THE MEANING OF MOVEMENT ON THE
CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN STAGE
Thesis for the Degree of Ph. D.
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
John C. Hurd
I966
This is to certify that the
thesis entitled
THE MEANING OF MOVEMENT ON
THE CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN STAGE
presented by
John C. Hurd
has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for
Ph°D' degree inipffl
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Major prLo/feséor
8/’+ / 66
Date
0-169
LIBRARY
Michigan State
University
L.
ABSTRACT
THE MEANING OF MOVEMENT ON
THE CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN STAGE
by John C. Hurd
In spite of the opinion and evidence that movement
makes a far stronger impression on an audience than either
static pictures or sound, there seems to be insufficient
use of meaningful movement on the American stage today.
The purposes of this study, then, are first to rediscover
the heritage and the present state of theatrical knowledge
and opinion about the meaning of stage movement, and second
to derive principles and methods for taking advantage of
stage movement '_s powerful potential.
The sources studied are primarily writers and prac-
titioners from the theatre. They include certain selected
well-known and influential authors in the fields of stage
direction, motion pictures, television, dance, and pantomime.
The observations of the authors chosen are inductively com-
Diled and compared according to subject, and, wherever
possible, harmonized to produce Opinion norms of stage move-
ment meaning. Additional principles and illustrations [are
derived deductively from the norms in order to complete any
John C. Hurd
gaps in the classifications.
The data from stage directing sources include such
subjects as composition, picturization, gross blocking,
fine movement of pantomime and business, the relation of
movement to script lines, and the roles of audience pre-
disposition and aesthetic or psychical distance in the
reception of movement communication. The additional data
derived from related theatrical sources by direct adaptation,
by abstraction, and by analogy include such subjects as
camera shots and montage sequences, live television's
immediacy and spontaneity, dance choreography, and con-
ventional and symptomatic pantomime. All the data compiled
and harmonized result in blocking, pantomime, and business
principles and practices that are relatively consistent
with each other and with the sources studied.
A system is deve10ped by the study that classifies the
movement meanings into four basic categories: abstraction,
mimesis, metaphor, and symbol. They refer respectively to
meaning derived from formal or aesthetic elements in com-°
Position, from imitation of natural and cultural body
movement, from borrowing movement in the culture analogi-
cally, and from conventionalized movement sign language.
The major findings of the study are three-fold. First,
many directors, to convey meaning, depend upon the still
picture and words to the extent that the existing knowledge
John C. Hurd
of movement is rarely used to anywhere near its potential;
however, a great many of movement's meanings derived from
the cultural and theatrical heritage, and illustrated in
the study, are already available to the stage director.
Second, few if any investigations made in a theatre
during a performance have tested directly what a theatre
audience understands stage movement either to mean by it-
self or to contribute to script meanings; hence, a great
deal of what is known and practiced, compiled by this
study into norms, can be profitably subjected to controlled
testing to discover wherein the meanings lie.
Third, even the movement oriented director seems to be
restricted to what is currently practiced or to what is
scientifically discoverable about present stage movement
meanings, but if he will accept the role of creative
artist as described by the study he can to some extent
supplement the known and the discoverable by creating new
movement meanings; he can, by association and familiari-
zation, both enlarge and enrich the present meanings
until they may eventually reach the proportions of a com-
Dlete language of stage movement.
THE MEANING OF MOVEMENT ON
THE CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN STAGE
By
John C. Hurd
A THESIS
Submitted to
Michigan State university
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Department of Speech
1966
g Copyright by
Jtnfli C. IiUTu)
1967
1.
To Plot or Not to Plot . . .
2. Phases in Plottin MOvement
from Guiding Concepts 50
Details. . .
a) Summary of the Six
Phases .
b) Pri mm es of Theme
and Ima e: Selection
of MeEa hors and
S m501s to Eel
Create a Movement
Pattern. . .
c) Principles of Character
Relationship:3 YieId-
ing Possibil‘ties for
Movement’Patterng.
d) Pri nprles of ross
ovement
C. Preparation for B1 locEing Completed
MHUTER IV. PLOTTING THE MOVEMENT IN THE CONTEXT
OF THE PLAY . . . . . . . . . . .
A. Introduction: General Application of
Blocking Theory and Script Analysis
to Plotting . . .
1.
Blockin Order: From Cross to
WT to RefIned.
Order Degendenï¬ Upon Principles
m 0 e o '
B. Matching Gross Movement to Script
Analysis
1. SelectiEEVStage Areas .to Match
Meanin of French Scenes. .
2. SeIectIn ng a Sequence of Stage
Areas and Reasons for Choice
3. Relating Necessary Movement to
Invented Movement in Plottimg
4. Choosing a Scheme for Relating
oving and Still Pictures to
the Scene . . . . . . . . .
5. Select n Movement and Area
6.
to Sh s y Both Thematic and
Ps cholo ical Demands . . .
Summa : éhecEin tHe Gross
PloEting Againsé EHe Script
Analysis and Principles 0
Blocking. . . . . . . . . .
iv
99
109
109
110
118
131
lh9
150
159
16A
B. Composition Elements Analyzed and
Defined According to the Authorities
Compared. . . . . . . . . . . . .
1. Deriving a List of Composition
Elements. . . . . .
Mass in Composition. . . .
Line in Composition. .
Form in Compositigg, . .
Balance in Com osition . .
Emphasis in Composition. . .
Summary: Composi ion Elements
Used in Com osition . . . .
C. Picturization: Tï¬e Meaning of
Composition. . . . . . . . . . .
1. Introduction: ways Abstract
Elements May Contribute
Meanin . . . . . . . . . .
2. Picturization at Rest and Its
Suggested Meanings, Accordipg_
to the Authors Select§g_. .
a Mass at East . . . . .
b Line at Rest . . . . .
c Form at Re§§_. . . . .
d Balance at Best and
in Motion. . . . .
e) Em hasis at Best . . .
3. Picturization in MotIon and
Its Spggested Meanings,
According, o t e Au hors
Selected . . . . . . . . . .
a ne in Motion . . . .
b Form in MotIon . . . .
c Emphasis in Motigg_. .
d Rhythm in Motion . . .
4. Summary of PIchrIzaEIgn_. .
NONU'I-P‘UUN
CHAPTER III. PRINCIPLES OF MOVEMENT IN THE CONTEXT
OF A PLAY. . . . . . . . . . . .
A. Introduction: Areas of Concern in the
Relation of Movement to Context .
1. Abstraction, Mimesisz Metaphor,
and Symbol in he ontex .
2. Contributions of Movement to
Context Context to Movement
B. Principles 0 e rec or's on ro
Over Relations of Movement to
Context a o o e o e e o e 0
iii
29
29
31
32
33
35
39
44
1+5
94
94
95
99
TABEE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION. . . . . . . 1
I. AREA OF INTEREST OF THE STUDY . l
A. Area of Interest in Part One of
the Study. . . . . . . . . . . . 2
B. Area of Interest in Part Two of
the Study. . . . . . . . . . . . A
C. Area of Interest in Part Three Of
the Study. . . g
D. Expected Values of the Study . I :
PART I
ESTABLISHING A NORM 0F MOVEMENT PRINCIPLES AND MEANINGS
(MAPEHIIL HOW MOVEMENT MAY HAVE MEANING . . . 12
A. Introduction. . . . . . . . . 12
B. Can Picture and Movement Have
Meaning? . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1. An Opinion Poll of Repre-
sentative Authors . . . . l3
2. Implicatipns of the P011 . 17
C. Ways Movement and Picture May
Communicate Meaning: Abstract and
Concrete. A System of Classifi-
cation . . . . . . . . . . . 18
1. Meanin of Abstract
Formal ElemenEs:
COmposition and Picturi- 8
. l
zation. . . . . . . . .
2. Meanin of Concrete Con—
Cextual Elements: Mimesis,
Meta hor and S mbol. . . 19
3. Use 0% AbsCract and Con-
crete Ways 0? Communicating
b Picture and Movemen . 24
D. Conclusion: Summary of Ways of 26
Meaning. . . . . . . . . . . . .
CHAPTER II. COMPOSITION AND PICTURIZATION: ABSTRACT
SOURCES OF MOVEMENT MEANING. . . 27
A. Composition and Picturization
Defined. . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Matching Gross Movement to Analysis
of Character Relationships. . . . 155
1. Introduction: Possible Actor
and Actor to Audience Relatigp:
ShiESO o O o O O O O O O O O 165
2. Plottin the O ositions:
Approach- etrea , Rise-Fall. 165
3. Plotting the Direction the
Actor Faces . . . . . . . . 174
Matching Final Ground Plan and Stage
Setting to the Gross and Character
Movement. . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Matching the Fine Movement to Gross
Blocking, Character Movement, Stage
Setting, and Script Lines . . . . 181
1. Viewing Pantomime as a Lan- 8
l 2
gpage . . . . . . . . . . .
2. Viewin Pantomime as Havin
Three Moaes of Meaning. . . 187
3. Viewin ‘Pantomime as an
Ad unc to Scri nes . . 197
Matching TImIng Co Eï¬e Movemenf:
Discerning and Plotting Tempi and
Rhythms Appropriate to the Script
and the Movement Plan . . . . . . 211
Summary Conclusion: Challenge to Make
Pantomime Serve a More Useful
220
Communication Purpose . . . .
AUDIENCE RECEPTION OF MOVEMENT
EXPRESSION. . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Introduction: Problems and Area of
Interest. . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Communication as the End Product
of Dramatic Expression. . . . . . 224
How Individuals and Mass Audience 6
22
Perceive. . . . . . . . . . . .
1. How Movement is Perceived and
Interpreted Generally . . . 226
2. How Movement is Perceived and
n erpreted y he T eatre
Audience. . . . . . . . . . 233
ConclusiBHTTA—Cï¬allenge to Take
Advantage of Audience Predispositions
and to Expand the Meanings of Move-
ment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
PART II
NORMS OF MOVEMENT MEANING EXPANDED
BY COMPARISON WITH RELATED SOURCES
CHAPTER VI. SCREEN PRINCIPLES AND TECHNIQUES
ADAPTED TO STAGE MOVEMENT AND
PICTURE. . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
A. Introduction: Relating Theatre Move-
ment to Screen Arts . . . . . . . 239
l. Interdependency of Stage and
’SCreen. . . . . . . . . . . 239
2. Purpose of Adapting Screen
Movement to fhe Stage . . . 240
3. Kinds OT ScreenMovement Tha__ 4
2 l
May Be Adapted. . . . . .
4. Methods of Ada tin Screen
Movement to The Stag_ . . . 242
B. Screen Techniques Adapted to the
Stage: Individual Shots and
Sequences of Shots. . . . . . . . 243
1. Individual Shots Adapted to
the Stag_ . . . . . . . . . 244
2. Sequences of Shots Adapted to
the Stag_ . . . . . . . . . 256
a) Montage as it is Used
on Screep_. . . . . . 256
b) Purpose of Screen
Montage Adapted te
258
the Stag__. . . . . .
3. ComposifIOn in Motion Within
the Screen Frame, Adapteg_
to the Stage. . . . . . . . 291
agEconomy Within The Frame 291
b MCvement Within The
Frame . . . . . . . . 292
c) Camera's Point of View
Reflected in e Frame_ 298
C. Principles of Live Television Con-
sidered for Adaptation to the Stage 306
1. Introduction: Immediacy and
pon ane y 0 ve e ev sion 306
D. Relations p e ween g an oun
on the Screen: Adapted to the Stage 311
1. Some Relationshi s Between
SI HE ana Sound Su ested b
EEI'EY“"‘ 'M a] 312
e creen e
a. . . . . .
2. S ecIaI ReIaEIonshi 8 Between
an oun on agee_. 319
vi
E. Summary Conclusion: Screen's
Challenge to the Stage Director.
1. Challenge of Analogy . .
2. Challenge of Creativity,
CHAPTER VII. MOVEMENT WITHOUT SPEECH: CERTAIN
PRINCIPLES OF DANCE, PANTOMIME,
AND PSYCHOLOGY ADAPTED TO STAGE
PLAY MOVEMENT. . . . . . . . .
A. Introduction: Special Contributions
of Pantomime and Dance to Dramatic
Movement: From The Theatre and Life
1. Theatre's Contributiep;
Conventional Lan ua e . .
2. Life's Contribution: Humep_
Behavior. . . . . . . . .
3. Order of Presentation: From
Cross to Fine_. . . . .
4. Movement as Expression eg
Qemmunication in Dance and
Pantomime . . . . . . . . .
B. Cross Movement Composition Elements
Interpreted By the Choreographer
1. Mass Considered as Densigy .
2. Line Considered as Abstraction
Textural Dynamic. . . . . .
3. Form and Balance Considered as
Abstraction and Image . . .
4. Emphasis Considered as a Func-
tion of Stage Spaee . . . .
5. Rhythm Considered as a
Natural and A Musical
CFganizer . . . . . . .
C. Fine Movement Adapted from the
Psychologist, the Pantomimist,
and the Dancer: Movement of
Individual PeOple . . . . . . . .
l. Bod Movement: Three Kinds
ComEIneH: Mimesis, MeEapng,
Symbol . . . . . . . . . . .
2. Mimetic Movement: Meaning
Derived rom mi a ion q_
Natural Body Movemeng . .
a) A Psychological View
of the Meanin of Bod
‘Meyement: The Dancer_e
Interpretation of
Psychological Principles
Combined With Relate
_P§ycho ogica ews_e
vii
O
321
322
322
325
325
326
326
328
329
330
331
332
335
339
341
344
345
346
347
b) Delsarte: Bod Movement.
A ClassiTIea Lan ua e. 356
c)PanEomimistS' and Dancers'
Views of Mimefic quy_
Movement . . . . . . . . 375
3. Meta hor A IIed to the
Eencer's ngy Movement . . . 383
a) Hum hries' Substitution
0 Parts. . . . . . . . 384
b) Ha es' Kinesthesia Throu h
Aï¬stracEion ana Analo 385
c) Erdman's Non-VerBal Poetic 86
Image . . . . . . . . . 3
d) Mesic and Dance Analogous
to Script and Stage
Movement. . 387
4. Sypbol in Dancer's Body Move-
ment: eaning Derive rom
Dance "Sign Lan ua e". . . . 390
5. Communication b Bod Move-
menE StarEs From RealIty . . 391
D. Conclusion: Fine and Cross Movement
Without words, vehicles for Expression
or Communication. . . . . . . . . . 392
1. Communication Problem: The
ygtrans a a eness 0 Ar . . 392
2. Agdience ReactIOn EC Communi-
eetion: Diverse or Controlled 393
3. Centent of MOvement Communi-
eetion: Musical and Emotional
vs. Ideational. . . .
4. The Dance Trend: Communication
der pression . . . . . . . 397
395
PART III
CONCLUSIONS: TOWARD A LANGUAGE OF MOVEMENT
CHAPTER VIII. A FOCUS ON MORE DYNAMIC MOVEMENT
MEANINGS: COMPOSITION, PICTURIZATION,
MIMESIS, METAPHOR, AND SYMBOL. . . . 400
A. More Dynamic Composition Through
Balance and Flow. . . . . . . . . . . 401
1. Dynamic Use of Balance in
Movin Com osition. . . . . . . 401
a) Belance in Time as well as
S ace. . . . . . . . . . . 402
b) Effe C on Audience of
Apparent Balance and
Imbalance. . . . . . . . . 404
viii
c) Application of Principles
0 Apparen Balance in
Time .
2. ngemic Use of Flow in MOVing.
om 08 tion. . . .
a) C C
_9n inuous Flow In PhySi;
cal and Ps cholo ical
Nature Applied CO tEe
Sta e. . .
b) One in At A Time
A lied 50 Flow. . . . .
c) Flow RelatIonships Between
Menta an sical MOVC-
ment . .
d) Problem in Flow RelatiOn;
ships: LaCk of Punchation
and Phrasing .
3. Summa Conclusion: . amIc
FIow and Balance Punchated
and PErased to Mainfain
408
410
411
411
412
416
Im ressionOTCContinuous Life 421
Be More Dynamic MovemenC Meanings Tï¬rough
Mimesis, Metaphor, and Symbol . . . 422
1. Extended Definitions of the
_hree Kin S 0 ‘Movement 4 2
Meanin . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. A IicaEion of the Three Kinds
0 Movement Meanin . . . . . 433
a imesis A lie . . . . . 433
b MeEapHor AppIied. . . . . 441
c Symbol Applied. . . . . . 454
C. Conclusion: Principles in The Use an
Creation of Movement Meanings . . 459
CHAPTER 11:. A FOCUS ON THE PROBLEMS OF COMMUNI;
CATING BY MOVEMENT. . . . . . . . . . 461
A. The Problems of Aesthetic and Psychical
Distance. . . . . . . . . . . . . 461
1. Aesthetic and Peyehical Dis-
ance Dif erentiated. . . . 462
2. AudIence Reaction CO De rees of
DISEance. . . . . . . . . . 465
3. AtEem ES to Lessen Audience
DIstance. . . . . . . . . . 467
4. DisEancIn Devices vs.
TReaErIcaI CommunIcation. . 470
B. The Problems of Expression‘flithout
Communication . . . . . . . . . . 471
1. Pro osal: Ex ression‘flithout
CgmmunIcaEIon Iï¬possIEIe. . 472
ix
‘Noo. ..
K / n
u.‘
2. The Alternatives: Designed
‘COmmunication or Therapeutic
Ex reSEiOn. . . . . . . .
C. The Problems of The Role of The
D. Summary Conclusion:‘Movement Problems
EHHJDGRAPHY.
Director: Organizer, Interpreter, or
Creator . . .
l. The Director's Total BespOnsi;
bility fer the Art Product.
2. The DirectorTs Total Responsi-
bility toï¬the Audience.
and Directions for Solution .
. 474
476
. 477
477
478
. 480
INTRODUCTION
I. AREA OF INTEREST OF THE STUDY
The central concern of this study is to investigate
the meaning of gross movement on the American stage today.
By gross movement is meant the larger pattern that is
usually referred to as blocking. However, gross movement
cannot be studied with accuracy unless its relationship
with fine movement is also investigated. Gross movement is
intimately related to, and sometimes indistinguishable from,
fine movement, or what is usually referred to as pantomime,
Sesture, physical characterization, or business. The
relationship seems to be organic in that blocking may derive
from character movement, and pantomime may be a refined and
detailed treatment of the blocking. Both kinds of movement
may derive directly from the script or derive from the
director's experience and merely be consistent with the
script. Therefore, the study of the ground covering moves
that are gross movement must include some attention to the
moves that are fine.
The meaning of gross movement is also inextricably
r"Elam-141 to the meaning of the still picture. Not only do
the compositional principles of a still picture apply to the
conlposition of the stage picture in motion, but actual still
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pictures on stage may be an integral part of the gross move-
ment pattern. For this reason composition and picturization,
primarily the meaning of still picture composition, need to
be included in a study of the meaning of movement.
Gross stage movement also bears definite relationships
to, and in many instances borrows directly from, movement in
other fields of study. The closest related fields, chore-f
graphy and motion picture direction, therefore, are to be
compared with stage movement. All three arts have a common
heritage and indeed use each others' principles, art forms,
and personnel in combination regularly. Practitioners in
one field often practice in the other two as well. For
this reason some comparison of the movement principles of
dance, pantomime, and film with those of theatre can be of
special value to the theatre director, both to harmonize
their concepts with his and to gain value from their Special
findings derived from the common heritage. Also, because
many directors, choreographers, and pantomimists depend so
heavily on them, some attention must be paid to the
Psychologists' contribution to the meaning of gross move-
ment on stage .
A. Area of Interest in Part One of the Study
The first part of the study is devoted to evolving
norms of movement meaning directly from the field of theatre,
to discover what the present state of Opinion and knowledge
3
among certain acknowledgedand influential theatre authorities
is concerning the meaning of stage movement.
The purpose will be to correlate, to extend, and to
apply the norms in order to derive consistent theories based
on those norms. The primary sources used for the norms will
be, in alphabetical order, the published play production and
direction texts of Curtis Canfield, Alexander Dean, John
Dietrich, John Dolman, Samuel Selden, and Milton Smith.
Secondary sources include nineteen other texts and over twice
that many individual authorities. Their contribution is
largely to provide corroboration for, or minority dissent
from, the primary sources chosen.
The method of the first part is primarily inductive.
Data is collected and correlated by subjects from each of
the pertinent sources. In every case the dataare summarized
rather than quoted in order to present the kernel of the
idea on each subject and to present that idea, for easy
comparison, in the same order and form as its corollary
idea. Once the data are brought together comparisons are
made, harmonization is attempted, and conclusions are drawn
in an informally deductive method. The attempt is to draw
Principles directly from the data or to deduce principles
that are consistent with the data.
The content of the first part of the study is divided
into five chapters. The first chapter discusses how meaning
may communicate, if indeed it can, both apart from and within
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the context of a play production; the chapter includes the
setting up of a system of classification to guide the
ordering of the data. The second chapter compiles Opinion
concerning the abstract sources of meaning, composition,
and picturization. Elements of composition are covered
under the categories of mass, line, form, balance, emphasis,
and rhythm. The third chapter deals with the principles of
movement in the context of production, including the normal
phases of plotting that movement, while the fourth chapter
covers the actual plotting of that movement in context.
Under the category of movement in context are discussed the
meanings contributed by the director's addition of mimetic,
metaphoric, and symbolic movement (terms with special mean-
ings for this study), as well as the meanings contributed to
movement by the context of the play.
