Whether you’re just starting out, or you’ve been performing for a while, there are a handful of acting techniques that are sure to improve your skills.
From getting to know your characters better with the Stanislavski method, to embracing improvisations with the Meisner technique, these approaches have the potential to transform your acting from good to great. So, let’s dig into the must-know acting techniques for beginners and pros alike.
1. The Stanislavski method
This method, developed by Russian director and actor Konstantin Stanislavski, is one of the most famous acting systems in the world. It’s designed to create authentic performances, by encouraging actors to go deep into their characters’ lives, including thinking about their motivations and emotional states.
There are several elements to the Stanislavski method:
- Given Circumstances: Stanislavski believed that understanding everything about your character was key to giving an authentic, believable performance. Actors, then, are asked to thoroughly analyse and understand everything they can about their character, asking questions like “Who am I?”, “Where am I?”, “What relationships do I have?”. Better understanding your character, so the theory goes, will help you to make more informed decisions about how your character would act in any given moment.
- The Magic If: You should understand your character well enough to know what they might do in any situation, no matter what set of circumstances arise. Actors are encouraged to ask themselves “what if?” questions, like “What if I were in this situation? How would I react?”, to explore their characters further.
- Emotional memory: Stanislavski thought that an actor drawing upon their own personal experiences could lead to deeper emotional connections with their characters – and therefore a more believable, genuine performance. If a character is experiencing grief, for instance, an actor should draw upon their own experience of grief when thinking about how the character would think, feel and act.
- Objective and super-objective: The objective is what a character wants in any particular moment, while the super-objective is the character’s ultimate goal or desire. These help to inform the character’s motivations and actions.
- Physical action: Stanislavski emphasised the importance of physical actions when it comes to portraying motivations and emotions. Rather than simply expressing feelings, actors should also focus on showing feelings through their actions.
- Subtext: Stanislavski believed that the full story isn’t told by the words on the page. He believed it was up to actors to read between the lines to truly understand the motivations and feelings of characters, and then to portray that through their performance.
2. Method acting
Method acting is derived from Stanislavski’s methods, and was later developed by three teachers: Lee Strasberg, Stella Adler and Sanford Meisner. This type of acting requires actors to fully immerse themselves in a role, essentially ‘becoming’ a character in order to fully understand and empathise with them.
This may involve extensive research into the character’s background, adopting specific physical traits, and even living in character outside of the performance. Actors may also undergo physical and psychological preparation, including adopting a particular accent or taking on the mannerisms of their character.
There are many exercises method actors use to fully get into character, but at its core – and similar to the Stanislvaski method – actors draw on their own personal experiences and emotions to connect with the emotions of their characters. This involves recalling past experiences to evoke genuine emotions in their performances.
3. The Meisner technique
This acting method was developed by Sanford Meisner, and it’s an approach to acting that focuses on three key elements: emotional preparation, improvisation and repetition. Meisner believed that these elements all work together to help actors stay engaged and present, enabling them to connect with their scene partners.
- Emotional preparation: The Meisner acting method encourages actors to put themselves in their character’s shoes, tapping into either their imagination or their own personal experience to better connect with a character’s emotional state. However, this should only be the focus in the first moment of a scene. After that, according to Meisner, all an actor’s reactions and actions should be based on what’s happening in the scene and what the other actors are doing.
- Improvisation: That means that actors should only react in response to what happens organically in a scene – which means that all actions and reactions should feel genuine and unrehearsed.
- Repetition: Meisner used repetition exercises to develop actors’ observation skills, and one of the key acting exercises used by Meisner-trained actors is the repetition exercise. There should be two actors, and the first makes an observation about their scene partner, who then repeats the statement. To begin with, the phrase is usually something mundane like “You’re sitting opposite me”, but eventually, it gives way to statements about each other’s behaviour. Through this exercise, actors should stop thinking about what to say and do, instead speaking more freely and spontaneously.
4. The Chekhov technique
Actor Michael Chekhov was trained by Stanislavski, and went on to develop his own acting technique. The Chekhov technique is a ‘psycho-physical’ approach, meaning that internal impulses and feelings are shown through physical gestures.
This method encourages actors to use their imagination, connect with their character’s emotions through movement, and explore how inner thoughts are linked to behaviours and actions – all with the aim of delivering a more authentic and emotionally rich performance.
The energy exchange between actors is also a key part of the Chekhov technique. Known as ‘radiating’, actors should both give energy to and receive energy from their scene partners, with the aim of creating a positive flow of energy between all actors, to make the scene more dynamic and compelling.
5. The Spolin method
Viola Spolin was a pioneer in the theatre world, and created a set of ‘Theater Games’ which helped to popularise improvisational theatre. She believed in the power of play and spontaneity to unlock creativity and enhance communication skills, helping actors to feel grounded in the present moment – which helps them to naturally gel with their scene partners, develop new characters, and explore their imaginations.
Her theatre games are excellent acting exercises to help you act on your impulses rather than over-thinking responses. Some of her most popular theatre games include:
- Gibberish: Actors are put into pairs, and must communicate using only gibberish – with a focus on non-verbal communication and emotional expression.
- Mirror: Two participants face each other. One initiates a movement, and the other mirrors it, with the goal of creating a synchronised mirror image of the first actor’s movements – without ever speaking a word.
- Contact, sometimes called Touch to Talk: Actors can only speak when they make physical contact with another actor, like putting a hand on their shoulder. Each time an actor wants to say something, they must make a new kind of physical contact.
The goal of working through these exercises is to unleash the creativity inherent in all of us – after all, Spolin believed that everyone could act, we just need to learn through experience.
6. Practical aesthetics
Practical Aesthetics is an acting style developed by playwright David Mamet and actor William H. Macy, based on the Stanislavski technique as well as the teachings of Meisner and the Stoic philosopher Epictetus.
This technique offers a straightforward approach to acting, giving actors with a practical and analytical framework for approaching their craft. It’s a four-step to breaking down a scene:
- A literal analysis: What is going on? What is the character doing?
- A ‘want’ analysis: What does the character want in the scene?
- The essential action: What exactly are you doing in this scene?
- The ‘as if’ analysis: How is this situation similar to something you’ve experienced in your own life – or might experience at some point?
This technique teaches you to dig deep into the script to really understand what you’re doing – but not necessarily why you’re doing it. It teaches you that it’s impossible to embody the character, so all you can do as an actor is to play the scene as you would if you, personally, were put into that situation.
7. Classical acting
Classical acting focuses on the external behaviour of the actor – in contrast to most of the acting techniques on this list, which focus more on the motivations and emotions of the character. It’s not so much a specific acting technique as an umbrella term for a set of acting styles that originated in theatres in Europe between the 5th and 16th centuries.
Some of the key elements of classical acting include:
- Script analysis
- Diction and pronunciation
- Physicality and gestures
- Emotional control
Improve your acting skills
These techniques are some of the most common among actors – but it might take a little trial and error to find the one that’s right for you. If you want to find out more tips and tricks to improve your acting technique, sign up for Brian Cox’s Acting course.
From impressing at auditions and drawing out the subtext in scripts through to navigating a film set and developing a truthful character; Brian will walk you through it all, scene by scene.
