chekhov as much as himself. Which makes sense, frankly.

It was Dantchenko who repeatedly BEGGED Chekhov for the right to perform The Seagull after the play’s initial failure.

'So let me have the play. ...I am too poor to pay you adequately' lives rent-free my brain.

The funniest part: Chekhov did in fact still say No, and Nemirovitch-Dantchenko did in fact just keep begging like this until Chekhov acquiesced.

It’s actually kind of pathetic, I love it.

This production was eventually approved and to call it a success would be to undersell it. It immediately made Chekhov famous as a playwright which lead to his fame outside of Russian, and was also the first true success of the MAT and it’s then unique approach to theatre. This thereby set the stage for Stanislavski’s ideas to take root in the world of acting and arguably led to the modern role of the ‘Theater Director’ as we now think of it.

It is undeniably one of the most important productions in theater history. Chekhov’s subtle, character driven writing focused around subtext paired perfectly with Stanislavski’s fixation on psychological realism, and both would go on to be influential on a staggering scale.

And it only happened because Dantchenko begged for the script, believed in them both, and worked aggressively to make the production happen.

(Note: The MOST historically influential Chekhov fanboy was Vladimir Lenin, who was radicalized by Chekhov’s short story Ward No. 6. Never let anyone tell you that art doesn’t matter.)

Also worth noting that, if you believe him, Chekhov’s Gun should actually be called Nemirovitch-Dantchenko’s Gun. He does in fact claim that the famous literary rule stating "If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one it should be fired. Otherwise don't put it there." was a piece of advice he gave to Chekhov, which Chekhov then went on to repeat numerous times over the years.

Is this actually true? Maybe. It’s certainly possible and I’ve certainly found nothing to disprove it.

Dantchenko claims to have offered the advice to him while criticizing an early draft of The Seagull where it was revealed that Dr. Dorn and Masha are father and daughter before never bringing it up again. As he tells it, he gave that advice as a reason to cut it, Chekhov agreed, the play was changed. And that could be. Dantchenko was a storied professional by that point, had a great deal of experience as a writer and teacher himself, and routinely shared many words for praise and critique with Chekhov, so Chekhov listening to his feedback and repeating it later isn’t impossible.

On the other hand, there is always the very real and ever looming possibility that the same kind of person writing an autobiography might also just be saying shit for clout. As mentioned, this axiom was shared by Chekhov repeatedly over his career, so much so that none less than Ernest Fucking Hemingway wrote an essay titled ‘The Art of the Short Story’ where he shit on Chekhov’s Gun specifically. He insisted that inconsequential details needn’t be essential to the plot, more or less arguing that sometimes things are just there - Sometimes the curtains are just blue, let the people looking for symbolism and English teachers scream into a pillow about it.

This idea was already very famous when he claimed to have come up with it, so it’s hard to say for sure. If nothing else though, it does do a great deal to drive home just how impactful both Chekhov, Stanislavski, and Dantchenko’s legacies are. Regardless of who said it, it was most certainly popularized by Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, which debuted at the MAT directed by Stanislavski, so I figure some amount of credit is due.

For my part, Nemirovitch-Dantchenko’s Gun might actually be more historically accurate, but Chekhov’s Gun is only 3 syllables so I’m going to be sticking with that.

Either way, I hope this granular specificity gives some sense of why I locked in on this book, particularly given how central Chekhov will also be to the Haruspex video as well. Despite being an autobiography, it often feels more like a broad history on both the MAT and Chekhov’s career as a playwright from someone who personally supported both.

I won’t go over the whole minutiae of every detail the book covers, but I think it’s suffice to say it paints a picture of a group of young artists eager to push their form forward, and often struggling to get there. In the early days, many thought they were just kinda pretentious. Because, ya know, they kinda were. It is pretentious to think you can improve a whole art form. And then they did it, and reveled in that success.

And then they had to look at their budget after the play had closed.