The fifth chapter compares opinions on what the audience
contributes to the meaning of movement. Such problems as
how the audience views, the nature of empathy, audience pre-
disposition, and aesthetic distance are discussed.
Part one is restricted to Opinions from theatre
authorities and comments by the author of the study. The
norms of meaning of movement on stage derived thereby are
then available for comparison with the findings from related
fields.
B. Area of Interest in Part Two of the Study
Part two is devoted to comparing the formulated norms
and theories to, and refining them in the light of, opinions
from related sources .
The purpose of the comparison is to enlarge theatre's
movement language through borrowing and adapting principles
espoused by influential writers in other movement fields.
The sources include authorities from the film art, including
Sergei Eisenstein, authorities from the dance art, including
choreographer Doris Humphries, and authorities from the
pantomime field, including Francois Delsarte. A few
psychologists who have Opinions directly bearing on a
language of movement for the stage are also added to the
study.
The method of part two, as with part one, is primarily
inductive and deductive, but also analogical. The study
correlates the norms from the theatre sources with whatever
is found pertinent in the related sources, extends the norms
imaginatively into further principles, and adapts new
principles to theatre use both directly and by the process
of analogy. This process grows out of the metaphorical
relationship of one kind of movement with another and
results, of course, not in proven or even logically certain
principles, but in concepts that are analogically suggestive.
The concepts still need testing both by controlled experiment
and in stage production in order to find out Just what is
communicated and how.
The content of part two is divided into two chapters,
the borrowings from the screen art and the borrowings from
sources that use, or study, movement without speech,
6
including psychology, dance, and pantomime. Chapter one
adapts screen techniques of individual camera shots, mon-
tages, and the connotations of the screen frame, as well
as the contributions of live television, both directly and
analogically to the stage. It includes a special challenge
to the director to use the analogical method.
Chapter two, movement without speech, adapts certain
empathic psychological principles, meanings derived from
choreography, and meanings derived from pantomime to the
dramatic stage. Especially noted is the strong influence
of Delsarte, as an early clinical observer of behavior, on
the dance and pantomime fields, and the lack of contemporary
clinical study on the language of movement to advance his
beginnings.
Part two completes the comparison of sources for the
derivation of norms and principles. The section on
psychology is admittedly weak for certain specific reasons:
first, because the primary purpose of the paper is to ex-
plore the performing arts for the discovery of a unified
approach to current theatre movement meanings; second,
because the primary methods are deductive, inductive, and
analogical rather than clinical or statistical. The only
Purpose for including psychologists in the study is to show
from what sources certain theatre practitioners derive their
information and concepts. Ultimately the search among
Psychological and statistical studies in the field is not
7
very rewarding for this study. TO make existing related
studies really pertinent to the language of gross movement
on stage, they, too, would have to be adapted by analogy.
C. Area of Interest in Part Three of the Study
Part three is concerned with the possibilities and
problems in develOping a language of movement for the stage.
Its purpose is to explore the area of more dynamic meanings
for stage movement and to investigate some of the problems
Of audience reception of those meanings. The sources are
the principles and data already employed in parts one and
two of the study and the conjectures of the author of the
study. The method remains largely deduction and extension
by analogy.
Chapter one focuses on more dynamic movement meanings
in both the abstract and concrete categories. More exciting
movement composition is sought through the principles of
flow and phrase and by the use of balance in time as well
as in Space. More dynamic meaning of movement in the play
context is sought through certain Special applications of
the three kinds of meaning: mimetic, metaphoric, and
symbolic. The attempt is made to find human principles,
metaphors, and symbols that contain movement, derive from
movement, and will produce meaningful movement on stage.
Chapter two focuses on the limitations and assets of
Certain special problems in communicating to an audience.
Aesthetic and psychial distance are compared, communication
8
is declared to be an essential ingredient of expression,
and the director is challenged to free himself from the role
of interpreter and to take up the role of creator.
D. Expected Values of the Study
The values of this study are hOped to be two fold: to
provide the director with workable stage movement principles
and to suggest directions the creative director may take
toward increasing the communication possibilities of his
stage movement.
It becomes clear in this study that most of the commonly
accepted opinions Of the meaning of movement on stage are
based on long theatre practice, on analogy, on quasi-
psychology, and on culturally accepted symbols; there has
been little attempt in theatre to give movement meanings any
Objective validity. However, this is not to undervalue the
study. The theories and principles of movement presented in
this study are most of the logical possibilities implied or
Suggested by America's heritage and current practice in the
meaning of stage movement. The concepts derive from the
funded knowledge of a representative group of authorities.
The principles therefore should be practical and workable,
because they are based on current practice. However, these
theories make no claim to certainty or even to tested
Probability. They may, however, provide principles that
are well worth testing, as well as practicing, inasmuch as
9
they represent the best the performing arts can produce,
short of that same testing.
It is the surmise of this study that meaning is
communicated by movement in the way in which the funded
experience suggests. It is the primary Job of testing to
discover exactly what element in a total context of movement
on stage communicates what feeling or idea to what audience
under what circumstances. At present the kernel of meaning
is probably buried, in many instances, in a husk of un-
necessary convention.
On the other hand, this study means to point out that
meanings change through usage, and directors can be instru-
mental in making these changes, in creating meanings of
movements through the process of association and familiar-
ization, and not merely in discovering what meanings are
already communicated.
The director who accepts the challenge to be a creator
can start by leaning on his heritage in order to obtain more
exact, more complete, and deeper meanings for his current
uses of stage movement. He may be challenged to keep more
careful and complete control over that movement realizing
what powerful potential it has. He may then extend his
language of movement by direct or analogical application of
movement principles. Finally he may also wish to conduct
controlled experiments with the principles derived from
this study, to clear away the debris Of non—meaning, and to
lO
discover exactly wherein meaning lies. In accepting this
challenge the creative director may use this study as a
springboard toward restoring to theatre a more significant
use of its unique quality: expressive movement.
PART I
ESTABLISHING A NORM OF MOVEMENT PRINCIPLES
AND MEANINGS
CHAPTER I
HOW MOVEMENT MAY HAVE MEANING
A. Introduction
Opinions about if and how movement can have meaning
cover a wide range. From the authors chosen for this study
there is general agreement that to some extent movement can
commuucate meaning, but agreement is not so general con-
cerning how that meaning is communicated. Part of the
problem encountered is that the authors consulted do not
use the same terminology or methods. It has been necessary,
therefore, for this study to create a system of classifi-
cation to reflect as closely as possible the mutual intent
0f the authors. The system is entirely original with this
study although the category names are in common usage, to
smmeextent, by the authors studied. However, to serve the
Purposes of classification better, each category name has
been given both a more inclusive and a more exclusive mean-
ing than that of any of the chosen authors.
In establishing norms of movement meaning as derived
fmnicertain authoritative and widely used texts on direct-
inglit'is first necessary to discover to what extent the
C‘hosen authors feel movement can have meaning, and then to
Cler‘ive the system of classification into which those
meanings can fit.
12
13
B. Can Picture and Movement Have Meaning?
1. An Opinion Poll of Representative Authors
All authors agree to two basic assumptions: (1) the
stage picture and movement when carefully designed are
capable of telling the story of the play, and (2) the stage
picture and movement ought so to function. Most authors
expand this assumption to say that unconsciously, to some
extent, all positions and moves have meanings to audiences
and so the director is obligated to try to select the moves
that are apprOpriate to the script. Some even proclaim
that most of the movement and picture meanings can be known.
However, what these pictures and moves actually mean is
usually only hinted at, in the broadest of terms, by the
authors. The point is that there is much more general
agreement concerning the obligation of the director to give
meaning to his blocking than there is agreement, or even
statement, concerning what the blocking means. To illustrate
the point here are some representative opinions as to
whether or not movement has meaning on stage:
A. K. Boyd feels that every stage movement must create
a positive effect, 1:) help to express the speech, character
or mood of the scene; a move is not made merely to avoid
stagnation; further, a move must have meaning in itself,
not merely result in a desirable grouping.1 Herschel Bricker
h
——_
lAlfred Kenneth Boyd, The Techni 116 of Pla Production
(London: G. G. Harrap and Company, Ltd., I931â€: Pp. 75-81
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suggests that the director must plan all moves and stage
pictures in advance to insure that each will have meaning.2
Gilmor Brown seems to feel that movement has a definite
function in attention getting but that the meaning largely
resides in the grouping of the actors between movements;
however, movements have certain qualities, such as strength,
that can support the verbal play.3
Canfield feels that the initial placement of characters
will give expression to the characters' relationship to
each other; the audience will connect the initial placement
of characters with the placement of characters at the end
of a scene, or movement, and will see a progression or
change in relationship as told by the changed picture; the
audience should be able to follow the meanings of a play by
sight alone; though Canfield is not so sure that stage areas
or moves have inherent meanings.4 However, his faith in
the potential meaning of the stage picture is intact, for
he feels that the director's craft is mainly to make certain
that the Juxtaposition of characters reveals what the
characters are to each other.5
———_
2Herschel Leonard Bricker ged.) Our Theatre Today
(New York: Samuel French, 1953 .9 99- 199-245. T
3Gilmore Brown and Alice Garwood, General Princi les
ï¬' Play Production (New York: Samuel FrencH, 1947), pp,
“Curtis Canfield, The Craft of Pla Directin New
York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, n.d.;, PP. 135-1 5.
51bid., p. 166.
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To Dean, picturization is the placing of characters
to suggest the mental and emotional attitudes they have
toward one another. If the placing is done successfully,
the nature of the dramatic situation will be revealed with-
out the necessity of dialogue or movement.6 His is the
most highly develOped (and probably also the least
susceptible of the authors consulted to general agreement)
system for the meaning of blocking.
Dolman states that the purpose Of movement should be
associated or at least consistent with the main purpose of
the play. He implies that specific moves can have meanings
independent of the rest of the context. Good movements
simplify and clarify the script, and some moving compositions
may have meaning only when seen in their full sequence;
isolated or static moments in a movement sequence may be
meaningless . 7
Drummond feels that movement on stage consists of a
series of meaningful tableaux connected by moving transi-
tions.8 His view, though over simplified when compared
with that of Dean, Smith, Canfield and others, is still
6Alexander Dean, Fundamentals of Play Direction (New
York: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc†1941),— P. 203.
7John Dolman, Jr., The Art of Play Production (New
York: Harper 8c Brothers, 1946}, pp. 113-116. _‘
8A1exander Magnus Drummond, A Manual of Pla Production
(Newll8fork: New York State College of Agriculture, 1937),
pp. .
16
substantially the theory most emphasized by all the authors
studied.
Hewitt feels the actor should achieve a continuously
changing pattern of movement designed to express the
character and thought of the play.9 Hopkins says that
every movement on stage should mean something.10 Arthur
Krows feels that movement should be restricted to what is
vitally necessary to change the stage pictures or to carry
actors on or off the stage,11 whereas most of the basic
texts suggest that movement can be much more valuable when
specially designed to help interpret the words of the play.
Selden feels that one function of movement is to trans-
late into outer form what is usually only felt as an inner
response.12 In general his entire book is an exposition of
how he feels blocking movement affects audiences or
communicates to them.
C. B. Purdom also feels that movement can and presumably
ought to be in keeping with character and can be planned in
relation to the situation of the play;13 while he also
feels that grouping and moves should contribute to the
—_l
9Barnard Hewitt, 33 11., Play; Production, Theo
3L Practice (Philadelphia: Lippincott, I952T, p. 36 .
lOArthur HOpkins, How's Your Second Act? (New York:
Samuel French, 1931), p. 15.
1J‘Arthur Edwin Krows, Pla Production in America (New
York: H. Holt & Company, 1 1 , pp. 63-55-
l2Samuel Selden, The stage in Action (New York: F.S.
Crofts & Company, 19417, P- 93-
l3Charles Benjamin Purdom, Producing Plays (3rd ed.)
17
interpretation of the play.14
2. Implications of the P011
He can see from this compilation that there is general
(though not unanimous) agreement among the theorists and
directors of the theatre that both the grouping and the
movement of actors on stage can and should have meaning to
support a script. However, the writers who give Specific
principles and examples of what composition or Specific
movements actually convey are few. For most of the authors
studied there seems to exist a faith that movement has
meaning; for a few there is an acceptance of meaning from
only subjective proof .
However, there are two basic implications drawn from
the cited Opinions: First, that there is, or can be, some
definite, decipherable language of picture and movement that
generally communicates to the average audience; and second,
that movement and picture must be able to have meaning in
themselves, apart from the words of a script.
The second implication needs some clarification. If
stage movement contributes no meaning all its own to a
total context of a play there would be no point in Speaking
of choosing movement that is apprOpriate to the script. If
the context of the play, largely given meaning by the words
M
(London: J. M. Dent & Sons, Ltd., 1951), p. 80.
â€Edwin C. white, Problems of Acting and Play Production
(London: Sir Isaac Putnam & Sons, Ltd†1939), p. 114. ‘
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of the play, gives to movement all the meaning it has, then
any movement would be as apprOpriate in the context as any
other movement. The movement in itself would be neutral
until the context told the audience what the movement
meant. By saying that movement does contribute meaning to
the context of the play the chosen authors imply, then, that
movement does have some independent meaning to contribute.
It is the task of this study, then, first to try to
discover according to the authors chosen the meanings that
still picture and movement have in themselves, both as
abstract compositions and as parts of non-verbal contexts,
and then to determine how they can help to interpret a
script, that is, what additional meaning they can bring to
a verbal and scenic context.
C. Ways Movement and Picture May Communicate Meaning:
Abstract and Concrete. A System of Classification
1., Meaning of Abstract Formal Elements: Composition
agd Picturization
Abstract compositional elements, such as mass, line,
form, balance, emphasis, and rhythm, seem to convey mean-
ings to an audience. No doubt these elements originally
acquired meanings by association with, or abstraction from,
other contexts known to the audience; however, the result
seems to be that meanings now seem to inhere in the abstract
elements themselves .
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In directing a play the director must select com-
positional elements to fit his concept of the themes, moods,
and situations of the script. In order to choose he must
have some concepts of what meanings those compositional
elements will contribute to the context of the play.
This meaning aspect to composition will be called picturi-
zation.
Composition, then, will be considered the subject of
the abstract formal elements of design and their formal
relationships; whereas picturization will be considered the
subject of the meanings communicated to an audience by the
abstract formal elements and their relationships.
It can already be seen, from the realization that
formal elements probably originally gained meaning from
contexts, that some overlapping is bound to occur in the
categories of abstract and concrete meanings.
2L Meaning of Concrete Contextual Elements: Mimesis,
Mgtaphor, and Mbol
Movements that require actors in the context of a
stage in order to have meaning seem to derive from certain
relationships: those between actor and actor, between actor
and stage, and between actor and audience. These relation-
ships include posture, direction of facing, and relationship
to stage setting as well as to all the abstract elements of
composition .
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In a sense all Of the meanings derived from contexts
are symbolic, in that they stand for something other than
themselves, something that is usually in real life off the
stage. But the way in which these symbolic moves communi—
cate seems to fit into three categories: mimesis, metaphor,
and symbol. Although all modes seem to be in some sense
symbolic, the term "symbol" will be retained for the third
category.
a) Mimesis Defined.--First a picture or move may mean
itself. Strictly Speaking the picture or move involves an
actor who is in a position, or moves in a way, that is
supposed to resemble what a real person would do were he
in the situation the play represents. This category, called
plot movement by Canfield, necessary movement by Smith, and
variously, essential, dramatic psychological, and script
movement by others, is that which directly expresses what
is necessary to the furthering of the plot. For example,
walking to open the door and to let in an entering character
or sitting down because one is crippled, are classified in
this category. Strictly Speaking these moves and positions
are a language. They do convey meaning of a non-verbal
variety. They signify more than themselves. They are
symbols in that they stand for real moves that would really
be made in Similar circumstances in real life. Hence, they
are the closest moves possible to the real in art.
why should this point be made? Because, as most
authors agree, no stage move is identical to a real life
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move. All are at least somewhat distorted if only to make
perfectly clear, across the physical distance to the
audience, what the real move would be like. So even the
simplest "realistic" movement can be seen to be part of a
language where the move stands for something other than
itself.
b) Metaphor Defined.--Second, a picture or move may
have an analogical relationship to some other movement
already known to the audience. The way the stage picture
borrows meaning from its analog this study calls metaphor.
The authors studied feel that meaning can be borrowed
in a variety of ways to depict both the psychological
nature of characters and the thematic nature of the play.
For example, all the authors agree that actor positions may
indicate affinity for, or Opposition between, characters on
stage. Such meaning is variously described as social,
psychological, or symbolic. The inner or outer emotional
state of affinity, or the verbal context of affinity, is
depicted by character proximity. Similarly, inner opposition
is depicted by wider separation between characters. Carry-
ing this over into movement, physical approach is supposed
to signify a mental attitude of approach and a physical
withdrawal similarly a mental attitude of retreat.
Selden adds to what this study calls the metaphorical
classification two more basic moves: rising and lowering,
or moving with and against gravity. By analogy, the moves
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can mean triumph or submission, overcoming or being over-
come.15 Positions in metaphor may depict the state of
being overcome or of having overcome. The category of
this meaning, depicting inner emotional states through outer
movement, is a level of meaning different from mimesis. The
outer form symbolizes the inner attitude; the move or
position stands for the felt relationship. This kind of
meaning is metaphorical because it is dependent upon a
ratio: of doubtful accuracy--A is to B as C is to D. As
the mind is to the felt attitude, the body is to the physical
move. If the mind feels attraction the body moves closer.
Smith adds another variety to what the study calls
metaphor. His terms are symbolic move or symbolic position;L6
He calls the process translating the psychological-indivi-
dual and the emotional ideas of a scene into physical
situations. Translating the "idea" of the scene into
movement is really the second subdivision of metaphorical
movement. The first subdivision concerns the outer
depiction of inner psychological states; Smith's primarily
concerns the outer depiction of ideas in the play. Often
the two modes overlap. To illustrate, Smith lists oppo-
sition, intervention, siding, enmeshing, and pounding. If
two characters are in psychological opposition to each other
M
15Selden, _p. cit., p. 276.
16Milton Myers Smith, Pla Production (New York:
APpleton-Century Company, 19 , p. 101.
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they move apart and stand in physical opposition to each
other; similarly if two ideas of contrasting themes are in
Opposition to each other the characters or groups repre—
senting the conflicting ideas may move apart and stand
opposed. Opposition is closely related to the previously
mentioned affinity, or advance and retreat.
A character separating two fighters or lovers verbally
may also do it physically, depicting intervention; a
character changing his mind may change sides and stand with
the character with whom he is now in agreement. These
metaphors can be extended to include a pacing move for
mental vacillation; a static center position for indecision,
and a hiding movement behind the character he sides with if
cover is needed.
Enmeshing, or surrounding, would be appropriate for
either a group antagonism or a group reverence for an
individual. The body postures, the quality of the moves,
and the context Should clarify the specific purpose of the
enmeshing while pounding is a sort of thrust and retreat
move, not unlike fencing.
The dangers of such relationships in the language of
picture and movement is that an audience may not be able to
read back into the move what was its original metaphor.
Whenever a metaphor is employed, without a context, an
audience member may pick his own metaphor by which to read
the move. Obviously then several other factors must be
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present in a move to give it more Specific meaning. In
general, the way in which the move is made, the accompany-
ing business, and ultimately the plot situation may serve
to clarify the metaphor.
For now these examples are sufficient to define the
category. The analogical relationship is the important
element that separates metaphor from other modes of
movement meaning.
c) Symbol Defined.--Third, a picture or move may stand
directly for another symbol, word, or verbal concept, If a
movement has such a specific meaning of a verbal sort the
movement would be, in effect, part of a sign language. Hula
dancing movement, Noh and Kabuki movement, Balinese movement,
deaf and dumb sign language, and certain accepted symbols in
some American modern dance are examples from this category.
Since there does not appear to be an American theatrical
Sign language this third category may have to remain largely
empty except as the director borrows from the dance or
derives or creates new symbols that may only hold meaning
for one particular production. The category of the literal
symbol is the ultimate in movement meaning and seems to this
study to complete possibilities for the meaning of movement
in the context of the play.
L Use of Abstract and Concrete Ways of Communicating
21 Picture and Movement
8.) Movement to Support.--A director's stage movement
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may support, strengthen, enrich, or underline the surface
verbal meanings of the script. The movement may have meaning
through mimesis, metaphor, or symbol, but the meaning of
the movement is either the same as, or positively related
to, the meaning of the words of the script. In such a case
the words and moves combine to provide a single unified
meaning. The movement supports the words.
b) Movement to Contrast.--A stage movement may con-
trast with the surface verbal meanings of the script. Again
the movement may derive its meaning through mimesis, metaphor,
or symbol, but the movement meaning will contradict, or some-
how be negatively related to, the surface meaning of the
words of the script. Such a move can be called contrasting
or contrapuntal. Its purpose can be to editorialize upon
the words, to make a comment, rather than directly to support
them, or it can be actually to deny the meanings of the
words. The contrapuntal move can be used where the inner
state, either psychological or thematic, contrasts with the
outer verbal form. As an example, the words may sound
serene while the character is disturbed. In such a case,
the words may sound like an advance but the move can be a
retreat. The words may say, "I'm on your Side," but the
positions can Show Opposition.
The contrapuntal move can be useful in both comic and
ironic situations, but for such a contrapuntal use of
movement and position to work, it is essential that non-
verbal communication can be in fact possible; that moves can
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have meanings apart from a verbal context.
