Annotation
The course offers a critical overview of actor’s working methods, with a focus on the contemporary crisis of representation and questioning of a stable identity. The starting point is the actor’s differing methodical approaches during the 20th century, with a stress on the Brechtian challenge of the tradition. The differing methods will also be elucidated through a historical overview.
The course will take a critical approach on 1. The psychological and political self: identity and representation. 2. The modern and post-modern body: essence and freedom, versus performativity and construction. 3. The ideologies of portrayal.
Lecturing formats
Lectures, group discussions
Examination
To complete the course the student shall hand in a paper (5 normal pages – 9000 signs including spaces) presenting actor’s methodical challenges in the contemporary discussion on theatrical representation.
Literature (to be completed)
Auslander, Philip, “ ‘Holy theatre’ and catharsis” and “Boal, Blau, Brecht: the body”, From Acting to Performance.
Essays in Modernism and Postmodernism, (1997), pp. 13–27; 98–107
Benjamin, Walter, Understanding Brecht (1998), pp. 15–22
Brecht, Bertolt, Brecht on Theatre (3rd ed.) (2015), excerpts
Diamond, Elin, “Brechtian theory/feminist theory. Toward a gestic feminist criticism”, Unmaking Mimesis: Essays on Feminism and Theatre, 1997, (pp.43–55),
Hodge, Alison, (ed.), Actor Training (2010), excerpts
Roach, Joseph R., The Player’s Passion. Studies in the Science of Acting, (1993), excerpts
Roselt, Jens, “Making an appearance. On the performance practice of self-representation”, in: Dreysse, Miriam &
Malzacher, Florian (eds.), Rimini Protokoll. Experts of Everyday. The Theatre of Rimini Protokoll, (2008), pp. 46¬– 50
Sjöström, Kent, “Bodily education in modernist culture – freedom and commodification”, in: Theatre, Dance and
Performance Training, Vol. 6(1), 2015, pp. 72–84,
Sjöström, Kent, “Authenticity, copying and the critical gaze – the crisis of representation”, in: Arte Acta, 4, 2021, pp. 7–26
The course will take place in the series these days: 25/10: 10:50-14:05; 27/10: 14:10-17:25, 1/11: 10:50-14:05; 5/11: 10:00-13:00; 22/11: 10:50-14:05; 26/11: 10:00-13:00