An Actor Prepares (1937) - This book explains how the actor must psychologically and emotionally prepare for a created role. Once it is created, the actor must personally develop it until he feels comfortable living as somebody else. Actors must ask themselves 'What would I do if...?' based on the circumstances surrounding their character. The System describes this as a personal reality.
Building A Character (1949) - This book deals with the external training an actor undertakes to communicate different aspects of a role. The stress here is on a physical and vocal approach to the role and how far these aspects can change to display aspects of the role while remaining in the character.
Creating A Role (1961) - This book gives detailed examples of how The System can be applied to various roles. The actor must make the role fit the script, but only after preparing the role and assuming it both physically and vocally. The actor must effectively consider and approach each line and every pause from the character's perspective. This helps the actor gain proper access to the subtext.
Nourish the Beast
by: Steve Tesich
Bruno:
(seated talking to a friend, blurting out roughly)
Let me continue.
(beginning again)
I don't know how old I was when I was first put in the orphanage, (re-thinking)
not very. And the first time I heard the word orphan I thought it was this guys
name Billy orphan (laughs). Then I found out that I was an orphan too, and I
thought, Billy and I were related (smile). (frown) and then I found out that we
were all orpans, and I thought that can't be right somebody must be lieing.
(inturrupted, impatiently waiting that shouting and standing...)
Let me finish! (Begining again) So we're all orphans, but I still didn't know
what the word meant except that we talked about (slowing) everything in the
terms of that one word. (gesturing to desinated space CL) The outside world
(?) was a non-orphangae, those that got placed were de-orphanated,
(frustrated) those that came back were re-orphanated. (with a laugh) For a
long time I thought only boys were orphans, (beat) so when I grew up I
wanted to be a girl.
(preparing again, this time to give a memory that cuts much deeper)
But (....) I still didn't know what the word meant, so I asked a gaurd one day:
(Looking up to where the ggaurd would be if you were about six, and the
voice lightened to imply an innocence.) What's an orphan?(returning to
regular voice, talking to his friend not himself as the orphan, lines said with a
saddness) he said that an orphan was somebody that nobody liked. (gainning
achild like innocence again with a power) but the other orphans liked me,
Billy liked me, (regained) I asked him if that made me a non-orphan. (real life
again) He said no, being liked by another (drawn out) orphan didn't count.
(picking up speed and moving, pacing)
So I started thinking that nothing in the orphanage counted, the only things
that mattered were on the outside. (turning, sitting) For the whole time that I
was there some police athletic league kept promicing to take us to a ball
game. We went to bed everynight hoping that tomorrow was going to be the
big day when we'd go to a (softly) ball game. (laughing) we didn't even know
what a ball game was, properly speaking, but it was on the outside so we
assumed it was something increddible something unheard of(gesturing to the
sky). Then one day this man came and took us (unworthly) to a ball game
(still in awe at the sky).
(beat)
The yankees won
(beat smiling very mockingly)
That was it. The Yankees won. (Angrily building) And all of us orphans sat
there scratching our asses thinking (pause, fourteen) you mean this is it, this
is the real world. (older again) That's why I still go to ball games, i keep
thinking one of these days I'm going to see it the way I'd thought I'd see it. You
know the ball game of the century (building) the ball game of all time
(returning to the previous ball game gesture).
(turning to friend "Sylvia)
And when I go I see some of the orphans I once knew, Billy's there every time.
(frustrated) I mean they're all grown up and everything but still looking
orphany (cut line: "as hell"), still (Climax as far as lines go) waiting for the ball
game! (!!!!) (building soflty, filled) You see don't you? You see how they
tricked us into thinking the outside world was so fantastic and full of wonders.
(recanting) I mean it's not like we thought it was all good but... we did think it
was full of.... extremes! (filled again, but slowly methodical now) That's it
extremes. The most buetiful and the ugliest things wer eon the outside,
nothing inbetween...
(Self Actualizing)
And that's why I became a cop. (say this as if this was why this topic came
about) I thought that by being a cop I'd be able to find those extremes.
(sudden pause and move in close, desperately almost a whisper)
And sometimes (beat) I think I'm close. (beat) sometimes I'll be walking my
beat and I'll hear this screaming, I mean (really going for it) I mean screaming
so painful that you heart wants to comit sucide. (beginnig to straighten) And I
think hotdog this is it this is it this is the saddest goddamned thing that has
ever happed. (returning) So I rush to the house and rush up the stairs and
what do I find
(beat, take this pause and leaving it open ended to what "fantastic and full of
wonder" thing is in store for the audience)
Some old lady is screaming her head off because her paraket ate something
foul and was vomiting all over the cage. (continuing) I swear to god Sylvie, the
parakeet was barfing like a truckdriver, the old lady screaming her head off,
and for some reason she turned the fan on
(giant build, coming close and pointing)
And (p.) there (p.) it (p.) was (p.)
(beat)
Bird barf, all over the wall paper (gesturing, to real world space).
(exuent)