D. Conclusion: Summary of Ways of Meaning
All forms of movement and picture communication
discussed by the authors studied seem to be encompassed in
the four categories mentioned: abstraction (picturization),
mimesis, metaphor, and symbol. Whatever can be communi-
cated apart from words seems to be done by a movement either
that partakes of certain abstract, formal design elements,
that stands for a movement in real life, that is derived
from a metaphor, or that is part of a Special Sign language.
Of course there are all degrees of distortion from nature
and elaborate extensions of metaphor to produce both
conventionalized and esoteric styles, but the same basic
categories of meaning seem to apply throughout.
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CHAPTER II
COMPOSITION AND PICTURIZATION: ABSTRACT SOURCES
OF MOVEMENT MEANING
Chapter one has suggested the ways in which movement
and picture may communicate meaning. The first of those
ways is through the abstract, formal elements of design,
in other words through picturization, the meaning aspect
to composition.
In general terminology and concepts of composition
there seems to be a fairly wide area of agreement among the
principal writers in the field of play direction and
production. Whereas the actual meaning of some of these
compositional elements gives rise to most of the more
interesting differences of opinion.
In many instances cited the elements under consider-
ation were considered by the authors studied primarily as
attributes of the still picture. It is this study's
contention, corroborated in due time, that most of the
compositional elements can be attributes of the moving as
well as the still picture.
First this chapter will present extended definitions
0f composition and picturization, and then compile the
Opinions of the authors concerning analysis and meaning of
the compositional elements.
27
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A. Composition and Picturization Defined
l . Composition Defined
According to Alexander Dean composition is a term
that should be reserved to refer to the structure or
ordering of principles of the stage picture or movement
and not to the meaning or communication values.1 Compo-
sitional elements of the still and moving picture then
will include mass, line, balance, form, emphasis, and
sequence.
Still other elements of composition are the Spatial-
temporal qualities. They include primarily rhythm, tempo,
and sequence, elements that differentiate a time and Space
art like theatre and a time-art like music from a merely
space art such as painting, even though the latter may use
time terminology in a nonliteral sense. The techniques of
combining these elements into a stage picture, both still
and moving, and the elements themselves as the tools of
design, comprise the subject of composition.
.24 Picturization Defined
Picturization, again Dean's term, refers to the
creation of stage pictures and movement for the purpose of
communicating meaning. It is the process of using com-
Positional elements for the purposes of meaning rather
*
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than merely for some inherently pleasing effect. In
picturization the meaning of the compositional elements
becomes important along with such elements as strength,
weakness, focus, symbol, image, association, and phrasing.
The category of picturization, as well as composition,
Dean uses primarily, though not exclusively, to analyze the
still picture. For this reason many applications of these
principles to movement must be taken from other sources or
originated by this study.
B. Composition Elements Analyzed and Defined
According to the Authorities Compared
1:, Deriving a List of Composition Elements
The first task of the director who iS planning to
move a play is to discover what tools and techniques of
composition he has at his disposal. These fall into
categories that are generally agreed upon by most of the
represented authors. Dean writes of line, mass, and form,2
as well as emphasis, stability, sequence and balance.3
Dietrich writes of unity, variety, coherence, contrast,
Inlance and emphasis.4 He also includes in the term com-
position the additional connotation of the meaning of the
composition; in effect, he combines Dean's composition and
picturization into the one term. The term includes the
___
2lbid., p. 197. 3IbId.. p. 137.
â€John E. Dietrich, PELDirection (New York: Prentice-
Hall. 1953). p. 98.
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"artistic and meaningful arrangement of characters upon a
"5
stage. The conceptual basis for the two authors is, how-
ever, very similar. They both agree that the meaning of the
composition is primary.6
Dietrich also includes in composition, rhythm, grace,
harmony, contrast and subordination,7 while Dolman writes
of balance, proportion, harmony, and grace.8 Smith writes
about balance, emphasis, and variety.9 It can be seen that
the same terminology for compositional elements keeps
recurring in all the works studied with only minor differ-
ences in definition of terms; this study proposes the
following list to include all the elements suggested: mass,
line, form, balance, emphasis, and rhythm.
The next task is to determine what these elements are,
trying to avoid for the present the temptation to discuss
what they do, or what they mean. First are the categories
of elements (mass and line) and second are the categories
of arrangement of those elements (form, balance, emphasis,
and rhythm). "Rhythm", except as it is found as "sequence"
in the still picture, will be excluded until a Special
section on moving composition.
5&3†p. 92. 62.1312-
7%., p. 103.
8Dolman, _p_. 9113., p. 69.
9Smith, pp. 3:15;... P. 98-
31
2. Mass in Composition
According to Dean, mass is the element of composition
1xmt gives the effect of weight.10 Mass may appear light
cu'heavy, delicate or gross, large or small. Mass also
gives the effect of size. Of course on stage, as else-
where, the size of a mass is a function of contrasting
masses. A large mass is such only in relation to a smaller
mass. A heavy mass is only such in relation to a light one.
The effect of mass may be attained by several
categories of elements. Color, number, grouping, and stabil-
ity contribute as much to mass as does contrast. Bright
colors may activate an area or grouping such that the
grouping assumes more importance in a picture and has more
weight. Mass with a broad base of support can create the
ineling of stability and add a serenity or security to a
mass. large mass may be created by close groupings of
actors, small mass by separating out individual actors
fknm the group. And of course scenic elements can create
mass, though they are not of central concern to this study.
Ifltimately, mass is a function of contrast. A weight is
the most heavy or light on stage to the extent that it
contrasts with another weight on stage that is lighter
or heavier.
IODean’ 92-. Cite, p. 198‘
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3. Line in Composition
The next compositional element is line. It is defined
by Smith as the pattern made by outlines or edges or where
colors come together.11 Dean adds the idea that mass and
line together determine form and Shape.12 Where two
masses meet, where an enclosed mass borders on a background,
where the outer edge of a shape is seen, including the
shape of an arrangement of actors or the Shape of scenery
and furniture, there are formed lines in a composition.
These lines have certain categorical characteristics that
are useful in stage movement design. A straight and a
curved line are the basic types and may appear in many
combinations for different compositions. The straight may
be horizontal, vertical, or diagonal; it may be almost in
isolation or in obvious contrast to another line. If
straight lines meet, angles and jagged lines will result;
a straight line may be complete and continuous or broken.
The curved line generally may be a segment of a circle or
a segment of an irregular curve such as an ellipse, hyper-
bola or parabola.
Smith (and others) point out, that lines may also be
formed in time as well as in Space by the pattern of move-
ment traced upon the stage by an actor.13 The action may
‘—
1lsmith, pp. cit., p. 45.
12Dean, 9p. cit., p. 194-
13Smitn, _o_p_. cit., p. 45.
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describe a curved or straight line, a jagged line, or, in
conjunction with scenery or fellow actors, provide a pattern
of intersecting lines. It is important to point out this
means of providing line through movement because it is the
beginning of relating principles of still picture composi-
tion to a less developed area in the basic texts studied,
moving picture composition.
4. Form in Composition
When mass is bounded by line Shape the result is form.
Many forms of mass and line, or size and Shape, may be
grouped or patterned together on stage. The overall stage
pattern can be called the form of the composition. The
main components of the stage composition are the forms of
the emphatic elements and the relatively unused Space.
a) Types of Forms.--Dean discusses the overall stage
forms as symmetrical or asymmetrical, deep or shallow, and
compact or diffused.lu
Symmetrical and asymmetrical form will be discussed
later under types of balance. Suffice it to mention here
that types of balance are attributes of form.
The deep form is one that uses a large portion of the
up-tO-down stage Space, a shallow form uses relatively
little up-to-down stage Space. The compact form refers to
the grouping that allows for relatively slight Space
between actors. Dean intimates it usually results in an
n.
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unstable composition because it does not have a broad base
and because it is usually grouped in one segment of the
stage. The diffused form has relatively large Spaces
between actors and employs a relatively large portion of
the stage. This study suggests that a stage form may be
classified by selecting a point anywhere along the continuum
suggested by each pair of variables. Such a combination
might yield a form of stage composition that was, for
instance, almost symmetrical, relatively deep, and some-
what diffused.
b) Coherence in Form or Sequence.--Dietrich mentions
coherence as an attribute that forms Should have.15
Coherence refers largely to the Space relationship between
characters on stage, as well as between characters and
scenic elements. Dean suggests that such coherence can be
achieved by a form of spatial (or static) rhythm. This
spatial rhythm he calls sequence.16 In effect, the spaces
that separate characters or scenic elements follow some
scheme of units. Spaces are all multiples or divisions
of some basic unit, similar to the module used by
architects. This rhythm of Spaces helps to provide a coher-
ence or a sense of all belonging together.
Another basic method of producing coherence is
through body position and facing. In brief, the positions
‘_
15Dietrich, _p_. cit., p. 99.
16Dean, _p. _c__i_._t_., p. 184.
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of actors, and the direction in which they look will, as
in good painting, lead the eye around the composition and
then back to some emphatic point.
5. Balance in Composition
Next are the compositional elements that deal with
the arrangement of form in Space and time, starting with
balance. There are two varieties of interest to this
study: actual physical balance and aesthetic, or apparent
balance.
a) Actual Physical Balance.--Balance may be variously
defined as a state of equilibrium, inertia at rest, or
equal and opposite forces or masses. It is perhaps as
well expressed analogically by Samuel Selden as any,
though all the texts use the same basic metaphor variously
called the teeter-totter, see-saw, or fulcrum and lever
principle.17 The basic physics formula is weight times
distance equals weight times distance as explained by
Dietrich.18 Very simply, the principle in physics is that
the weight on one side of a fulcrum multiplied by the
distance from the fulcrum is equal to the weight on the
other side of the fulcrum multiplied by its distance from
the fulcrum. In practice this means that the farther a
Weight is from the fulcrum the lighter it must be to
balance a weight on the other side of the fulcrum.
___
17Selden, _p. cit., p. 153.
18Dietrich, pp. cit., p. 100.
36
In general there are two balanced design types: sym—
metrical and asymmetrical; and two kinds of ways of achiev-
ing the balance: by actual, physical mass, and by the
impression of importance or the impression of mass. The
design types are derived by considering the center of the
stage to be the fulcrum. If the right side is a mirror
image of the left the stage is in perfect symmetrical
balance. If one side is obviously not identical with the
other but both sides balance, the stage is in asymmetrical
balance.
b) Aesthetic, or Apparent, Balance.--Perhaps of more
dramatic significance than actual physical balance is the
impression of balance. Dean calls this the difference
between physical and aesthetic balance. In Dean‘s
terminology, aesthetic balance is achieved by weight
derived from emphasis.19 Dietrich refers to it as the
difference between physical and psychological balance.
To Dietrich the latter refers to the equilibrium of
contending forces.20
There may be two different principles involved here.
In one, weight is given by arrangement; in the other,
weight is given by the context of the play. Since this
section deals with compositional elements it is best to
P413 off a discussion of psychological weights until
h
19Dean, pp. cit., p. 189.
2ODietrich, 9p. cit., p. 102.
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picturization. Aesthetic weight, however, can exist in
pure pattern apart from context. A bright color may
"weigh" more than a dark, even though the latter is part
of a larger mass. A color or Shape that contrasts sharply
with its background may also "weigh" more than a larger
mass that does not contrast as Sharply with its background.
Contrasting shapes, line patterns, "busy" compositions may
all "weigh" more than less internally contrasting masses.
Harm colors may weigh more than cool.
1-Apparent Stability. Stable as opposed to unstable masses
may weigh in different senses. Dean feels. a mass that
appears top heavy may appear unstable and hence have a
potential for movement, have a more exciting appearance
than a mass that is bottom heavy, or stable.21 For this
reason for balance a top heavy mass may "weigh" more than
a bottom heavy mass. However, psychological weight may
well involve different principles though with similar
results. The psychologically stable mass (such as a group
of satisfied, resting characters) appears heavy in the
sense of dull, complacent, or unmoving but probably will
not weigh heavily in the stage balance. It does not have
the weight of potential.
2-Apparent Height of Moving and Static Masses. Another
aspect of apparent balance concerns the relative weight of
R
211368.11, i. Cite, p. 177’
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moving and static masses or characters. According to
Dietrich, the dynamic or emphatic character may outweigh
the static character.22 However, it still remains to
decide to what extent the moving character is dynamic and
emphatic. To decide with any accuracy the subject of
emphasis must first be discussed; but suffice it to say at
this point that movement attracts the eye and generally may,
under certain circumstances, create more weight for
aesthetic balance than no movement; however, the moving
character may also be psychologically weaker than the
stable character and possibly "weigh" less, though attract-
ing the eye more.
3-Apparent Balance in Time. when movement is introduced
into the problem of balance the field is Open to conjecture.
One fairly consistent principle seems to involve a balance
that is achieved in time rather than in Space alone.
Canfield speaks of scenes progressing from one stage area
to another with a Special area set aside for a particular
scene.23 Obviously at any particular moment the stage may
be off balance as only one small section is being used.
However, given the duration of the play, each area is used
and the director may achieve a balance in time. A useful
device to suggest schematically how such a balance is
achieved is imaginatively to place all the scenes on the
Stage at the same time and see if the result is an
_‘
22Boyd, 22. cit., p, 102, 23Canfield, 92. 9L†p. 134.
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aesthetic, physical, and psychological balance. This way
the imbalance of a moment is resolved in time rather than
in Space.
4—Apparent Physical Balance. There are several observa-
tions apprOpriate to balance of movement in time. One is
a.tendency, pointed out by Canfield and Dietrich, of
ixnnking of a section of the stage as temporarily being
23 In essence this means that the audience
the whole stage.
may not feel a stage is unbalanced if the small portion
being used at the moment is in balance, the portion that
provides the environment for the small scene. Such an
environment may be bounded by the actors, a furniture
arrangement, lighting, or by scenic elements, and the
area may temporarily appear to be a stage within a stage.
In effect, this small scene tends to pull the center, or
fulcrum, of balance over to itself and to eliminate the
rest of the stage as far as having any effective weight
is concerned.
in Emphasis in Composition
Within the balanced form composed of mass bounded by
line certain elements can achieve relative degrees of
ckmunance. This attribute, called by various authors
ibcus, directing of attention, as well as dominance, will
hm called in this study emphasis. It is achieved by many
_.__
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subordinant elements of arrangement grouped for this study
as centrality, convergence, stage area, contrast, sequence,
space, isolation, stage level, body position, and restor-
ation of balance.
a) Emphasis by Centrality.--The most usual cause of
focus is centrality. The center of any composition, be
it a triangle, semicircle, or line, has potential for
emphasis. Of all these the apex of the triangle is most
emphatic because it is also at the center of converging
lines.
b) Emphasis by Conveggence.--The triangle is the
figure used by all the authors studied as the basic form
to provide maximum emphasis. The apex of the triangle is
emphatic because it is at the crossing, or convergence, of
two lines, and because it is usually at the center of the
composition. The triangle may be regular in shape or
broken up into a series of small groupings, arranged
either symmetrically or asymmetrically, and still maintain
its emphatic convergence.
c) Emphasis by Stagg Area.--In Dietrich's discussion
of emphasis he groups the elements under the heading of
"control of attention'.‘25 Prominent in control is the
relative dominance Of the various stage areas. He ranks
Humiin order of dominance as being down center, up center,
down right, down left, up right and up left.26 Dean
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25Dietrich, _p. cit., p. 113. 26Ibid., p. 108.
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designates the areas the same way27 though he is more
concerned with dramatic qualities the areas express than
with their relative dominance. The principle expressed by
both authors, and others, is that the closer something is
to the audience, and to the center of the stage, the more
dominant it is. This principle does not account, however,
for the suggestion that right is stronger than left. Both
authors relate this to the Western habit of reading from
left to right; thus the eye seeks the left (stage right)
first, making it a stronger area.
d) Emphasis bl Contrast.--Contrast is an element that
Dietrich suggests may make for emphasis even when the con-
trasting element is not in a dominant stage position.‘28
Such contrasts may consist in part of multiplicity vs.
isolation, bright vs. dark, movement vs. still, tall vs.
short, or fast vs. slow. Basically, however, the point is
that the single element that is different from the rest
is the emphatic element.
e) Emphasis by Sequence.--Identified as the static
aspect of rhythm, sequence may take on two basic roles in
terms of emphasis: negative and positive. Negative use of
it may be had by breaking up a sequence. If a group has
regular internal sequential Space relations, something out
of sequence is emphatically contrasted.
27Dean, 9p. 93.3., p. 212.
28Dietrich, _p. 91.3., p. 103.
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A positive use of sequence may be had by the use of
repetition in the sequence. Repetition sets up a rhythm,
and the rhythm sets up an expectancy of continued repeti-
tion. The last element in a sequence can be emphatic both
because it is expected and because it breaks the sequence.
The last person in line entering a room, the downstage
left end of a diagonal line, or the third movement in a
series of three movements can all be very emphatic.
It may be pointed out that emphasis through repetition
in a sequence may require combining with other means of
emphasis in order to be the most effective. For example,
the elements in a sequence may contrast in size with the
last element being the largest. A sequence of elements of
the same size could result in monotony rather than emphasis.
f) Emphasis by SpaceLor Isolation.--Space is an
important aspect of sequence, but it is also important in
setting objects apart from the rest of the composition, in
isolation. If a space is also part of a sequence of regular
spaces then rhythm can add to the emphasis by isolation.
The rhythm sets up an expectancy; a sudden break in the
rhythm, with a large Space, sets up a vacuum, or unfulfilled
expectancy. A final element appearing after the vacuum,
then, has an emphasis derived from both rhythm and isolation.
g) Emphasis bLStage Level.--Stage level refers to
height above the horizontal plane of the stage. Subject to
the principle of contrast, generally the authors studied are
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in agreement that a higher element is dominant and a lower
element is subordinate. Colby Lewis shows how Leopold
Jessner used this particular form of emphasis so blatantly
that critics accused him of underestimating the intelligence
of the audience.29 His use of steps to arrange compositions
in ascending order was his chief claim to fame. Be that as
it may, level is an effective way to achieve focus, when
used in conjunction with depth and contrast.
h) Emphasis by Body Position.--A body position can
achieve strength or effectiveness to the degree that it is
facing the audience. Of course, its degree of emphasis will
depend upon its contrast with other elements in the com-
position, including the direction other actors are facing.
i) Emphasis by Restoration of Balance.--In movement,
restoration of balance is a device which can stand more
investigation as an emphatic tool. Several authors, in-
cluding Canfield, mention a stage scene which was planned
to be obviously unbalanced. The area which needed "weight"
to complete the balance was an area of vacuum. The audience
felt something belonged there. when the director placed
something there it was for the moment very emphatic. As
Canfield points out, however, unless the audience is drawn
to notice the vacuum no expectancy is built and hence the
emphasis value is not so great. This principle has far
-__1
29Colby Lewis, "Leopold J essner’s Theories of Dramatic
Production," g.J.S., Vol. 22 (April, 1936), p. 203.
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reaching implications for the whole theory of the meaning
of movement on stage. It suggests that balance may not
be as important to the stage picture as imbalance; that
imbalance seeks balance and hence imbalance is more po-
tential and exciting; hence more emphatic, than balance.
j) Emphasis Contrasted with Strength and Dominance.--
At this point it may be well to seek a differentiation in
terms. Strength, dominance, and emphasis may all be some-
what different qualities in the achievement of attention.
A figure in isolation may have attention but be weak as a
character because of context, body facing, or weak stage
area. To be more explicit, there are many kinds of weak-
nesses and strengths that relate to, but extend beyond,
composition and will be discussed under picturization.
IL. Summaijy: Composition Elements Used in Combination
All the compositional elements, when used together,
can provide an interesting and aesthetically pleasing stage
picture. The design will have the rhythm, sequence,
stability, and balance of masses and line, with an emphatic
center Of interest required for any, even the most abstract,
of art. However, for theatre, the authors agree, composition
is only a minimum. The picture, still or moving, must help
to tell the story of the play. These compositional elements
must have meaning that relates to the meaning of the script.
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C. Picturization: The Meaning of Composition
1. Introduction: Ways Abstract Elements May_Contribute
Meaning
Abstract formal elements may communicate meaning through
still pictures or through movements. Hence picturization
will be considered to have two divisions: at rest and in
motion, though Dean tends to retain the term for the still
picture.
a) Still and Moving Picture Contrasted.--A1exander
Dean states that movement comprises the moments of pictur-
ization in their ever changing aSpects, that picturization
derives its principles from painting as movement does from
dance.3O
However, there are aspects to the meaning of still
ruptures that do not have parallels in moving pictures,
even as there are meanings of moving pictures whose unique
characteristics do not find a parallel in the static.
In fact an opinion somewhat Opposed to Dean's ought
1x>be kept in mind throughout this section. Dolman states
that the time dimension in the theatre art must be taken
hux>account in composing the stage picture, because often,
parts of a moving composition in isolation are dead and
awaningless although significant in sequence.31 Of course
3ODean, 9p. cit., p. 223.
31Dolman,‘gp, cit., p. 116.
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Dolman does not deny the value of a significant still
picture on stage. He merely points out that moving com—
positions are not Simply series of meaningful still
pictures.
Dietrich states that the only real difference between
the technique of the painter and that of the play director
is a difference in depth.32 This view is based on a prior
statement by him that the primary purpose of movement is to
dissolve one picture in order to form another, hence the
basic art of the director is the art of the still picture.33
Yet later he suggests that the sole purpose of movement is
the projection of meaning, either intellectual or emotional;
and again, that without motivation no movement can be mean-
ingful.34 Although Dietrich does not discuss meanings of
abstract elements, the implication is that the still picture
may communicate meanings through abstract compositional
elements in context, but that movement primarily requires
motivation for meaning, hence communicates primarily
through psychological mimesis.