If there’s anything I’ve taken away from all of this research, it’s that theater people have just always been Like This. They’ve always been desperate for creative evolution, always willing to put idealism ahead of practicality, always have to be bailed out, and never ever learn because learning would mean giving up on that drive for creative evolution.

So many of these stories can be boiled down to ‘we did this amazing play that everyone adored, but afterwards we turned around and realized that we had spent literally all our money doing it that we were worried we wouldn’t be able to fund the next show, and then some industrialist/merchant who admired our work would swoop in with a blank check to save us from ourselves, before we did it again.’

Things apparently got easier after the rise of the USSR, at which point funding became a non-issue. There was of course the censors, but there were censors when the Tsar held power too. On the flip side, once the Soviets had power, suddenly all his theater needed to do to secure more funding was to ask for it and prove a need. Dantchenko actually makes the point that the kind of artistic experimentation they were pursuing in the latter days of the MAT would have been impossible in America, where a singular failure can often be enough to ruin a theater.

Yes! It does occur to me how funny it is that I am posting these worlds onto Patreon.com! I love you.

(Another note: This also isn’t to imply the Soviets were all rainbows and sunshine ofc; around half the biographies on 20th century Russian theater practitioners I've seen abruptly end when Stalin takes power including some of the MATs alumni.)

It’s reassuring and horrifying in equal measure, I won’t lie - to look at these artists I’m nearly two centuries removed from me and see so much of my friends, my peers, and myself in the way they talk about creativity. They really are just fuckin’ people, just like everyone, which is obvious but always wild to see from such a distance. Disappointing that things have changed so little, but comforting to know that there is an unbroken lineage of weird nerds being passionate about making meaningful art by any means possible.

Which brings me to as good a place to end of as any:

The sections that I found the most compelling were, perhaps unsurprisingly, him talking about living and working through the February and October Revolutions. There’s stories of him opening to audiences desperate to find some kind of escape from the stresses of the world outside, only for the audience to turn into a mob as one accused another of being bourgeois. Stories of Dantchenko seeing people spirited away into the night by police before they’re never seen again. Anxiety about whether there would even be a place for artists like them when all of this finally finished.

And Dantchenko just kept working, alongside the rest of the theater. A new show, night after night, just keeping the ball rolling because there was still more to be done, bills to be paid, and audiences to entertain. No matter how bleak and uncertain things got, the show still continued on, and still made huge difference to a lot of people in the process.

I found that really resonant and frankly inspiring, For No Particular Reason Whatsoever.

It’s nice to know that, even in the most unbelievable circumstances imaginable, people can just keep creating.

What’s next??

I’m going to be continuing my research as I begin to dive into getting the script well and truly in order. The reason I call this ‘preliminary research’ is because, while I’m sure the specifics and nuance will change, I believe I now have enough knowledge in hand to begin informing how I write the script and what ideas I want to hint at (if not outright discuss) over the course of the summary.

In the short term, there’s two books I’m planning to work through next. First is My Life in Art, Stanislavski’s autobiography for reasons that I’m sure are self-evident.

The second book, and the one I'm frankly more curious about, will be Computers As Theatre by Brenda Laurel. Laurel has a PhD in Theatre, worked at Atari in the 80s, and founded her own game studio in the 90s. I’ve already read snips from it and it feels like I might have found someone who is much smarter and more qualified than I am in all ways and who has already put some of the ideas I have into words. So fingers crossed on that.

If you dug this, let me know and I’ll be sure to post something similar in future once I’m done with either of those. Feels like it’d be a good way for me to get my thoughts and notes in order about some of these texts, but also, ya know. This did end up being like 4000 words.

Sorry. lmao.

Compromise: If enough people like this, maybe I’ll make a private vlog out of these kinds of posts in future

Anyways, as always, thank you all for everything and I hope you’re doing well, despite it all.

Still going to be doing my best to get a cut of Day 1 to ya’ll by the end of December, but at the very least, I anticipate some big milestones getting hit this month. Incredibly excited for this one ya’ll, know it’s going to be something really special

Peace~

Ruby