Stanislavski

This is a real treat, a short interview with the legendary acting teacher Stanislavski. I love the second part where he is talking about teaching rhythm to Jack Nicholson and Robert Deniro, he cuts to the bone. I think it shows just how important it is for animators to get up and do what they are animating instead of just sitting there thinking it up. According to Stanislavski if you have to think it up then the battle is already lost.

This interview stirred a sadder thought within me too. I was lamenting that in our course at Southbank I don't think I have ever gotten to the stage with a student where we can really get stuck into these kinds of "performance" issues. Lets face it, within the context of our course we only get to take 3 or 4 (at best) fully animated acting scenes through to completion, and it seems to take at least that long to cover things like Balance, Line of Action, Gestures, Key frames, Model, animation drawing techniques, software etc etc. Lets face it, there isn't much point talking about "killing the mouse" if the character can't even stand up or get from a to b without becoming unreal to the audience. All this at a time when I fear that the course is going to evolve in a way that allows less time for hands on animation projects (nothing certain and nothing that effects current students).

.......Sigh!