It seems that picturization at rest and in motion can
both communicate, but how much of that communication is
contributed by abstract elements is still in question.
b) How Much Meaning Abstract Elements Can Contribute.--
Opinions about how much meaning can be contributed by
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abstract elements varies a good deal. They range from
Dietrich's, who, as has been seen, feels that very little
meaning is conveyed apart from context, through Selden's
view, that rules of design are more apt to be a hindrance
than a help because of the var-iables,35 to Dean's, who
assigns a "family" of meanings to each abstract line
element.36 Selden does not, however, explain what either
the rules or the variables are ; however, from his context
this study deduces that his "rules" would be those that
assigned definite meanings to abstract compositional
elements and his "variables" would be the many colorings
that context would give to the meanings. Dean recognizes
the importance of these "variables", as will be seen, and
so gives a wide variety of possibilities of meanings of
abstract forms to suggest that they may contribute variously
according to context.
Canfield also tends to be careful in his assignment
of meaning to abstracts, such as line and stage area. He
feels that Dean assigned Specific meanings that were
really only subjective and hence couldn't be argued.37
However, Canfield makes no attempt either to refute Dean
or to establish that Dean's meanings are subjective. It
seems that the director needs more than either a Simple
35Selden, pp. 933., p. 65.
36Dean, _p. 9352., p. 197-
37Canfield, _p. g... p. 135.
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affirmation or denial, but Canfield's readers generally
have to go to other authors for the meaning of design; his
concern, as is Dietrich's, is with the organic relationship
of movement and picture to the script in the context of the
play.
c) Abstract Meanings Separated from Contextual Mean-
iggpw-The problem becomes one of separating the meanings
of the compositional elements from their play context and
from other contextual ways of communicating to investigate
the meaning of the abstraction by itself.
This study has already suggested that for a movement
to have meaning in a context the movement must have a
contributory meaning all its own. Otherwise any movement
can mean anything a given context means, and there is no
valid reason for choosing one kind of movement over another.
Of course this study recognizes the vital role of context
to give a total meaning to a picture or movement, but the
study contends that general meanings are contributed to
contexts by design elements and that the context makes
those meanings Specific.
d) _S_o_urces of Abstract Meanings.--The problem of sepa-
rating abstract meanings from contextual ones is not easy,
for it seems apparent that meanings of abstract elements
must derive from association with prior contexts. In other
words, whatever meaning abstract elements have seems to have
originated from mimetic, metaphoric, and symbolic associ-
ations. For example, Dean refers to the meanings of
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abstracts as the effects of composition upon emotion, but
the kinds of meaning they have, as will be seen, are large—
ly associational.
However, the difference between the source and the
abstract is important. Though deriving from mimesis,
metaphor, and symbol the meanings of the abstracts now seem
“hainmere at least to some extent in the abstracts them-
selves without apparent awareness by the audience of the
original source.
It should be noted, though, that the communication
process is analogical. Even the pure empathic communication
of abstract elements, the direct motor effect on the audience
member, is in a way analogical. The appearance of imbalance,
fbr'instance, may create a motor reaction in the audience,
but the process is still symbolic. It must start with the
visual; imbalance must be seen and recognized. AS Dolman
xxnnts out, a physical imbalance may actually be felt, but
an.apparent imbalance has to be learned; it is a symbol of
physical imbalance.38
Only after learning the symbol does
11w audience have a motor response, but a response often
authout conscious thought. The abstraction has acquired a
meaning that is now all its own.
Whatever the source of its meaning, and however in-
exact that meaning may be, the compositional element seems
to be the most basic unit of picture and movement. Meaning
M
38Dolman, _p. cit., p. 11.
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seems to inhere in the compositional element, and the
director seems to be able to discover that meaning and to
use it to contribute to the context of his play.
2. Picturization at Rest and Its Suggested Meanings,
According to the Authors Selected
The elements under consideration are the same ones,
and presented in the same order, as in the previous section
on composition. They are mass, line, form, balance, and
emphasis with rhythm still considered in its "at rest"
aSpect of "sequence". Although each picturization element
is considered in its "at rest" aspects, most of those
aspects apply to picturization in motion as well, and will
only be discussed in this section. In most instances the
overlap is assumed rather than stated. In the section on
balance "at rest" and "in motion" aspects will be considered
together because of the integral nature of the material.
a) Mass at Rest.--Not many authors suggest meanings
for mass, probably because most of the meaning that mass
has is derived from how other compositional elements are
combined with it. The shape, outline, color, form or
contrast of mass really give mass most Of its Significance.
In effect it is the raw material of composition. If it has
any meaning at all it is probably in terms of degrees of
felt weight. Dean considers mass to be the effect of
weight,39 On stage mass may only be so many square inches
M
39Dean, _p. gig†p. 198.
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of differentiated space, but the Space connotes the presence
of an object of a certain Size, and that object and its Size
connote a certain weight, in part dependent upon the size of
the mass. Obviously how much weight is connoted is a
function of many other compositional elements, but without
the contribution of mass to a composition there would be no
impression of measurable weighted Space for the other
elements to modify.
b) Line at Rest.--Dean, Smith, and Dolman make the
major contributions to the meaning of line with Dean
presenting the most complete analysis. For this reason his
ideas will form the basis for this analysis with other
opinions presented only as they dissent from or add to
Dean's.
According to Dean the horizontal line is restful,
oppressive, calm, distant, and languid; the perpendicular
line is high, grand, dignified, regal, forceful, impressive,
frigid, spiritual, ethereal, soaring, and aspiring; the
disgonal is moving, unreal, vital, artificial, arresting,
bizarre, and quaint; the broken horizontal line is casual
while the broken vertical line is violent; the straight
line is strong, stern, formal, severe, simple, close (near),
and regular, while the curved line is natural, intimate,
quiescent, free, graceful, flexible, and cozy.40 Each of
these line types can be combined to produce composite
â€01bit. p. 197.
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qualities. Or several lines may be used in combination, such
as a curved horizontal line with a straight vertical; some
contrasting combination of the qualities also results.
Smith takes line meanings one step further by identi-
fying different kinds of curves and intersections of lines.
He agrees substantially with Dean when he writes that a long
straight line is serious, a vertical line is noble and
dignified, and a horizontal line is earthy and stable. He
adds that long slow curves are sensual and fanciful while
sharp curves, arcs, and segments of a circle are mostly
comic; Jagged lines and sharp angles are exciting and
dramatic.All
Dolman suggests, in agreement with Dean, that the
curved line is effective for grace. He adds to Dean's idea
that straight lines are formal by suggesting that both
straight lines and segments of a circle are too forced and
unnatural, requiring artificial tensions to maintain them,
while slow curves are more natural, graceful and emp athl-
cally satisfying.42 Substantially, the rest of the basic
directing and producing texts agree with the above general
format or are silent on the subject. The dissenting Opinions,
not stated here, do not contribute more to the meaning of the
line but largely voice cautions not to put too much faith in
Claims for exact meanings, and give warnings that there is
3;
1â€Smith, op. cit., p. 46.
lleDolman, op. cit., p. 71.
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little experimental proof of the contentions.
The line meanings of Dean need a sympathetic and imagina-
tive interpretation to be of any positive value to the
director. There are seeming contradictions in the list;
there are qualities that do not seem to fit together; the
list appears too set and dogmatic, even as Selden or Canfield
nflght point out. The key to the variety of meanings may be
that Dean realized that the abstract lines needed to be
related to specific contexts in order to carry one of his
specific meanings. At least such an interpretation brings
order to the list. A line employed in a stage setting
usually becomes the outline of a specific object. If the
line is a horizontal one, for example, it may partake of
one of the qualities Dean lists largely because of the con-
text. IFor example, it is an horizon and so distance is
suggested possibly along with calm, earthliness, and repose.
Ihbm this simple example, it can be seen that many seemingly
very different "meanings" of the lines and patternS, as
expressed by Dean, are really dependent upon their context.
}fls is in effect a sampling of the range of meanings a line
can have in context.
Dietrich's thesis is herein Justified, it seems. To
have as specific meanings as Dean suggests may well require
a context beyond the abstract line pattern, otherwise each
Viewer chooses his own association.
On the other hand, Smith and Dolman try to suggest a
54
general meaning for line that is less dependent upon context.
Even here, however, a great deal of unconscious association
is employed. For example, the horizontal may be calm be-
cause it is associated with the horizon. The straight line
may suggest severity as it is associated with the straight-
laced personality. The curved line may seem cozy as it is
associated with a friendly enclosure, or it may produce panic
if associated with a trap. Hence, by conjuring up an image
of what the line reminds us of, or by feeling about the
abstract line the same as we feel about the object from
which it was abstracted, the audience may feel emotion from
a line. The original source for the line may lend its
connotation to the stage picture or stage move. The curved
line may connote "enclosure." When given the specific con-
text of the scene, the line then becomes more specific in
its connotation, because certain possibilities are eliminated.
The image, from which the audience abstracts, more closely
parallels the situation of the play. The context then gives
the audience the clue as to which of the meanings of Dean is
closest. The "enclosure" becomes either "cozy" or "trap."
Yet, it can be seen that Dean, Smith, and Dolman all
suggest that a certain family of traits is inherent in line
formation. If they are right, in at least some general way
there are line patterns appropriate and inapprOpriate to
certain contexts. As Smight might put it, the straight line
seems more serious, the long slow curve more graceful and
sensual, and the tight curve more comic; the Jagged line is
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more excitingfl3
The writer of this paper has tested abstract line
patterns with many groups of students and community groups to
try to find out if there is any objective truth to the ideas
above. Always the family of traits suggested by these
authors is expressed by the audience, without a context
necessary. The tests were no doubt without proper controls
and subJect to a varietyof interpretations, but the results
were too consistent to discard the theories as mere subJec-
tive Judgment on the part of a few directors.
One reason for the consistency has already been
suggested: consistent association with obJects of that
particular line pattern. There seem to be two general kinds
of association that would account for the connotative meaning
of any symbols; they are: cultural association, and psycho-
logical nature. In fact both are probably inextricably
related. A certain line pattern may have come to have a
certain meaning culturally because of a relatively consistent
use in association with certain basic moods. A curved line
may be learned as comic because many cartoonists employ it
in comic drawings. On the other hand, the drawings may be
more comic because they employ sharp curves. It seems
difficult to say which came first without fairly extensive
inter-cultural tests. To establish any real, basic universal
43Smith, _2. _c_i_t_., p. 46.
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meaning for abstract lines it seems some correlation would
have to exist between the nature of our senses and the nature
of the line.
Here, then, are some prOposals that may start con-
Jecture about a third reason for consistent meaning of line.
Lines may have meaning partially because of the nature of
sight and also partially because of human motor responses.
When the eye follows a curved line, there is no felt
interruption to the flow. The smooth continuity may affect
motor reaponses, may set up an expectancy that is satisfied;
it is restful because it is anticipated. A broken line of
irregular variety may destroy what the eye expects, or not
even allow an expectancy to occur. The result is apt to be
a restless feeling. A sharp angle may unexpectedly interrupt
a flow, or reverse an eye movement. The unexpected may be
exciting. The above conjectures about association by
metaphor, association by social conditioning, and emotional
response by motor response to eye movement, may in large
part provide a basis for the meaning of abstract line.
To examine further the validity of abstract line's
meaning will require the assistance of related fields, or of
Special tests. Conjectures here have already gone beyond
the purpose of this section, what the selected theatre
authorities have to say. At this point it seems that the
normal expectancy of theatre people is that certain line
shapes and patterns can produce certain emotional responses
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in an audience and that, when combined with concrete
picturization and movement, they tend to imbue these concrete
elements with their metaphorical, connotational, habituated,
and innate meanings.
The kind of treatment that each author accords to the
meaning of other formal entities is similar. Therefore there
is no need to repeat the analysis of the different kinds of
meanings involved or the general approach to the relative
subJectivity of assigning values. Suffice it to present the
views.
0) Form at Rest.--The authors studied classify emphasis
and balance to some extent as attributes of certain types of
form. For this reason there is some overlapping in cate-
gories though balance and emphasis will each be covered in
separate sections.
l-Emphasis vs. Meaning in Form. Forms of stage compositions,
particularly the balances and shapes of masses, may be said
to have two general reasons for use. The first is to create
emphasis, the second is to contribute meanings. Every basic
text is more or less explicit on the ways in which forms may
direct attention for emphasis. Possibly Dietrich is the most
complete though Canfield, Dean, Smith, Dolman, and Selden all
have largely mutually consistent views. They concern what
Dean might call compositional elements: how to gain emphasis.
To create meaning through form the director needs to know
more: what the different meanings of the different forms are,
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why the director uses one kind of emphasis rather than
another, and what one variety of focus says better than
another.
The first use of a formal arrangement on stage is to
gain focus or emphasis, and one task of this study is to
investigate what a particular variety of emphasis contri-
butes (usually connotationally and emotionally) to the stage
picture. The second use, to contribute meaning, refers to
the meaning, if any, of the abstract form itself: feelings
that are conveyed by particular arrangements of mass and
shape and balance. The latter shall be taken first as it is
the most abstract and basic; i.e., the least dependent on
context for its meaning. The first has its basic meaning in
pointing to an obJect or line or actor that is expected to
carry the primary meaning; though the type of emphasis used
may also suggest an underlying point of view about the content
of the primary meaning.
2-Meaning Contributed by Form. Most of the authors and
directors give assent to the principle that the gross group-
ing on stage can contribute meaning to the play, as Tyrone
Guthrie puts it,.over and above the common sense positions of
peeple in a situation; ideas and emotions underlying the
scene can also be expressed.44 It is Dean again, though,
‘l
“Toby Cole and Helen K. Chmoy, Directors on Directing
(rev. ed.; Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, I963T, p. 251.
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who attempts the most complete statement of what these
abstract elements of arrangement mean.
To recapitulate, Dean considers mass to be the effect
of weight.45 In other words, for the stage, actual weight
is of little importance. To extend the views of our main
texts, psychological balance, aesthetic balance, or physical
balance are really all achieved through obJects, shapes, or
groupings appearing to have relative sizes and/or importance.
The actual physical weight of the mass has no effect on
dramatic balance.
3-Types of Form. The next point is to see what arrangements
of these masses do to an audience. This arrangement is
usually called form.)+6 Dean, it has been noted, lists six
varieties of form: symmetrical, irregular, shallow, deep,
compact, and diffused.
The symmetrical form, an arrangement of regular or
repeated forms with the mirror image relationship between
stage right and stage left, Dean feels conveys a sense of
formality, artificiality, coldness, hardness and quaintness.u7
The first reaction to this list of attributes is apt to be,
that "quaintness" doesn't seem to be of the same genre.
Again, as with line meanings, it seems that the only
Sympathetic interpretation of this listing is to suggest
45Dean, 22. _c_i_._t_., p. 198-
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that Dean needs a context to give his specific meanings to
form.
One way of achieving a comic effect is through ex-
cessive regularity, a mechanical pattern, imposed upon
fluid life. Hence, given a situation in a play that does
not seem to merit such a symmetrical treatment, a director
can gain a comic perSpective by making his stage picture
provide a symmetrical comment on the situation. This would
be an example of the contrapuntal use of picturization.
The other attributes of the symmetrical form appear to be
those wherein the arrangement is used to support a context.
The irregular form Dean lists next. Other authors
usually call this asymmetrical. To Dean this provides a
casual, impersonal, realistic, informal, free, or sincere
impression. Here the list appears to have validity with
the possible exception of "impersonal." This seems to fit
equally well into the former grouping of symmetrical relation-
ships; the type of situation Dean had in mind again might
have explained its inclusion. The rest of the attributes,
in comparison with "symmetry," give us a clue to his method
of arriving at the list. In a sense it is by an adoption
of Aristotle's "imitation of nature"; that is, his is an
imitation of culture. Usually, as is obvious, formal, pre-
Planned situations in cultural life, ceremonies and the like,
carry with them a patterned arrangement, a regular and
balanced appearance. By association, the audience expects a
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regular or formal proceeding when presented with the arrange-
ment on a stage. In unplanned, informal, or "realistic"
situations there is usually an unplanned, irregular
appearance. Hence, by association, a relaxed and informal
atmosphere on stage may result from a use of the "real life"
arrangement. Of course, "appearance" of unplanned is an
important word. Neither Dean, nor any of the other authors,
askes for really unplanned pictures.
The deep form and the shallow form yield less agreement
among the several authors; Dean feels that a deep (multi-
plane) form, one which makes a considerable use of up and
downstage Space, conveys warmth, richness, mellowness,
sincerity and realism. A shallow composition conveys quaint
ness, artificiality, shallowness, alertness, efficiency, and
immediacy. His reasons are not clear but an analysis of the
attributes seem to suggest a verbal analogy. In effect, a
deep composition physically shows a deep feeling emotionally,
cu'a deep thought intellectually. Action taking place on
Imuw'physical planes suggests ideas and feelings on many
mmnflbnal and intellectual planes. The contrary, of course,
would be expected of the shallow-scene. However, the shallow
seems to have other attributes that suggest immediacy. Here
ii:seems that context is partly the ruler again. Shallow
downstage might mean immediacy, shallow upstage might merely
mean artificial. Shallow combined with compact might suggest
"immediate togetherness." Shallow and regular might suggest
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quaintness, if the context is comic. Again the importance
here is to see the family of meanings that Dean feels inhere
in certain forms, meanings that certainly require the use of
life copying, metaphor, and association to have a residual
meaning, and certainly need a context to have a specific
meaning; still the groupings do make a special contribution
to, and a comment on, the scene, it would seem; not Just any
pretty picture would accomplish the desired support comment.
But it is difficult to see how the depth of composition could
have any of Dean's specific meanings without the appropriate
context.
Three other authors have significant contributions to
make on the subJect of depth: Dietrich, Jessner, and Dolman.
Jessner's view is not unsimilar to many constructivists and
proponents of symbolic staging such as Appia, Meyerhold, and
Tairov; it is Just that Jessner seems to be clearest on this
point of depth.
Dietrich at one point mentions that the only real
chiference'between the technique of the painter and that of
tie play director is a difference in depth.â€8 In another
:flace he points out the usual designation of strong and weak
eueas, previously cited, suggesting that upstage positions
sue generally weaker than down.49 ‘But later he suggests
tkmt movements toward and away from the footlights do not
uaDietrich, _p, cit., p. 98-
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affect balance.50 His latter statement would suggest a
definite limitation in the possibilities of meaning differ-
ential between up and down stage, a differential he has
previously maintained. The problem bears exploration. It
can be seen how a member of the audience, sharing eye level
with an actor, will notice less apparent movement toward him
than from side to side; it can be seen how the right-to-
left stage balance will not be affected thereby; but to
suggest that the total stage balance would not be affected
would seem to nullify the differences in the relative
strengths of up and down stage areas, and to suggest that for
purposes of strength a play need take place only in the plane
of the proscenium.
One solution to this problem might be to mention that
strength and balance are not identical, though related, on
stage. A face coming toward the audience may appear to be
getting stronger without appearing to tilt the boards. Still,
if there is any audience impression of up-and~down by
areas, by furniture placement, by groupings, or by scenic
elements, then it would seem that balance involves the
horizontal plane of the stage floor and not Just the vertical
Plane of the proscenium. This latter view seems closer to
Dolman's when he suggests that the stage exists in four
<hmmnsions, unlike the painter's two.51 It certainly
M
501bid., p. 140.
51Dolman, pp. cit., p. 116.
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complies with Dean's view of depth and also with Dietrich's
adding of depth to the tools of the stage "painter."
Perhaps Jessner gives us a clue to the solution with
his famous steps. As Jessner points out, his steps allow
for a better three dimensional composition, both real and
apparent. By raising the back of the stage, upstage becomes
observably different in depth.52 Of course, a tilted stage
gave the name up and down stage to the areas to begin with;
Jessner's method merely allows him to break the tilt into a
series of planes for level acting areas. Appia did something
similar with his Space staging; however, it would seem that
the theatre's tilted auditorium floor and balcony might also
tend to make contemporary stages more three dimensional in
appearance and make for a more three dimensional balance.
At any rate, physical depth, or the appearance of physical
depth through actors placement on identifiable stage planes,
(nmmt both to include depth in the problem of balance and
perhaps also to help depth contribute analogical meaning to
a scene.
The compact form, to Dean, conveys warmth, force, horror
and power. Here, more than ever, it is necessary to refer
‘MJcontext and culture for understanding Dean's specific
umanings; however, by now that method should be clear and
lull not be further labored. Suffice it to say here that
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there are more meanings possible than given. The warmth of
togetherness, the force of united strength can be seen, but
the huddling together because a group is cold or afraid may
also be a possible metaphor for the compact composition.
Therefore, there are two distinctly different and anti-
thetical possibilities in compact groupings depending upon
whether they are motivated by weakness or aggressiveness.
Perhaps of equal importance is the principle of old time
actors voiced by Selden,53 that space gives individuality;
a compact grouping may say "mass" as opposed to "individual."
That is, it may convey a feeling of impersonality. It may
also convey a feeling of instability if it is huddled in
one section of the stage with relatively empty Space else-
where.
The diffused form, to Dean, conveys indifference, cold-
ness, turmoil, defiance, and individualism. The connotations
should be obvious from the previous discussion of compact.
Again by analogy and nature, the audience may feel the
(maracters are unrelated to each other emotionally to the
extent that they are also unrelated physically on stage.
Again the context may become vital to make sure that the
audience is using the same metaphor as the director. Still
txm family of meanings is fairly clear: separateness may
lxeconveyed even though the Specific quality of separateness
53Canfield, 92, cit., p. 251.
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only appears in a specific context. Or as Dean puts it, the
director first conveys feeling (in his order of planning the
stage picture) in the general manner of his composition, and
then clarifies it later with the arrangement of details.54
h-Sources of Formal Meanings. A few principles of the sources
and varieties of meaning of groupings assert themselves. It
would seem that there are two general types. If the arrange-
ment actually resembles what the audience would eXpect to
see if the stage event were to occur in real life, there is
the illusion of life. The arrangement is a symbol for the
real. 0n the other hand, the arrangement could also be a
metaphor. Perhaps thereis no formal necessity to the scene,
no real-life counterpart, but the director abstracts from
an analogous situation the formal grouping he finds there
and applies them to the scene, because the director may wish
to make a comment through his borrowed form. His abstract
gmnnflng principle, then, is derived from either mimesis or
metaphor, though the form has now taken on a meaning
Inesumably apart from the recognition of source.
In any event, the director first conveys some general
feeling through his formal scheme and then clarifies the
feeling with added details.
d) galance at Rest and in Motion.--Because many of the
:unblems about balance derive from relationships between the
5â€Boyd, op. cit., p. 201.
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two types, balance at rest and in motion will be discussed
together in this section.
Balance is a compositional element generally agreed
upon as essential to the good stage picture. There is the
core of opinion grouped around the need for balance, a need
based on its pleasant, satisfying, and stable character-
istics. There is also a suggestion, only slightly develOped,
that there are definite needs for an unbalanced stage
picture. The latter suggestion provides the basis for a
conJecture that imbalance may be an essential ingredient
to the stage picture in motion.
l-Balance vs. Imbalance. Dietrich Speaks of a serial or a
circular response pattern in dialogue, and also of a
motivated situation continuing until a state of balance is
regained.55 For now it will be sufficient to explain that
the pattern refers to a contextual imbalance, such as one
of conflicting motives with one movement taking supremacy
over the other in alternation until a state of equilibrium
is gained. In this pattern imbalance in motivation and in
the forces within the situation, at least at any particular
nmment, are essential for psychical movement. In effect,
immalance seeking balance results in movement toward a
conclusion. As Dietrich puts it, a psychological balance is
mï¬ï¬‚eved when an equilibrium of contending forces is
55nietrich, _p. cit., p. 16.
68
achieved.56 Earlier, he states that anything not in equi-
librium is diSpleasing.57
The two ideas suggest at first a surface contradiction.
It seems that the majority of a scene has to be in a state
of imbalance in order to keep it from ending. When the
scene becomes balanced it also is over. If the observation
is accurate, then only the conclusions of scenes are pleasing
and the main body of the scene is diSpleasing. To correct
this conclusion, it would seem that perhaps some analysis is
appropriate here. What do some of the other writers main-
tain?
Dean also writes that viewing an unbalanced scene is
distinctly unpleasantg8‘While Selden, substantially agreeing,
finds that an unbalanced scene sets up an expectancy for a
balance and that expectancy satisfied is very satisfying.59
Selden's observation is not basically at variance with either
Dietrich's or Dean's; however, all suggest that imbalance is
diapleasing and balance is pleasing.
Perhaps a helpful idea would be to contrast the im-
balance of the still picture with the imbalance of the
moving picture. It seems that a still picture that is
unbalanced is unpleasant because there seems to be within it
M
56%., p. 102. 57Ibid., p. 100.
58Dean, _p. cit., p. 183.
59Selden, _p, cit., p. 172.
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no potential for change to a state of balance. Being static
it appears to be set in a permanent state of imbalance.
Whergag a scene in motion, but unbalanced in appearance or
feeling, is not in static imbalance but may be in potential
balance, moving toward balance. Hence, when translated into
movement terms, the unpleasant may only appear disquieting,
or, more positively, exciting; more so if the picture seems
to be moving through obstacles, through states of relative
balance to imbalance, with the real possibility, seen by
the audience, of an eventual state of balance.
Selden goes further than the other authors to suggest
that imbalance is the essential element, not balance, to
the ingredient of motion in theatre. He explains that when
an organism is in balance (or equilibrium) with its environ-
ment, it seeks no transit or change. Further that every
object or organism that appears to be out of equilibrium
with its environment, and is trying to re-establish that
equilibrium, has within it potentialities for movement; that
nmvement itself is the process of adjustment.60 Such a
view, again supports Dietrich's psychical view of the
function of imbalance. However, what appears strange is,
how, with these views, either author can consider imbalance
"unpleasant"; it would seem rather to be exciting, potential,
and vital as opposed to static, and monotonous. The only
6OIbid., p. 148.
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reconciliation appears to be as previously stated, that
imbalance not in the process of readjustment can be irritat~
ing in that it is failing to fulfill expectancy.
At any rate, the conclusions of the authors are these,
that balance is pleasing and imbalance is not, especially
within the frame of a still picture; that such balance is an
apparent not a real one (that is, a psychical and/or
aesthetic balance, not a physical one); and that there are
exciting implications for the role of imbalance in what
Selden calls the pursuit of adjustment.61
2-Meanings of Balance or Imbalance. With the above said,
are there, however, any particular "meanings" to balance or
imbalance? Perhaps there are at least conveyed feelings:
imbalance can create in the audience,hence mean,excitement,
unpleasantness, expectancy, or some form of disquiet,
depending upon whether it is imbalance at rest or imbalance
in.motion. At rest, imbalance can perhaps also imply
motion, hence imbalance can mean that motion can soon be
expected. Balance can perhaps convey,_.hence mean, peace,
quiet, rest, satisfaction, correctness, or boredom, again
depending upon how long it is apparent what precedes it
(i.e., whether it is a resolution of imbalance or merely a
static state), and what follows.
The varieties of balance, symmetrical and asymmetrical,
have already been discussed under the category of "form" so
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the above may exhaust the general possibilities for the
meaning of balance and imbalance as an abstract formal
element.
3-How Balance Meanings are Derived. It remains to suggest
in what ways the meanings of balance are derived. As an
example, Dietrich's serial response pattern seems to have
roots in the illusion of life, mimetic. category, while
balance achieved in time, first one force superior and then
another, suggests a physics principle such as illustrated
by the pendulum, hence derived from a metaphor.
The point here is merely to suggest that a mimetic or
a metaphorical basis, derived from everyone's experience is
the source for the feelings expressed by balance on stage.
As Dolman points out, without previous experience of such
states as imbalance, and, very important, without the
visual recognition of the symbol for that imbalance, an
audience's motor responses would not take place either
pleasantly or unpleasantly in reaction to the effect.62
e) Emphasis at Rest.--Translating emphasis into meaning
eventually will have to take on a less abstract look; for
emphasis deals not only with abstract arrangement of parts
but also with posture and direction of facing of human bodies.
Ihlthis section, however, the abstract character will be
explored to see if there are meanings to kinds of emphasis
62Dolman, _o_p_. cit., p. 11.
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beyond the mere strength and weakness of emphatic and non
emphatic character, meanings that are separate from the
contextual meaning that results from implied human
relationships. For again, in composing a scene if the human
relationships alone give the emphasis a meaning then there
would be little reason for selecting one kind of, e.g.,
strong, emphasis over another. The authors studied give
such Specific meaning of emphasis only to stage areas.
l-Stage Areas: Strength vs. Meaning. All authors generally
agree as indicated in the section on composition, about the
order of strength of the various stage areas. They do not
agree so well about the emotional qualities of scenes played
in those areas. To compare views, there first needs to be a
distinction drawn more carefully between "strength" and
"meaning." Strength is akin to emphasis in that it is a
compositional element more than an element of picturization.
A.person, or idea, or scene emanating from a strong area, or
moving into a strong area, places emphasis upon itself. The
weaning, though, is dependent on the context of the scene,
the idea expressed, the appearance of the person. To under-
score through strength, or to minimize through weakness is,
IK)dcubt, to contribute something to meaning; the position
contributes importance. But "strong" and "weak" do not stand
for something other than themselves. They are strong and
weak areas of the stage; they are not standing for strong
cn'weak areas in nature. Nature does not have a proscenium,
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and hence strong and weak areas are not found in areas in
nature; they correSpond to aesthetic factors derived from
art or from ceremony. The areas have inherent strengths
only because they maintain a constant and consistent physical
relationship to the entire audience. Such strength
designations change quite radically in arena theatre where
the conventional proscenium stage areas no longer apply.
2—Stage Areas: Meanings. However, allied to this strength
and weakness are certain inherent or acquired meanings to
stage areas. On this point there is perhaps the most dis-
agreement of all with neither Dean's nor his Opponents' points
of view particularly well supported. Dean again provides
the specifics with Canfield the strongest direct dissenter
and others providing varying degrees of doubt.
Says Dean, down center is hard, intense, harsh, strong,
climactic, and final; up center is regal, aloof, noble,
superior, and stable; down right is warm, informal, close,
and intimate; down left is not so warm as down right,
distantly intimate, formal, and introspective; up right is
soft, distant, and unreal; up left is soft, infinite and
ghostly.63
It can be seen how the qualities are related to
Inetrich's (and others) ideas of relative strength of area.
Dean has taken the ideas of strength one step further and
63Dean, _p. cit., p. 212.
74
suggested that each area has certain potential for specific
feeling. He doesn't try to explain why, whether these
qualities somehow derive from the way the audience views,
or derive from the audience’s association of areas with
scenes usually portrayed there.
Canfield is quite explicit in his Opposition tO Dean's
view, without being any more explicit than Dean as to his
reasons. He says that Dean felt intimate love scenes should
be played down right regardless of the setting or context,
and that such meanings of stage areas are only subjective
and cannot be argued.61+
It seems that both men may overstate their cases.
Obviously Dean could overcome part Of Canfield's objection
by stating that he (Dean) would supply the down right area
with the appropriate furniture or scenery for a love scene,
not that he would play it there regardless of the scenery.
1hï¬:the claim of subjective meaning is more difficult,
perhaps impossible, to Oppose--or maintain-~without extensive
controlled testing.
3wStage.Areasz Opposing Views Harmonized. However, for the
purposes Of this chapter the important step is to try to
come up with a norm Of expert Opinion, and that norm may
best be found by trying to relate, or harmonize, the Opposing
views in some creative way.
6403.11f131d, 92. ï¬., p' 135’
75
There seems to be an inversion at work. Taking a closer
look at the qualities that Dean indicates are communicated
by an area to scenes that are played in that area, it seems
possible that the process originated in reverse, that
scenes played in an area have gradually attached their
meanings to that area. Perhaps Dean, as director, presented
many scenes on stage in the order in which he would like
them to appear strong or weak, according to generally
accepted views Of area strength. If down right is considered
to be third in order of strength, or fourth in order of
weakness, it would seem apprOpriate in many cases for him
to play intimate (close to the audience) and soft (less
strong than down center) scenes down right. By consistent
choice Of strong and weak areas for various types of scenes
Dean or any experienced director may have gradually
established cliches of apprOpriate areas for different kinds
of Specific moods. After years of such presentation, both
he and his audiences may begin to associate these areas
with the qualities inherent in the scenes usually played
there, supported by the more tenable relations of strong
and weak, or varying degrees of emphasis, in area. Ulti-
nmtely, the result would be to feel that the areas have
inherent emotional values which they contribute to the
scene. In fact, if the above analysis is correct, the
areas would ultimately have inherent values, but only by
association and learning, only as SYMb°1S established by
usage and based on a compositional truth.
76
The conclusion of a discussion of areas, for purposes
of establishing a norm, might be to suggest that Dean's list
is a very helpful one for the director who is trying to
decide what strong or weak areas of emphasis might be
appropriate for certain scenes. Dean's list will start the
director's imagination working to consider, for instance,
whether or not a particular love scene is one which should
have the degree Of strength found in the down right area.
4-Other Aspects of Emphasis Combined With Stage Areas. As a
minimum, then, it would appear, by implication, that all
authors would agree that the emphatic element in a composi-
tion can have varying degrees Of strength according to the
areas used, and also that the less emphatic elements can have
varying degrees Of strength in relation to the most emphatic
element. For example, a character isolated from a group
will be emphatic; if he is in a strong area while the group
is in a weaker area, he will be emphatic and strong while
the group will be less emphatic and weak. Conversely, if he
is in a weaker area he can be emphatic but weak. Such weak-
ness or strength can connote emotional attitudes toward the
character; he can be dominant or subordinate while emphatic.
He can generate sympathy or disdain in weaker areas; fear,
awe, or dignity in stronger areas. Of course, the Specific
emotion becomes a contextual matter, all that can be said
new is that the position can show the character to be at
least weak or strong while being emphatic.
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Shared positions with an emphatic area can share
strength or weakness while sharing emphasis; and if areas
have emotional connotation such as Dean suggests the charac-
ters can share those attributes as well. Beyond these
meanings, the director may need human bodies and their
posture and facing to make the meaning of emphasis more
specific; he will no longer be dealing with meanings Of
abstraction but Of elements in a concrete context.
3, Picturization in Motion and Its Suggested Meanings,
According to the Authors Selected
Picturization in motion partakes of most of the
meanings of picturization at rest. However, there are
certain special ways in which picturization elements apply
to motion that need further clarification. Mass will not be
dealt with in a separate section below since mass means
little more in motion than it does at rest, specifically,
the impression of weight. The changing shape of mass con-
cerns line and form in motion, while line in motion usually
is the path described by form in motion. In turn, form in
nmtion concerns both the changing shape of forms and the
moving position of forms from one stage area to another. As
the forms move they change emphasis both in the internal
relationships Of parts of the form but also in strength,
and possibly emotional connotation, as they move in certain
(ï¬xections into new stage areas. And as forms move they
adopt patterns Of repeated beats, or rhythms.
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Balance in motion has been discussed already in the
section on picturization at rest. Rhythm and tempo will be
discussed at more length in chapter four on meaning in
context, since it seems that rhythm, even more than other
abstract elements, depends upon, and derives its meaning
from, its context. Therefore, what remains to consider here
are the special meaning aspects of abstract line, form,
emphasis, and rhythm in motion.
a) Line in Motion.--There seem to be two general
purposes for line in motion. The use forthe creation Of
mood and emotion is to be distinguished from the use to
create emphasis and balance. Such devices as dressing,
balancing, and the curved approach, as discussed by Dietrich
(and others), are basically not line patterns to convey mean-
ing but to maintain visibility of a primary character, to
maintain a balanced composition, or to maintain emphasis
Upon the character or Object that is conveying the meaning.65
The curved approach to place the moves in a more or less
emphatic position is not the same as the curved move to
convey whatever emotion is connoted by a curved line; however,
a particular curved move may well serve both purposes.
IeMeaning of Line in Motion. This study presumes that the
actor may create in time and space whatever shape and meaning
a.painted line may create in Space alone. However, the
65Dietrich,‘_2, cit., p. 130.
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special meaning of moving lines is little mentioned except
by Smith and Dean. To Dean, movement along lines (hori-
zontal, perpendicular, and diagonal, either straight, curved
or broken) has the same emotional meanings as he lists for
graphic, or still picture, lines.66
Moving line meaning has already been discussed as
approached by Smith; Specifically they are his group move-
ments determined by such images as encircling, punching,
siding, and separating. Other metaphorical bases for line
meaning may occur to the director once he is given the basic
suggestions of Smith.
Dolman has an interesting theory as to why slow curving
lines, such as the parabola, hyperbola, and ellipse, are
more pleasing and natural for stage purposes than straight
or circular. His idea is that straight and circular lines,
or moves, require artificial tensions to be maintained?7
The theory seems to be based primarily on an analogy from
physics; in the case Of a circle, that a centripetal force
must Operate against an equal and Opposite centrifugal force
to maintain a circle; such equal tensions would have to be
contrived. Similarly, straight lines seem to need both
pressure from behind, to keep them moving, and equal and
Opposite pressure on both sides, to keep them straight;
again these, he maintains, are very contrived pressures. He
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66Dean, _p. 93.3.. p. 256.
67Dolman, 92, gi§,, p. 71-
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might also have in mind images from his experience. In
nature the straight line and the circular curve rarely, if
ever, exist, even approximately; some form Of gentler curve
is more normal. SO by analogy and abstraction, if he
transfers his real life experience to the stage, the irregular
curve appears to him as more natural.
As Dolman points out, pleasing lines are more Often
the lines akin to the shape of suspended rope rather than to
the artificially straight.68 Of course if a composition is
to admit balance primarily because it is pleasing, it ought
also to admit slow curves if they are more pleasing than
straight lines.
Dietrich offers an equally interesting, though ap-
parently Opposite, view to illustrate how the "ideal" line
Of movement can depend upon what image the director chooses.
His premise is that humans are prone to conserve
effort, that is, to take the shortest route to a point of
interest.69 Earlier, he suggests a chart for all the
possible moves in relation to a point Of interest; the
moves are all charted as straight lines and are primarily
toward, away from, or passing by a point Of interest.70 His
use of the curved line is largely, as discussed above, for
countering or balancing the primary move Of another charac-
ter.
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It may be Of value to point out here a curved move in
relation to a point of interest, Smith's‘SymbOlic" use of
the curved approach in the metaphor Of encirclement. It
seems that in nature a man may well walk around an Object
of interest not merely away from, toward, or across it.
This circular movement in relation to an Object is found in
nature; the move also fulfills the rule of efficiency, in
terms of the man's purpose, without being a move in a
straight line.
It seems that Dietrich's principle is drawn from human
nature, or psychology. That the human being seeks the most
economical means Of accomplishing his goal may be true, but
it seems that the straight line is too mathematically
efficient, as well as tOO metaphorically mechanical, to be
typical of the human, as both Dolman and Smith seem to
suggest.
In certain dramatic situations there may be good
reasons, either metaphorical or motivational, for a charac-
ter to move in something other than a straight line. He
may have mixed motives; hence an indirect line of movement
may be expressive Of his indirection in motive. Or he may
be direct and efficient but in a graceful way, which may
well involve movement in Slow curves rather than in straight
lines. .A character may even move in mixed patterns,
Emssibly by starting his move in a curve and ending his move
in a straight line to indicate a change in his purpose or
point of interest.
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It seems to this study that the efficiency metaphor is
a good one, but that it derives more from mathematics than
from behaviour, hence derives its meaning from metaphor more
than mimesis; the straight line is the shortest distance
between two points. In effect, drawing upon another metaphor,
a cable approaches a bridge pier in an arc that is probably
parabolic in shape, yet is efficiently connecting two points
directly. Efficiency may not always entail a straight line.
There seem to be three basic ideas at issue in the
discussion. The first is that the shape of a movement may
have emotional meaning apart from a Specific context. If it
does, then one consideration in selecting the line of move-
ment should be its expressive appropriateness to the scene.
If straight lines,intersecting patterns, or Specific curves
express differing moods or emotions, then they should be
worked into the movement pattern for non-psychological
reasons.
The second idea is that efficiency and grace are in-
velved in line Of movement; the straight line seems to
suggest efficiency, the curved grace. Again, the qualities
0f line might better be chosen according to the attribute of
the character and the scene rather than for either Of these
reasons of graceful appearance or efficiency, unless, of
mmuse, efficiency or grace are attributes of the moving
character.
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The third idea is likeness to nature. Perhaps a compro-
mise may be effected here. An absolutely straight line, or
even the appearance of it, perhaps never appears in nature;
to make it appear on stage would seem to require of the
director a symbolic reason. However, the appearance of
directness and efficiency are certainly natural patterns in
some human behavior, and when human motivation is direct
then the line of movement may be direct as well without
being necessarily precisely straight.
Idne patterns in movements, then, may convey emotions
or moods at least as much as line patterns do in graphic
art. Patterns may carry connotations by metaphorical
reference to something in nature or culture, or patterns
may merely express the line Of movement most suggestive Of
the line a similar movement would take in real life; in
other words, the abstract line pattern may derive meaning
Item mimesis, metaphor, or symbol.
b) Egrm in Motion.--Form in motion would have meanings
parallel to those Of form at rest. Movement in symmetrical
or'asymmetrical, regular or irregular, or shallow or deep
ferms also convey the emotions that correspond to these
fprms at rest.71 It can be inferred that mass movements
that change from one form to another change meanings
according to the meanings of the two forms.
7lDean, _p. 21.3., p. 257.
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The movement in transition itself can also have special
meaning through the numbers, sizes and directions of move-
ments Of the parts of the moving form. To the extent that
the form is massive its movement connotes power. If parts
Of the moving form move together the power is accented and
increased; if parts move separately, the power is in
opposition to other power or, as Dean puts it, in turmoil.72
c) Emphasis in Motion.--According to the authors
studied, as form changes, or as it rises or lowers, or as
it moves about the various stage areas, Often following some
line pattern, the form's meaning changes through the varying
emphases it receives. The primary change is in strength and
weakness. Whether or not the changing emphases have any
more meaning than changing strength depends in part upon
whether or not Dean's meaning Of stage areas is accepted.
At least there is a certain amount Of agreement concerning
the relative strength Of emphatic movement.
lnEmphasis for Strength and Weakness. Strength and weakness
are the qualities Of movement most discussed by the authors
represented. Relative agreement on most points is apparent
though some quite interesting variants occur.
In some ways it seems that emphasis with abstract
compositional principles and emphasis by stage areas may be
separate in meaning such that they may work in mutual
subport or in counterpoint. By the degree of isolation,
*
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centrality, convergence, or stage level the degree Of focus
upon a character or object can be established. By the choice
Of stage area and direction of movement the strength of an
Object or character can be established. Hence it may be
possible to portray through picturization in motion, by
emphatic elements alone, a character who appears at the same
time both very important and very weak. If the reasoning is
correct it points out the possibility that emphasis by
abstract compositional elements has but slight connotation
Of strength or weakness when compared to the strength or
weakness of stage areas or body facing.
2-Emphasis by Level. Selden points out that a rising
character is strong because it is Opposing gravity; a falling
character is weak because it is succumbing to gravity.73
Dean agrees with the strength of height but Observes that
change Of level from lower to higher is Often neutralized
as a strong move because it is going upstage and away from
the audience.74 Of course Dean is writing more Of actors
who are ascending scenic elements, such as staircases, while
Selden is writing more of actors who are in the process Of
standing up or sitting down. Still the two authors seem to
be in fundamental agreement, though Dean's caution is an
important one: rising, by itself, may increase strength,
but rarely is any actual stage move a simple one, and one
neaning principle can nullify another.
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3-Emphasis by Stage Area. In the case of movement between
areas most authors agree that an abstract move is strong
when it is made from a weaker to a stronger area; it is
weak when made from a stronger to a weaker area. The
relative degrees Of strength are achieved by the amount of
change involved and the strength Of the area in which the
move concludes. As Dietrich points out, scenes can be made
relatively dominant by the sequence Of stage areas used;75
that is, the scene moving from a weaker to a stronger area
constitutes a strong move to a stronger position, and hence
makes the action of the new scene more emphatic than the
action of the Old.
A certain problem arises in Dean's application of the
principles described above. Dean writes that the strongest
move is from up center to down center, and the next strongest
move is from up right to down center, while the weakest move
is from down center to up right.76 Note that there is a
slight discrepancy between these moves and the principle
that the strongest move should be from the weakest to the
strongest area. Up left is stated to be the weakest area by
both.Dietrich and Dean, and so it is expected that the
weakest move would conclude in, and the strongest move
commence in, the up left rather than the up right area.
And SO it would if a director conceives Of movement as
75Dietrich, 9-2.. Cit., p, 108. 761388.11, 22. Cl ., p. 2214.
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merely the bridge, or dissolve, from one position to another.
The problem seems complicated by the influence Of natural
eye movement in reading. The problem is more complicated
still inasmuch as eye movement can be brought in evidence
for either view point.
There may be a real inconsistency here in Dean's
theory; at the very least there may be a problem in terminol-
ogy. First Dean states that a move from up right to down
center is the strongest. This would be a movement that
moves simultaneously toward the audience and from the
audiences left to the audience's center. Later Dean states
that the move from left to right is the stronger move
(from audience's right to audience's left).77 TO be sure
there is no mix up Of audience left with stage left, his
reasoning follows: The eye movement in reading goes from
left to right (i.e., stage right to stage left); therefore
a movement from stage left to stage right Opposes the
natural direction Of the western reading eye movement.
Opposition makes the move strong. Stage movement that
harmonizes with the eye movement is weaker in that it does
rmt involve Opposition. If this latter principle is correct
it would seem he ought to revise his first statement con-
cerning the strongest move; the strongest should be the move
from up left to down center; then it would also be from
Weakest to strongest area and in Opposition to eye movement.
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There seems to be no easy solution to his seeming incon-
sistency.
There also may be some doubt concerning the use of
"strong" in terms Of "Opposition to eye movement." There
is a possibility that stage movement supported by eye move-
ment is strongest. Different terminology may help solve
the difficulty. Perhaps the stage movement in harmony with
eye movement could be called peaceful, correct, or harmonious,
and hence could create a feeling of flowing with the stream.
Such a move might have the strength of "rightness." TO be
contextual, by way of example, such a move in harmony with
eye movement might be made by the "good guys" who are in
harmony with audience attitudes. While, on the contrary,
the strength of Opposition, Opposing the direction of eye
movement, might well be reserved for the strength Of the
"bad guys", those characters who are in Opposition to the
view of the play or the audience. If this harmony-Opposition
View has any significance, the view would reverse Dean‘s
Specific suggestions where he writes that the army going
against the eye movement is stronger and is psychologically
expected to win.78 The contrary Of his view might well be
true, namely that the army moving in harmony with audience
eye movement has the support Of the audience and is expected
to win.
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In summary there is general agreement that from weak
to strong areas are strong moves, and to a lesser degree it
is agreed that eye movement in reading has some effect upon
strength and weakness Of moves from side to Side. The
strength Of moves directly toward an audience as compared
to those that move across the stage provides an area of
controversy.
4-Emphasis by Diagonal Movement. The director has one more
decision about emphasis to make before he can choose what
sequence Of areas and directions Of moves he wishes, a
decision about the meaning Of the diagonal line. Dean and
Miner seem to Offer the alternatives well.
Dean, it has already been seen, feels that strong
moves are across stage, because they cover ground, and
downstage, because they come toward the audience. Diagonal
moves, he feels, are some sort Of "bizarre" mixed form and
rarely used;79 and in any case are weaker than moves down
or across stage.80 Miner, and others, on the other hand,
advise that the line of action is never horizontal or
vertical but diagonal.81
. It would seem that Dean is in the minority at this
Point, and that an application Of his own principles, a
combination Of Obvious distance covering, toward the
audience and from weakest to strongest area would result
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79Ibid., p. 197. 8°Ib1d.. p. 232.
81John Gassner Producing the Play (rev. ed; New York:
Dryden Press, 1953 , p. 257.
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in the diagonal move as the strongest line of action.
A decision about the significance of the diagonal would
have to be made by a director before he could decide what
is the strongest move to reserve for an individual in the
most climactic scene, and the strongest shift in location
from one playing area to another to reserve for the most
important change in the play content.
5-Summary Of Emphasis in Motion. In conclusion, the consensus
seems to be that the strongest stage move is on the diagonal,
toward the audience and across the stage at the same time,
from up right to down center. Additional support is given
to this conclusion by the following reasoning, drawn from
principles already given: a movement across the stage is
apparent, i.e., Obvious movement; the cross can be easily
seen to cover distance. On the other hand the directly up-
tO-down stage move, moving directly toward the audience,
does not appear to cover much distance. Further, if move-
ment is more attention-getting than stillness, then
apparent movement should be more attention-getting than
apparent stillness. Generally, then, the cross is stronger
than the up-tO-down stage move as far as getting attention
is concerned. And yet the full face Of an actor, approach-
ing the audience to the focal point Of the stage, down
center, is stronger than the profile Of an actor moving
in Dietrich's indifferent-tO-the-Object-Of-interest (the
audience in this case) relationship, the cross. Supposedly,
combining the strengths Of these two moves produces the
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strongest move, the diagonal. Of course Dean, as has been
seen earlier, distrusts the diagonal move and seems to
suggest that possibly it loses the strength of either of
its component moves and is possibly weaker than both.82
Although the chosen authors do not solve the problem this
way, it is possible that a curved diagonal cross, ending
with a move directly down stage at the center, on an
elevated stage level could be the strongest move on stage.
d) Rhythm in Motion.--In a sense,to say "rhythm in
motion" is to be redundant in that repetition in time of a
particular grouping Of accented and unaccented beats
constitutes rhythm. In a sense, then, rhythm implies motion.
However, since certain artists have adopted the word rhythm
to apply to the still picture, what this study has been
calling static rhythm, or sequence, some designation is
needed to differentiate still picture rhythm from rhythm in
time. Rhythm in motion will serve the purpose.
Rhythm first needs to be seen as related to the other
elements in composition rather than as some superimposed
attribute. In fact, some kind of rhythm may be unavoidable
in moving composition. Forms, composed of masses given
shape by line patterns, may move in relation to each other
and in relation to the audience. This movement has to take
place in time. Various segments Of a form, unless moving
with absolute smoothness and simultaneously at the same
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Speed, will provide some sequence of accented and unaccented
beats. If that sequence is repeated, a rhythm has been
established; if that rhythm continues at a relatively con-
stant Speed a tempo has been established.
For the purposes Of this chapter the study needs to
discover if, apart from any specific context, there are any
meanings that seem to be conveyed by rhythm in general and
by certain rhythms in particular.
In general, Dean feels rhythm communicates vitality,
order, coherence, and power Of attraction.83 Rhythm, in
effect, ties the production together, gives it all the same
flavor, and serves as a basis for a unified empathic reSponse
from the audience. In other words, rhythm, thought of as
abstracted from life processes such as the heart beat and
lung breathing, connotes life in a play.
In specific, Dean feels that certain rhythmshave
certain potential for more exact meaning, meaning in the
sense Of conveying certain moods or feelings. The major
determinant Of the kind Of feeling is the placement of the
-accented beat. For example, three beats generally convey
smoothness, gentleness, restfulness, and quiet. Within that
measure an accent onthe first beat connotes formality and
definiteness, while an accent on the third beat connotes a
lift, or a lilt. Four beats connote regularity, heaviness,
or impressiveness. An odd number of beats connotes uneasi-
ness and restlessness. A longer measure of, say, six beats
B31bid., p. 284.
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connotes, with a final accented beat, grandeur, and tension
or suSpense with a fifth accented beat.811L
Of these studied Dean is the only author of a play
directing text who suggests such specific meanings to
rhythm. It would seem that those meanings would require the
same warning, and supply the same family-of-meanings value,
that this study has suggested for Dean's specific meanings
Of stage areas.
4. Summary of Picturization
It seems that little more meaning can be gleaned from
abstract formal elements by themselves. After considering
the elements in isolation, in combination, at rest, and in
motion this study must now consider them in the context of
a play production.
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CHAPTER III
PRINCIPLES OF MOVEMENT IN THE CONTEXT OF A PLAY
A. Introduction: Areas Of Concern in the Relation
of Movement to Context
This chapter is concerned with the analysis of a script
in preparation for blocking. First it deals with the
question of how much pre—plotting Of movement a director
should do and then it sets up an additional classification
system. Movement in the context Of the play still fits the
four part classification set up by this study: abstract,
mimetic, metaphoric, and symbolic, but an additional
principle Of order arises. The order in which a director
analyzes his script for movement and uses his analysis in
rehearsals. Two separate systems of classification then
will be used simultaneously.
Finally the chapter deals with general principles of
relations between the script and gross blocking that ought
to be considered by the director before he actually plots
movement in a context.
l;_ Abstraction, Mimesis, Metaphor, and Symbol in the Context
From his script the director Often tries to derive
metaphors and symbols to help him interpret the major moods
and relationships in the play, the moods Of the stage
setting, and his resultant over all blocking scheme. After
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such decisions about theme, mood, abstract line, form,
balance, and rhythm, color and style have been made the
director usually makes decisions about the sequence of stage
areas and major gross moves that will be apprOpriate to the
context. Not until after this, and often not until re-
hearsal, does he become concerned about moves that are
mimetic. Of course, among practicing directors there is a
large range in order Of procedure. The purposes in
suggesting this particular procedure are, first, that it
reflects the order in which most directing texts present
their ideas about the meaning of movement in context, and
second, it shows the relationship between the kinds Of move-
ment and the process of analysis undergone before actual
blocking begins. In practice, at any step in the rehearsal
procedure any of the four ways in which movement conveys
meaning may be introduced into the process; but for analysis
this study will adopt the order Of the metaphor, abstraction,
and symbol preceding the mimetic.
2;, Contribution Of Movement to Context, Context to Movement
How context and movement contribute meaning to each
other is a highly diffuse and complex subject. Which
meaning is the derivative one is Often the big question.
In this chapter one of the tasks is to discover Opinions
about how much Of the meaning Of a movement is merely derived
from association with its context, how much some inherent
meaning of the movement contributes meaning to the context,
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how much the context may alter any basic formal movement
meanings with its specific, strong association, or how much
the movement may alter the basic meaning of the context.
This approach may help to decide how much a director can
editorialize on a script by his direction of movement, and
how much the script is determining the meaning of whatever
movement he employs.
Most Of the authors studied are concerned with a wide
variety Of relationships Of movement to context including
the relationship Of movement to interpretation Of the French
scene, of the motivational unit, Of the dynamic exit or
entrance, Of the emphatic line, of the kind Of dialogue, of
the clarification of a line, or of the emotional or aesthetic
basis for a scene. The total job Of picturization in con-
text, Of course, involves the added complication of the
posture Of actors, character motivations, business, and
characterization details.
A new variety Of associative meaning comes into being
once a move is seen in the context Of a play situation.
what might have been previously a simple strong or weak
move, graceful or abrupt move, now takes on specific
modification. The same move may take on the coloring of the
context. Given an angry character who makes a strong move
in a conflict situation, the strong move becomes an angry
strong move. By association with the situation the move is
thought by the audience to portray the specific emotion of
the situation. By association a move may be interpreted by
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an audience to convey rather refined feelings. In effect,
an abstract aesthetic meaning is superceded by a specific
physical meaning. Before the context the move only expressed
a very general tone, or mood, or a formal relationship;
with pantomimic context the move is given qualities by its
resemblance to natural or social contexts, or by psycho-
logical factors in the way our senses and body react to
physical phenomena; and given a verbal and action context
the move is given a specific relationship, and appears to
be a move with a specific meaning.
Also involved in the relation of movement to context
is the basic problem of whether the still picture or the
moving picture may best contribute meaning to a particular
scene. The difficulty is in finding anything like a
consensus while being inclusive Of all the representative
Opinion. However, this section is perhaps most important
in its implications for further develOpment Of a theory of
the relationship between the meanings Of motion and Of rest
in the stage picture.
About the relationships between movement, still picture,
and the script, Dean says, in effect, if sight and sound
factors are competing for attention usually the sight
factors will win. If what is in Sight is also moving then
it has an even greater advantage. Movement, then, is more
powerful than speech, and if both are going on together the
movement will get the focus}1
__
1Dean, 22, cit., p. 238.
98
He further states that pantomimic movement will tell
the story of the play more powerfully than the words, be-
cause man is more impressed by sight than by hearing.2
Selden supports Dean's view by writing that gesture may
Obscure words since the visual is stronger than the auditory.3
Smith, on the other hand, states that the ear is
quicker than the eye in the theatre, thus suggesting an
alternative View}1L In effect, Smith's statement does not
deal, as does Dean's and Selden's, with the factor of
strength or weight so much as with speed. A movement takes
time to perform and hence time to create its impression on
an audience. Also the audience eye needs time to change its
focus from one person or action to another. To explain by
a specific example, it is quite possible, in fast repartee
dialogue among several characters, for the audience to lose
track Of who is Speaking. A new voice will be heard, but
before the eye can locate the body, the dialogue has passed
to a new character. The relative Speed with which the eye
or ear may comprehend, then, is in a different category from
the relative force of impression made by that which is seen
and heard, with the seen more forceful than the heard.
2Ibid., p. 297.
3Selden, _p, cit., p. 241.
4Smith, _p. cit., p. 115.
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B. Principles of the Director's Control Over
Relations of Movement to Context
From the outset, Opinion would have it that the
director must control movement carefully or movement may
obliterate, confuse, or assume dominance over the script.
According to various authors the director, as will be seen,
has two general directions in which to go. If he declares
script supremacy he may either plan his movement carefully
to harmonize it with the script, or he may deny himself
this powerful tool of movement, suppressing it for the
weaker, though more subtle, complex, and intellectual, tool
Of the words. There is, in fact, a third choice taken by a
few authors: the director may let the movement occur as the
actor improvises it and edit it as the director's instinct
dictates. In effect, the latter usually accompanies a
different view of the play, namely that the actor and his
character is supreme, not the director, the production, the
script, or the audience.
In the actual job Of analysis of the script most
authors agree that the script Should dominate the director's
movement. But how much planning Of that movement the
director should do in advance of rehearsal, even in analysis,
is a subject Of controversy.
L To Plot or Not to Plot
Before discussing how the director may plot his blocking
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to fit his analysis a large body Of Opinion needs to be
summarized concerning how, or even if, a director ought to
plot that movement. Opinion seems tO range from HOpkins'
procedure of letting the actors roam about the stage and
letting the stage business be born from their actions,5 all
the way to Bricker's procedure Of planning in detail all
movement and business before even casting, and then com-
mitting all blocking to memory before the first rehearsal.6
Then to complicate his Opinion HOpkins also says that every
move should mean something, and that the director must know
exactly what he wants; the director simply should not let
the actor know he is being directed.7 Though. HOpkins seems
to express the most extreme anti—plan view, his practice
seems to suggest an iron directoral hand under a kid glove
of seeming actors' improvisation. Bricker's reasons for the
extreme view of planning is basically similar to that of
more conservative planners, to insure a meaning to the move-
ment and stage picture; however, he leaves it to others to
suggest a method of directing and a meaning for the resultant
movements.
The shades Of opinion are as follows: Edwin White
believes the director's job is both interpretive and
5Hopkins, pp. cit., p. 15.
6Bricker, 22, cit., p. 242.
7Hopkins, 22, cit., p. 13.
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creative, not imitative; the movement of a script should
follow the mind Of the director for each new production.8
C. B. Purdom suggests that all movement be worked out at
the start; to rely upon inspiration at rehearsals is a
weakness in the director; still a director should not be
rigid in the application Of his plan. In brief, he feels
that intuition is no substitute for technique, and technique
does not depend upon rehearsal improvisation.9
Harold Clurman declares that the director is the
"author" Of the stage action; that theatrical gestures and
movement comprise a different language from that which the
playwright uses; and it is the director who is the master
Of theatrical action.10 In practice Clurman is consistent
with his theory; from his notes about directing Member of
the Wedding it can be seen that he has created in detail the
movement pattern, gestures, and mood, as well as the back-
ground Of the play and of each character before entering
ll
rehearsal. At first there seems to be an inconsistency
in that he states his method is to get these elements from
the actor; a closer look discloses, however, that his method
does not mean the discarding of a plan. In effect, Clurman
8
white, _2, cit., p. 114.
9Purdom, 22, cit., p. 79.
10Cole, _p, cit., p. 275.
llIbid., p. 285 ff.
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gets from the actor exactly what Clurman has pre-planned,
a procedure which may save the self-esteem Of a tempera-
mental actor but is apt to be costly in time and efficiency.
Bernard Shaw, as might be expected, believed in pre-
planning all moves,12 as did Jacques COpeau.13 While Jean
Vilar declares that to compel an actor to integrate voice
and body into a pre-determined harmony or plastic com-
position smacks Of animal training.14 Of course Vilar fails
to discuss the possibilities Of pre-planning in Clurman's
style, which does not force anything upon the actor, but in
fact Clurman agrees with Vilar, that it is an appalling
fault in a director to insist pedantically upon a partic-
ular inflection or movement in a particular part of a rolel5
It is of side interest, perhaps, to note that Gassner quotes
this permissive passage from Clurman's writing but not the
part that insists on the complete planning by the director.
It is, after all, no more absurd to expect exact movements
from an actor, planned by a director-artist, than it is to
expect exact words from an actor, planned by a playwright
artist; to repeat Clurman, the director's role may well be
that of author Of the action.
Robert Lewis declares that a good director works out
a plan, a design; and bits and pieces Of the design cannot
_—
121bid., p. 193. 13Ibid., p. 217.
1“Ibid., p. 267.
15Gassner, _p, cit., p. 297.
103
be altered very Often without destroying the basic spirit
Of the whole production.16 Stanislavsky, employing an
improvisational technique both with movement and dialogue,
nevertheless was a careful planner and a stickler for
detail. It is true improvisationally he believed in
changing scenery and floor plan to keep the movement fresh
and changing in early rehearsals;17 what is sometimes for-
gotten, however, is the length of time he used for rehearsal.
Referring only to his works on acting will make the reader
think that the director simply made the actor think, re-
call, and feel. Reference, however, to his directions,
for example in Stanislavsky Produces Othello, will reveal
that he preplanned every detail Of his plot and character
background as well as very Specific movements and business
details that resulted from his analysis.18 His methods,
not unlike Clurman's method of drawing things out Of the
actor, merely required more time in order to draw from the
actor Stanislavsky's own preplanning. Of course, con-
clusions such as the above need more documentation than is
given here; but since his point Of view is not central to
the theme Of this paper, it seems sufficient to refer the
reader to Stanislavsky's production notes on Othello for
confirmation.19
16.1%" p‘ 308. 170016, 22'. Cite) Do 110.
18Konstantin Sergeevich Stanislavsky, Stanislavsky_
Egpduces Othello (London: G. Bles, 1948 .
19Ibid.
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Dantchenko maintained that the director gives the
actor everything, and the actor's Job is to enter into the
life of all the specific instructions given to him.20
Dantchenko warns, however, as does HOpkins, that the actor
should not, by the time the play is in performance, know
what has been given him, because he has made it so much his
own. Dantchenko's point Of view is substantially that Of
this study. Generally, the competent actor has enough to
create and enough to achieve so that he is most willing to
accept the blocking and detailed suggestions of a competent
director. In fact, he usually takes pride in being able to
make almost any direction look like his own invention.
Miner starts by decrying the didactic method of
direction that makes an actor "parrot back" in stale
Obedience,21 and concludes by advising that the moving
pattern of the play should be worked out before rehearsals
start.22 The presumption is that he counsels persuasion
and a certain flexibility combined with preplanning. Again
it seems pertinent to wonder why Miner uses the emotionally
toned words; he doesn't seem to think the actor has to
"parrot back" the playwright's words even though they are
usually rigidly pre-determined; yet he does seem to think
the actor would have to "parrot back" the director's move-
ments if they were predetermined. It seems that Dantchenko's
_—
21Gassner, _p, cit., p. 213.
22Ibid., p. 247.
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105
view Of the actor-director relationship should settle the
problem. If the actor knows his craft, he ought to be able
to make the director's pre-planned movement seem to origin-
ate spontaneously from the character portrayed.
Smith says the director is like an artist designing
a picture.23 Of course to carry that image further, it
would be absurd for the pigment and the canvas to determine
their own pattern; however, some modern canvas artists in
fact let the pigment do just that.
Dietrich feels that the basic purpose Of the play
production process is to give every talented person a
chance tO contribute the best that is in him, and that such
a purpose is defeated with a dictatorial director.24
It must be realized, of course, that the above purpose,
whether intended or not, is stated in terms of educational
or community theatre. Giving every talented participant a
chance to contribute is not the primary purpose Of pro-
fessional theatre though it may be the method used by some
professional directors. Giving such participants a chance
may or may not produce a unified blocking scheme, may or
may not result in a clear pattern of movement communication
to an audience; however, giving the participants their
chance probably will result in an Opportunity for them to
practice what they have learned, to experiment with something
new, and to learn more in the process. Such are admirable
___
23Smith, _p. cit., p. 94. 2%1etr1ch. _p. cit., p. 62.
106
goals Of educational theatre. In professional theatre,
giving competent actors a chance tO contribute from their
experience may result in good theatre, but it still may
result in a disunified or unfocused movement scheme. In any
case, the primary purpose Of professional theatre seems to
be to please an audience. A participant's contribution is
only pertinent to the issue to the extent that the contri—
bution will or will not improve the product the audience
sees; but the purpose is audience centered, not participant
centered.
The important point this study wishes to make here is
not tO confuse purpose with method. A good director's
method may be to utilize available talent to the fullest
while still allowing the playwright to dictate the words
at the same time the director dictates the movement. His
primary purpose may be to give each participant a chance or
to give the audience a unified impression, purposes which
are not necessarily compatible or incompatible. In any
event, this study is parimarily concerned not with partici-
pants but with whatever methods and principles will produce
the most clear communication by movement.
Selden, like Hopkins, seems to want the best Of both
preplanning and spontaneous creation. First he declares
that there is no "real" on stage; everything is presented
in some degree Of abstraction, so the director must create
a planned pattern; he selects, orders, and heightens both
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the gross movement and pantomimic effects.25 Later Selden
maintains that the director cannot plan the design Of the
movement; that it must flow from feelings and impulse,
though thought can enhance it.26
The two sections appear
to be in direct contradiction to each other; but whether or
not they are, it would seem that design can flow from
feelings and impulse and still be pre-planned. The feelings
and impulses conjured up by an experienced director,
imagining the script in action, and using techniques of a
language Of movement, are apt to be at least as reliable as
either the director's or the actor's impulses on the spur
Of the moment and under the pressure of the time when the
play first gets put on its feet.
Dean, the most outstanding prOponent Of the specific
meaning Of movement, and Of the director's Obligations as
artist and planner, still advises caution in rehearsal and
planning. In fact, the method he proposes seems to back-
track On his other principles; it is to plan the general
tonal qualities Of the various scenes but to wait until
blocking rehearsals to specifically compose the pictures,
moves, business, and rhythms.27 His reason is that pre-
planning in detail will tend to stamp all the director's
productions with the director's character. He has a point,
25Selden, _p, cit., pp. 5-13.
261bid., p. 195.
27Dean, op. cit., p. 261.
108
but the Opposite is equally possible; improvising by the
director during rehearsal may well result in reliance on
the same cliches Of movement and interpretation the director
has used before. It would seem that careful planning, by
an intelligent director, would stand a better chance of new
results, and Of having moves that grow out Of the needs of
the particular play, then would improvisation.
Canfield takes the subject up in detail, considering
many points Of view quite sympathetically. His conclusion
is a clear statement in favor Of the recognition of the
craft Of the director and Of the necessity for pre-plan-
ning;28 to Canfield, pre-planning and a steadfast adherence
to the planning through specific application is the only
way to insure a unified production, meaningful picture and
movement, and an exciting play that takes advantage Of the
director's analysis and experience. In general his view
Of the actor is that he can contribute a great deal, but
from his own techniques and experiences. The actor must
conform not primarily to some inner truth within the actor
but primarily to the inner requirement of the play and the
character. These inner truths may be subjective, but they
can be as objectively planned as the script itself, for
they are subjective truths of the character, not of the
actor.
Throughout this discussion there seem to emerge two
related but separate issues. One is whether or not to
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pre-plan movement, and the other is whether or not to dictate
movement to actors. One concerns careful application of
principles and analysis, the other concerns how to communi-
cate that analysis to actors. It seems to this study that
the two issues are independent variables and can be put
together, or separated, in any combination the director may
desire.
The consensus, if there is one, may be stated thus: a
director may pre-plan or not just as he pleases; however,
he need not identify detailed planning with dictatorship,
nor spontaneous creation with the appearance of spontaneity
in performance. If there is any meaning to movement with
its conventions, symbols, patterns, and pantomime, then the
director is giving up a powerful tool unless he works out
these elements carefully, and by some method insures him-
self that the actor uses the results of his careful analysis
and plotting.
2L, Phases in Plotting Movement from Guiding Concepts to
Details
a) Summary Of the Six Phases.--As compiled from
authors and directors consulted, analysis and plotting seem
to fit roughly into Six phases. (1) Phase one is the
director's attempt to find in the script a basic theme or
image for interpretation. He decides what script elements
suggest movement to him and conversely what movements will
suggest script elements, i.e., what movements seem to be
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suggested by mood, theme, structure, and point of view.
(2) Allied to thematic analysis, but different is character
analysis: what movement factors are suggested by characters
and their relationships in a play, as contrasted with what
thematic ideas suggest. (3) In the third phase, based on
his analysis, the director must plot his gross movement, or
blocking scheme and design his basic stage floor plan.
(4) The fourth phase may be to plot his fine movement in
Specific relation to lines Of the script. (5) Fifth, he
may plot the details of movement qualities in characteri-
zation, business or pantomime. And finally (6) the sixth
phase is the plotting Of the timing qualities of rhythm,
tempo, and sequence.
It may be, Of course, that a director does not work in
this order nor even plot these elements. He may even leave
much Of this work up to actors, designers, or chance. The
difference in method, however, would not invalidate the
categories. Whether these relationships of movement or
context appear on stage by planning or by chance, by
director or by actor decision, there will still be a
resultant movement pattern in some relationship to the
script lines, and with some amount Of business and timing.
b) Principles of Theme and Image: Selection of
Metaphors and Symbols to help Create a Movement Pattern.--
The image, or metaphor, seems to be the most popular mode
of communication to choose for play interpretation. Smith,
and others, suggest that this choice should start with the
lll
theme and what the play is trying to say, to suggest, to
sell, tO teach, or to express. Choice should start with
the main forces at work and the conflicts involved. Per-
haps there are too many fOrces or themes in which case the
attempt is to consolidate them into a single overall ruling
theme. This main theme, and the nature of the conflict
relationships in the play, may then suggest to the director
both a graphic image and a line pattern to the play. The
abstract line and graphic image may then control not only
scenic design elements but the form Of pictures and Of
movements on stage.
l-Sources and Use of Theme. Canfield says that the tone,
style, and blocking should Spring from the script.29 Smith
suggests four basic elements to look for in the script:
theme, line, color, and graphic image.30 McMullan wrote
an entire book about the way a director may find images in
his script to serve as tools for interpretation Of lines
and movement; he suggests watching for plot movement and
finding images that will picture that movement in graphic
terms.31
Other authors, such as Hewitt, suggest that life
provides our main image or metaphor for analysis, the life
both Of natural behavior and of convention?2 However, the
_._
29Canfield, _p. cit., p. 131. 3°Sm1th. 22. cit., p. 7.
31Frank McMullan, The Directorial Image (Hamden, Conn.:
Shoestring Press, 1962), p. 57.
32Hewitt, pp. cit., p. 11.
112
script may influence where in life the director looks for
his image. MacGowan, for instance, in talking about certain
European expressionist dramatists, draws attention to the
Specific use of metaphor in The_In§egt_ngedy where movement
patterns are derived directly from insect life.33 In the
same chapter, however, MacGowan suggests an internal rather
than external search for metaphor by asking the director to
seek his theme and his metaphor, and consequent movement
pattern, from the inner truth of the unconscious mind in-
stead Of from the outer world Of actuality.34 MacGowan is
not very explicit, however, in suggesting how the two
resultant movements might differ from each other. He does,
however, give examples. For instance, a red costumed
chorus group may represent a blood stain on the stairs,35
or a physical covering Of cloth may represent metaphorically
Napoleon's covering the glory that was the Bourbon's.36
Colby Lewis suggests that Jessner abandons external
realistic verisimilitude in order to attempt to express
man's soul.37 An analysis Of Jessner's movement seems to
indicate a complex thrice-removed-from the truth stage
picture. Actors stand for a blood stain on the steps, and
33Kenneth MacGowan and R. E. Jones, Continental Stage-
craft (New York: Harcourt, Brace and CO., 1922), p. 34.
341bid., p. 6 35Ibid., p. 136.
“
35Ibid., p. 137.
37Lewis, pp, g;§,, p. 197.
113
the blood stain stands for a physical death, and the physical
death stands for a spiritual death; however, such a dis-
tance from the ultimate meaning might make most audience
members see only a pretty set Of red costumed actors.
Reinhardt declared that the job Of the director is to
breathe life into the written word, to fill it with the
blood Of today in order to retain the spirit of that word.38
Reinhardt, however does not supply his readers with the
principle of analysis which must be used to arrive at the
apprOpriate movement patterns. Perhaps he intended some
principle such as Robert Lewis used to direct MypHeart's in
the Highlands. His image was a flowering plant that be-
came analogous to a group in motion; a trumpet player "waters"
the crowd with his playing, "the plant" grows and bears
"fruit" in the form of gifts for the player.39
2-Subordinate themes for French Scenes and Beats. 'When
analyzing the script the director will no doubt find many
metaphors and many themes, all subordinate to the main
theme and metaphor; in fact they will contribute to the
finding of the main metaphor. These subordinate images are
usually found in, and express, smaller units Of the play
variously called French scenes, paragraphs, sub-actions, or
motivational units. It is into these units that the
director usually subdivides his script to find meaningful
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39Gassner, _p. _c_:_l_t_., p. 306.
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parts that contribute to the whole. Harold Clurman main-
tains that a play is not constructed on lines of dialogue
but fundamentally on a series of actions, which he calls
beats, that are revealed through what a character wants or
is driving toward."O
Smith suggests that the "action" of
a scene is a literary term concerning the movement of a
plot by a succession Of incidents; the action needs to be
translated into psychical and physical terms and units.41
In effect these units are steps in a character's progress
toward a goal. Dietrich supports this view and calls
these steps "motivational units."42 In movement, these
units are used primarily to devise combinations of still or
moving pictures that are phrased, or paragraphed, for units
Of movement meaning. In effect, these units, or beats, are
similar to a paragraph in writing. In it one action is
carried out, or one incident occurs, or one subject is
discussed, or one aspect of a purpose is pursued, or one
step in a development is taken.
Let it be noted that there are really two different
Points Of View involved in deciding what the content of a
unit is. The two views may not necessarily result in the
same division Of the script into units. One view is
motivational and the other is thematic. The latter is in
terms Of the play's or author's reasons or themes, the
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former in terms of the actors. The points of view are not
only different in kind but may well be different in purpose.
The character intends one thing while the play may intend a
point Of view about what the character intends. For
instance, the character may fulfill his goal in the progress
Of a scene, but the play may mean to suggest that he should
not have. Hence, the metaphor and the movement may differ
somewhat depending upon whether the director uses as his
basic unit a motivational scheme or a thematic scheme.
Hopefully, a careful analysis will allow both purposes to
join in a single pattern that will interpret to the
audience the intention of both the character and the play.
3-Relating Subordinate Themes to the Main Theme. The next
step would be to decide how the theme and image of each
scene is related to the theme or image of each other scene
and to the theme of the whole play. The reason would be to
assure a variety in meanings with an overall unity of
purpose. Such smaller scenes may be divided, according to
Dean, into scenes Of incidental action, of background
action, Of main action, or Of emotional relationship."3
They may also be divided into steps that range from low to
high, steps that chart the progress of a character toward
his goal, as Canfield and others suggest.“l Another
division Of scene types is suggested by Dietrich's list of
43Dean, pp, cit., p. 209-
""Canrield, pp. cit., p. 134.
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basic motives; they may be scenes of reSponse, recognition,
adventure, or security wherein the basic character inter-
relationship is typified by one Of these drives.45 Another
list may also help in ordering the scenes, such as a list
Of the basic needs: sex, food, drink, air, and shelter.
Or still other listings such as by emotions expressed or
felt by the characters, or by moods inherent in the scene.
In any event, at this Juncture the point is to determine
the basic themes and images Of these scenes and to rank
them in some order Of importance, climax, vitality, or
mood, to try to discover some progressive structure. The
purpose Of the latter is to decide how and where to stage
the scenes.
Many authors suggest giving a scene a title in order to
summarize for the director the central content and purpose
of the scene. Such titling is akin to the selection Of a
theme or a metaphor for that scene. Canfield suggests
titling"6 as does Dean?7 SO, in fact, dO many others. .Also
this study wishes to point out that either a title or an
image may help to determine whether a scene will be static
or moving. For example, the director may title his scene
thus: George is surrounded by his admirers. He may also
title the same scene: George in the process Of being
surrounded by his admirers, or George showing Off more as
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“5Dietrich, _p. cit., p. 12.
"6Canfield, _p. cit., p. 134. â€7Dean, pp. cit., p. 207.
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117
his admirers close in. The first title suggests a still
picture and may result in a still picture blocking. The
second and third suggest moving relationships and are
apt to result in moving pictures in the blocking.
A similar set Of alternatives for a scene might be
this: George forces Henry to come to a decision, or George
chases Henry until George corners Henry and forces him to
decide. Examples Of course could be multiplied, but it can
be seen how from the start a director's choice of a moving
image oriitle, rather than a static image or title, can
influence the kind Of movement or still picturization he
arrives at in his scene.
Similarly, the central image for the entire play can
be a major turning point for the director. It would seem
that in its choice he has started on the road to a static
or a moving play depending upon whether his metaphor is
static or moving. If he sees the relationships in the
play as, e.g., mountain and valley his play may stand
still. If he sees them, for example, as rushing stream,
pendulum, or cock fight his play may move. In Short, if
he looks for the movement of the plot, the moving relation-
ship Of ideas, and the moving character relationships, then
selects a moving metaphor, his task is easier when it comes
to the selection Of specific physical movements.
This section concludes with the following Observations:
a director may call attention primarily to changes in
process or to the static results of change. If he wishes
118
to experiment with the maximum use of his unique tool Of
movement he can at the outset materially increase his
Opportunities for success first by looking for moving
themes, moving forms Of expression, moving titles, moving
moods, and moving drives when he analyzes his script and
second by choosing a moving metaphor to depict the moving
relationships.
0) Principles of Character Relationships Yielding
Possibilities for Movement Patterns.--In this second phase
Of the director's analysis much has already been anticipated.
The analysis Of the relationship between character and
character, the motivational, purposive, actionable relation-
ships, have already been discussed while dealing with
motivational units, or beats, to a play. Suffice it to say
in addition that the director may well have a problem in
translating his thematic unit into a motivational unit for
the actor. The advisability Of working with the actor in
terms of the play's purpose or merely in terms of the
character's purpose is a matter for the subject Of psycho-
logy Of learning. However, for purposes of analysis the
director ought to understand the difference in units and be
able to use both.
l-Relating Character Movement t>Theme Movement.--The actor
motivates his character using primarily psychological data;
the actor must attempt to create the impression that he
sees and feels only what the character sees and feels. The
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119
author motivates his play usually using a much larger range
Of data and a much more Objective point of view. Added to
psychological purposes are social, ethical, aesthetic, and
poetic purposes; even the psychological purposes usually
involve the interrelated motives of several characters. In
short, the purpose Of one character in any particular scene
is but a small part, and usually of one kind, Of the
author's purpose in that scene. More Often it seems the
author's purpose is to show something like the Opposition
of contending social forces or ideas as embodied in the
several characters in conflict, rather than merely the
purpose Of one character.
Hence, for actors, the director usually needs to make
a second script analysis, translating themes, images,
conflicts, and sociological and philosophical data into the
behavior and purposes of characters.
2-Combination.or Choice, Of Psychological or Symbolic Outer
Expression Of Inner Truth. Certainly the modern theatre
man seems to be much more concerned with psychology than
philOSOphy. He is much more concerned with analyzing a
play in terms Of character and motivation than in terms of
what the play says or how it says it. Even the non-
illusionistic expressionist, who scoffs at presenting
verisimilitude on stage is usually more concerned with
presenting the "inner truth" Of "souls" or minds or emotions
rather than ethical, aesthetic, scientific, conceptual or
even sociological "truth". The modern theatre man seems to
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be more concerned with "truth to" than "truth about,†more
concerned with correspondence with than comment about, more
concerned with the "is" than the "ought." He wants to
depict reality, be it inner, outer, or otherwise, rather
than to criticize reality. Of course there are notable
exceptions; however, the greater amount of contemporary
material in theatre concerns psychological reality, and
there is a dearth or submergence Of material involving
symbolic expression and editorializing techniques. In
fact an even more subtle lack is apparent. With the
exception Of basic text books on directing there is a
real dearth of thematic analytical method and material.
There seems tO be a growing tendency toward forgetting
the art and craft Of theatre and a greater dependency upon
the spontaneous psychological reactions Of the director and
the actor to bring the script to life. This particular
psychological approach to play production, letting actor
behavior on stage dictate character behavior seems to have
the usual anaemic results Of too much inbreeding. Charac-
ter portrayals more and more resemble each other rather
than unique human beings, because more and more the
characters are evolved primarily from what the actor feels
than from either the script or an understanding Of how
other human beingsfeel and behave.
The philosophical, or analytical, approach seems to
be less in vogue. However,in all fairness,this lack may
not be a real one but simply a reflection of the fact that
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the practicing experienced director no longer thinks
consciously of the craft Of his work but is always conscious
Of having to deal with artistic personalities. His writing
may reflect his conscious problem more than his unconscious
practice.
Concerning the inner truth Of character relationships,
the authors of directing texts seem to agree that a char-
acter's inner feelings must be given outer form. According
to Dietrich, a drama needs overt action; the inner must be
translated into observable action."8 His previously
mentioned basic motives must find a physical, observable
expression. However the "inner" that is being expressed in
the "outer" may be expressed, it seems, in two basically
different ways. One is psychological and the other thematic.
The first derives from motivation. There is some inner
reason, drive, or imbalance that leads a person to seek
satisfaction or balance. That seeking is the overt result
Of the motivation. From the outer form the seeking takes,
the audience is supposed to be able to discover both the
motive and the kind of solution sought.
Again, according to Dietrich, action means little
until we see the reason for it."9 This study has already
discussed this idea in terms of the meaning of abstract
movement; however, it seems necessary to find out in this
"8Dietrich, _p, cit., p. 8.
"91bid., p. 9.
122
section how the context may clarify the basic action. To
begin with, the move itself may be all that is necessary
in order to see the reason for it. Given a move with all
its pantomimic clarifications, that is, with its qualities
Of line, and its relationship to other actors and to the
audience, then the pantomimic movement context is quite
complete. The move without a verbal context may convey
much meaning; however, the move with all Of these qualities
is already in a context, though nonverbal, and is no longer
abstract movement.
The other basic variety of expressing the inner by the
outer may not deal primarily with the psychological but with
symbols. The outer form may be dictated by the line, image,
form, and pantomimic language symbols that are primarily
symbols abstracted from elements in nature; though symbols
certainly may be abstracted from human behavior. However,
there seems to be a basic difference in kind and procedure
between devising symbols representative Of inner states and
devising illusionistic heightening of natural symptoms
drawn from a real life situation. It seems also, though,
that there is no reason why both levels of translation Of
inner truth to outer form should not be used at the same
time without confusion. Dietrich and others write of the
illusion of reality, Jessner and others write of the symbol
of reality; the modern director may well use both.
3-How to Discover the Character's Inner Feelings. The study
turns next to discovering in the script what the character's
123
inner purposesare and how they can be transcribed into
movement. Dietrich is a good starting point for a montage
Of Opinion about discovering inner purposes to be portrayed
by actors with their outer forms.
According to Dietrich, the director should look for
the conflict in the scene, the drive of one character and
the Obstacles he is overcoming, Obstacles usually embodied
in another character. This conflict sets up an imbalance
in the action Of the play and provides the basis for his
previously mentioned give and take of reaction, giving
the director some internal movement to express in external
ways.50 These motivations of characters may stem from
either internal or external stimuli;51 there may be, in
other words, an inner drive or an outer event that sets up
the imbalance; or of course, there may be both. Obviously
the director in the first phase Of analysis must find the
physical Objects, or the characters, or the internal
reasons that motivate the characters in order later to
devise movement appropriate to them. At that time the
director may discover it is best to have three different
levels Of "motivation" for every move. First, an internal
reason within the character; second an external Object to
externalize the internal, to provide a point Of interest,
as Dietrich calls it, or to provide a destination for the
50Ibid., p. 158. 511bid., p. 147.
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124
move; and third, a symbolic motivation, a reason dictated
by the meaning of the play by the underlying purposes of
theme, possibly expressed in graphic image.
4-How the Character Should Portray His Inner Feelings. On
the subject of how characters should portray their inner
feelings or the inner purposes Of the play, there seem to
be two sharp divisions Of Opinion: by mimesis on the one
hand, and by abstraction, metaphor or symbol on the other.
The divisions might be labeled psychological and philOSOph-
ical.
Robert Lewis feels that the form of a realistic play
exists in the successful scene-by-scene fulfillment of the
main intention of each character in relation to the theme
Of the play.52 Thus he combines both philOSOphical and
psychological reasons in his analysis. Jacques COpeau felt
that the best translation Ofgipppppto outer was by using
all of the abstract elements of line, mass, and Shape,
combined with certain conventional symbols for human
behavior instead Of abstracting behavior from nature.53
His way,the actor would accurately indicate his character
rather than present the illusion Of character. To COpeau
such outer form, resembling moving sculpture, could con-
vey universal meanings rather than specific individual
characteristics. To Stuart Vaughn, universality is best
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52Gassner, _p, cit., p. 306.
53oo1man, _p. cit., p. 182.
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expressed by being really specific and detailed; and in the
context Of his writing appears to be suggesting the presen-
tation of unique individuals, not "universalized" symbols Of
humanity.54 His view would suggest that a well wrought,
realistic, and believable, human being on stage stands for
humanity better than an actor who attempts to portray char-
acteristics which are true Of all human beings but of no
particular human being. His point seems well taken, but
he perhaps understresses the possibilities of presentation
Of characteristics that humans have in common, character-
istics by virtue of which they are all classified as human
beings. Perhaps also, he neglects the possibilities in the
alternate method of being specific and truthful, namely the
method of using symbol, a form of Sign language, as it were,
rather than verisimilitude. Be that as it may, the rest Of
the Opinions seem to line up on either side Of this dividing
line between the two external ways of expressing inner
realities: symbol or verisimilitude.
Meyerhold, using his "bio-mechanics" system of body
training tried to make his actors physically able to
perform whatever was required by him. Such stage movements
were not psychologically motivated, says P. A. Markov, but
were displaying humans in large "poster" terms, portraying
characteristics of society in its classes rather than of
5hCole, pp, p$§,, p. 435-
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individuals.55 The results were evidently grotesque and
exaggerated, and were said to resemble a form of modern
dance. Meyerhold felt that truth was best expressed by
sociological rather than psychological motivation. He
preferred types to individuals as long as the types expressed
the inner truth of society.
Kazan prefers to look to the script for psychological
motivation, saying that directing consists finally of
turning psychology into behavior.56 It is interesting to
note, however, from his discussion Of Streetcar Named
Desire that he in effect is turning sociology, style,
poetry, and thematic play relations as well as psychology
into behavior. In any event he decides what the essence
of the character is so he can turn it into the behavior
of the character. It is obvious already that the "essence"
may not be a psychological essence to all directors.
For example, Harold Clurman also feels that every
movement should be significant Of an inner state, but his
method Of arriving at that movement is distinctly analogical;
his inner essences are expressed in terms Of metaphors, not
psychology.57 In discussing Member of the Wedding Clurman
talks of Frankie's growth by twists and turns, hence he
adds twists and turns to her movement pattern.58 Other
_‘_
55Pavel Aleksandrovich Markov, The Soviet Theatre (New
York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1935), p. 75.
56Cole, _p, p;§,, p. 354-
57Ib1d., p. 381, 581b1d., p. 382.
Cc
c“:
‘lu.
h“
and
127
metaphorical images for her are "getting connected,"
"wanting to get out Of herself," "wanting to go around the
world," "straining to get out," and "a mind and spirit that
leap."59 These are all applied to Frankie's movement
pattern. The director should find things to do that are,
as Clurman puts it, "concrete embodiments of abstract
ideas."6O
These movements are not the abstract formal variety of
COpeau nor the realistic variety Of vaughn. They supply to
character movement the dimension Of metaphor.
Note all three varieties Of inner reasons may be
applied simultaneously to any one movement. An inner
psychological motivation may drive a character to a point
Of interest; the character may get there using a somewhat
formalized body position and a floor pattern that together
have abstract meaning and still may get there in whirls,
leaps, twists, or other movements as suggested by a
metaphor drawn from a mental, an animal, or a mechanical
movement. In short, none Of these views of projecting
the inner into an observable form need be mutually in-
consistent. The director may look for all Of these
possibilities for character movement in his script analysis
and use all.
In using all Of the above methods of analysis, and
perhaps more, the director may be able to follow Selden's
n
59 1d., p. 383. 6OIb1d.
('9‘
‘1-
(I)
(J
n.)
128
advice completely and translate into outer form the total
inner reSponse that normally isn't seen.61 Of course,
Selden is really bringing into the discussion a problem of
expression and communication; his concern is with how an
actor can have psychologically motivated movement that is
externally observable, and how an actor can be true to
life, express natural emotional behavior, when most human
beings have learned to inhibit this behavior. Most natural
outer displays of emotion are no longer large enough for
the stage.
MacGowan's Opinion is that the actor should express
62 The illusion-
the form, not the illusion, Of reality.
seeking is apt to neglect the form, and hence the thematic
content, of the play. But MacGowan does not go to the
expressionist's extreme; he feels the audience will under-
stand the form Of life better if it is derived from the
actual psychological life the audience knows. He advocates
a selected realism form Of symbolism; the director might
look for a real Object, symbol, or activity that best sums
up the essence Of the scene or the character and use this
to stand for the whole; i.e., one pillar stands for a
colonnade. Thus MacGowan expresses a midpoint between
symbolic and psychological expression Of inner truth.
61Selden, _p, cit., p. 93.
62MacGowan, pp, cit., p. 120.
129
Worthington Miner maintains that the actor always
comes first, Over the director, the script, and the
audience,63 but in practice seems to subscribe to the
director's use Of symbolism as well. Miner's opinion seems
to be that the inner motivation of the actor, the truth
Of his own natural responses, is to be primary in deter-
mining stage movement. His view would suggest not only a
motivational approach to expressing the inner truth, but
a distinctly improvisational method as Opposed to pre-
planning. But in practice, for example, he writes Of a
parallel set Of stage movements that did not derive from
inner motivation Of the actor, yet did meet with his
approval. The movements were made by two characters walking
alternately in figure eight patterns. It is difficult to
see how such a movement could grow from an inner reSponse
to a drive or from a desire to relate to an outer point
of interest. In fact, the movements did not; they were
given to the actors by the director who was taking advantage
of the abstract meaning possibilities of line patterns, of
balanced contrast, and Of repetition, all of which are
symbolic and abstract representations of an inner thematic
truth, not of an inner psychological motivation.
Perhaps a pure system either Of symbolic or Of
realistic character movement has never been employed.
63Gassner, pp, cit., p. 252-
130
Even Jessner, who believed that the actor should be a
symbol for the idea and not a person in realistic detail,64
drew his abstractions from natural behavior. An analysis
of his moves in The Weavers Shows a very realistic handling
Of crowds and individuals, a constant flow Of movement, and
both an inner and an outer motivation clearly expressed.65
Even in the highly stylized Noh Theatre Of Japan, Fenollosa
maintains that the actor is presenting a complete service
of life; he symbolizes, or presents, a diagram of life and
Of recurrence in very simple situations.66 Although the
mimetic stage is despised by the Noh Theatre,nevertheless,
psychological motivations seem to be at the root of each
move both in the Noh and the Kabuki Theatre.
Perhaps a summary Of Opinion, when both the practice
and the theory Of various authors and directors is taken
into account might be this: a wide variety of symbolic,
formal, metaphorical, and psychological expression of the
character's inner truth should be apparent in his outer
form. It would seem that their combined advice is to seek
out all varieties of inner truth about the characters and
the situations; to express these truths in images, theme
statements, and titles that will suggest movement patterns;
and then to plot the actual movement on the stage.
6"Lewis, _p. 93.3.: DP. 2-3.
65Cole, _p, pip,, p. 326.
66Ernest Fenollosa and Ezra Pound, NOH (London:
Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1916). p. 17.
131
In view Of the above, it would seem that the usual
distinction-~between the movement that is "necessary,"
caused by the script, and the movement that is "arbitrary,"
caused by the director-~becomes a rather meaningless
distinction. Because of the richness of material available
to the imagination Of the director from the script itself,
when he has the techniques of discovering and using it, the
arbitrary element seems to be the placement of a dividing
line between "arbitrary" and "necessary." Eliminating
the distinction and using all approaches would better
prepare the director to give a richly expressive movement
context to the words Of the playwright.
d) Principles Of Gross Movement.--Some texts suggest
that right after the director's psychological and metaphor-
ical analysis Of the play script the ground plan should be
devised. Other texts suggest that the gross movement
should be plotted before the ground plan.
l-Relation between Ground Plan and Gross Movement. Can-
field's suggestion is to develOp the ground plan with the
designer before blocking is planned in detail, but after a
director's script analysis so that certain general movement
ideas can result.67 This ground plan should provide acting
areas and places to cross so that movement can be prOperly
motivated. Dean tends to bring the designer in at a later
time. TO Dean, it seems better to devise the ground plan
67Canfield, _p, cit., p. 130.
cr
132
after the planning of the gross blocking. The reason
suggested is that the director should decide from his
play's context and his knowledge of the relationship be-
tween moves, stage areas, and script elements, what form
his blocking should take and then put in the furniture,
walls, entrances, or scenic elements in places appropriate
68 Other directors, wishing to take more
to the moves.
advantage Of the designer's creative abilities, place the
reSponsibility with the designer for making the script
analysis concrete in the setting.
Where in the blocking process the ground plan is made,
and by whom, is dependent on the director's conception Of
his own function. Certainly if the director is to take
advantage Of his very complete analysis and his theories
Of the meaning Of areas and movements only he can know what
resultant stage patterns will best fulfill his analysis; he
should provide the ground plan. The alternative would
seem to be tO work with a designer who was also a director
and was sympathetic to the director's movement ideas. In
this latter case, two heads working with one point of view,
as completely as the director works with his actors, might
provide a Jointly produced ground plan that had more move-
ment potential than the product of the single artist. Note
that in any case, there is only concern here for the best
68Dean, _p. p_:_1_t_., p. 227.
133
product; this study is concerned with the best communication
Of ideas and feelings through movement, not with the contri-
butions of designers or actors.
2-Relation Between the Moving and the Still Picture in
Gross Blocking. In the blocking phase Of the analysis
procedure there seem tO arise two extreme points of view,
with many positions between, concerning the relationship
between the still picture and the gross move. The director
has to decide what kind Of still picture or what kind Of
movement, or combination Of the two, best expresses each
motivational unit, or beat as a whole. Generally the two
extremes are either a scene composed primarily Of movement
but starting and ending with a still picture, or a scene
composed primarily of a still picture but starting and
ending with movement. The first method pictures relation-
ships in the scene before and after change takes place,
while the second pictures a relatively static set Of
relationships arrived at and concluded by change.
The still picture extreme, stated by Drummond, is that
action on stage is fundamentally a series of tableaux, with
movement consisting largely of transitions from one tableau
to the next.69 To be sure, he suggests moving the charac-
ters one at a time and not as a group. Still, the rela-
tively stationary picture carries most of his meaning and
the move is primarily to change pictures.
*
69Drummond, _p, cit., p. 18.
134
At the movement extreme are those apparently more
influenced by dance than by literature. Selden perhaps is
the most extreme among the theatre peOple who are not
basically choreographers. He feels that force, the secret
Of unbroken movement, should be ever present on stage,
sustaining a "condition Of aliveness," that there Should
never be a complete rest.7O However, his view does not
mean he suggests constant physical movement, for he will
accept the condition of preparedness to move. He suggests
that movement be expressed in pulsations, that is, periodic
action and periodic rest.71 He borrows a term from music
and choreography for this condition, called phrasing, a
term that is developed most completely by Doris Humphries,
choreographer. Generally, though, even the periodic rests
Of the pulsations may be marked by slowing Of movement,
hesitations only, rather than complete cessation of move-
ment.
Selden feels that human beings need periodic hesi-
tations and repose to help them comprehend what the action
means; hence, phrasing, or fragmentation, is a valuable
aid to understanding.72 He maintains further that a rest,
repose, gap, or pause should be used as sparingly as the
pause in Speech, that the Simple lessening of tension may
be sufficient for phrasing.73 Thus the image Of ebb and
703e1den’ _2’ 2&2}, p, 65. 711bid., p. 96.
72Ibid., p. 185. 731219;: p. 189.
D—H
135
flow becomes more illustrative of his surge and repose
4
phrasing than does movement and still picture.7 Accord-
ing to Selden the audience desires a quickening Of the
sense of living because the audience's ambition exceeds
its energy; so audiences attend theatre at least partially
to live vicariously a more active life.75 For this reason
transit, pursuit Of adjustment, and covering ground, along
with change Of content, Of interest, of pace, of shape,
and Of mood, are vital for keeping the audience's senses
and minds alert.76 These changes are most appropriate
for a story that moves forward every minute, and for
action that progresses physically as much as possible.
When it cannot, it should continue to progress inwardly.77
From what Selden, and others, have said concerning making
progress outwardly apparent, it is possible to assume his
advice is for a continual physical manifestation of
progress.
Selden indeed asks for a continual sequence of acts
of adjustment in both time and Space.78
When coupled with
his view that good stage movement is essentially a dance,
it would seem that continual movement, with only pace
changes to provide rests, is his ideal of stage movement.79
However, Selden doesn't seem to want to go quite this far
since he also states that a design, after a series Of
F
“1121.9... p. 195. 75mm, p. 135. 75mm, pp. 137-47.
77Ibid.. p. 199. 78Ib1d.. p. 155. 79Ibid., p. 279.
136
active moments, may come to rest with a still picture.80
It may be accurately noted, however, that this use of a
still picture is quite momentary and minute when compared
to his preceding active moments where meaning is expressed
in movement.
Given these extremes, the in-betweens can now be
polled. Appia seems to want almost continual movement by
actors and a still picture by the scenery. He warns that
if the play or the actors are immobilized for even one
moment, movement with its power and significance is sacri-
ficed, without receiving the least compensation.81 His
view is that the stage does not have the painting's
possibility Of presenting past, present, and future
symbolically all at once. The painting's special possibil-
ity allows it to give the impression of movement. Actual
movement of actors in time and Space expresses life,82
while the scenery should be solidly resistant to human
movement for contrast with it.83 Thus, the scenery
provides the compositional still picture to express the stable
theme of the play while the actors express the living,
moving qualities of the play.
Colby Lewis reveals that Jessner apparently agreed
with Appia, that a play can have still picture and motion
m
80Ibid., p. 261.
81Adolphe Appia, The WOrk Of_Living Art and Man is the
Measure of All Things, trans. H.D. Albright (Coral Gables,
Florida: university Of Miami Press, 1960), p. 11.
821bid., p. 54. 831219.. p. 27.
rf‘
.,.
ht.
137
at the same time, with the stage setting supplying the
still picture and the actors the motion.8"
Hewitt expresses a pulsation, or alternating movement
and still picture theory in embryo. He feels that suspense
must find relief in action, action being change and growth
that breaks loose from gradually mounting tension.85 Yet
he also eSpouses the idea that the actor must achieve a
continually changing pattern designed to express the
character and thought of the play.86 Unfortunately he
presents little concrete idea of how his continual change
should be accomplished in conjunction with suspense and
relief.
HOpkins would seem to approve Of a flowing movement
pattern Of little abrupt change, of little hesitation, or
even punctuation, if he be taken literally. Fluidity of
movement with no disturbance is what he advises in order
to lull the audience into a feeling, non-thinking unit.87
TO Hopkins fluidity is the best way to achieve a unanimous
effect from a diverse audience; his is a sort Of hypnotic
somnolence wrought over their thinking minds. Whether or
not he achieves his effect may not be, however, entirely
due to the fluidity Of movement. The audience's pre-
disposition tO enjoy a play, as a group, and to put aside
84Lewis, _p, pi§., p. 206. 85Hewitt, _p, p33,, p. 31.
86Ibid., p. 35. 87Hopkins, pp, p32,, pp. 8-9.
ï¬lm
FE
138
practical, moral, and divisive considerations may be large-
ly responsible.
Leaning more toward the still picture view Of blocking,
Krows says that the play's action consists Of the players
moving from one important grouping to another;88 only the
most necessary movement about the stage should be allowed.89
Brown proclaims that the situations as they develop should
be illustrated by the grouping Of the actors and their
body positions.90 And although Boyd writes that stillness
is analagous to silence, and implicitly, perhaps, to be
used as Sparingly as a silence,9l he also writes that
movement to him is largely the means for Obtaining fresh
groupings whose relationships tell the story or the play.92
Going back in time a little, Antoine insisted that
movement is the actor's most intense means of expression,
but Antoine was not too explicit about Just how the actor
should use it.93 Antoine's statement could give rise to
either Of two interesting contemporary applications: if
movement is powerful, then use it constantly in order to
have a powerful play; or, if movement is powerful use it
88Krows, _p, pip,, p. 63. 89;p;p,, p. 65.
90Brown, _p. 9311., p. 84.
91Boyd, _p, p;£,, P- 95. 922219;. pp- 74. 75.
93Cole, _p, p;p,, p. 100.
139
sparingly and save it for when it is most needed. Antoine
himself probably used some combination Of methods since he
maintains that the statue-actor is to be decried, that the
stage needs more moving human beings,94 and yet he writes
of the proper way Of grouping the characters.95
The Duke of Saxe-Meiningen felt the stage should always
depict movement, but from his context it would seem that
the asymetrical, broken-up stage picture with its sug-
gestion of movement was more used than actual movement.96
Otto Brahm felt the chorus should not be grouped but have
free play of movement.97 Tairov felt that choreographic
principles should be applied to a play to produce a
symphony of movement.98 Gordon Craig felt movement was
not only important but should resemble in amount and style
the dance.99 Belasco writes Of indicating his ideas by
the groupings Of the characters; he is not explicit as to
whether these groups are still or moving.100
This summary of earlier directors is capped with a
statement by G. B. Shaw meant to apply to dialogue rather
than motion. Shaw's admonition is never to have a moment
94.1.1919.†p. 199. 951mg, p. 194.
96121.9... pp. 81. 85. 97_I_t_>_ip., p. 104.
98Gassner, pp, p33,, p. 88.
99Co1e, pp. pip, p. 148.
100919., p. 126.
140
Of silence on the stage except as an intentional stage
effect.101 The statement is provocative when associated
with Boyd's idea Of stage silence being analagous to the
stage at rest. If Shaw's statement were altered by sub-
stituting analagous parts it would read, "never have a
moment of motionlessness on the stage except as an
intentional stage effect." The analogy results in an
interesting point of view for the proponents Of theatre
movement as constant flux, a view similar to the one held
by Selden.
Having heard from Selden, this study now turns to the
remaining principle theorists Of the study: Canfield,
Dean, Dietrich, Dolman, and Smith with the addition of
Miner, for their Opinions on the relation between still
picture and movement in blocking principles.
Canfield is somewhat difficult to pin down; most of his
conclusions on the relation of still pictures to movement
must be drawn by inference. Characters move in order to con-
vey their psychological relationship by their physical place-
ment. They may begin a movement in a position to show one
set of relationships and end in a position to Show
another.102 He suggests that a hesitation at the
beginning and end of a move will help tell the audience
What the move means. For example, a character may start
in a dominant position and end in a subordinate one. It
h
1°ibid., p. 193.
102
Canfield,_pp, cit., pp. 162, 166.
WC
"b
141
would seem that Canfield reserves no particular meaning
for the movement part of the phrase, merely a meaning to
the serial juxtaposition of still pictures. Later he
suggests that the importance of group movement is the
finding of the characters in the right place at the right
time.103 His emphasis on the still picture and its mean-
ing seems to be further supported by his discussion about
the length Of time a stage picture may be held before it
loses the audience interest.10" The final proof of his
point Of view may be in the way he expresses his notion
Of blocking; he infers that good blocking consists largely
in having right positions to illustrate character relation-
ships.105
There is one other tendency in Canfield, however, that
may lead the reader to suppose that Canfield presupposes the
reader's know1edge of Dean. His general point Of view
toward the details Of movement, composition, and picturi-
zation is that Dean, or other texts, have already adequate-
ly discussed them. If the assumption is true, Canfield
does not disagree with Dean's view that picturization,
relationship, position, and moves can apply to either the
_—
1031bid., p. 231.
10"Cole, pp, pip,, p. 167.
105Canfield, pp, p;p,, p. 268.
142
still or the moving picture. Canfield's main positive
contribution to movement meaning is his suggestion to start
and end a movement phrase with a meaningful still picture,
a suggestion already made by Dietrich.
Dean, as mentioned above, has suggested that the same
categories that exist in the still picture can exist in
the moving picture. His view seems to be that the still
picture and the movement are equally important in con-
veying meaning. Dean states that picturization is to
embody the author's concept that each moment of the play is
depicted pictorially.106 And further, when movement is
put with picturization there is a picture that is ever
changing.107 Even when the overall stage picture is
relatively stable, the picture does not remain static
during the scene but changes slightly as the emotional
reactions and relationships Of the characters change.108
He compares stage movement to the motion picture. Both
are a series Of static pictures which pass so quickly, one
after the other, that the eye doesn't notice any break
between.109 Hence, constant small movements reflect the
general progressive values in the scene.
There is an interesting difference here between Dean's
and Dolman's use Of the motion picture film metaphor. Dean
thinks of film as a series Of still pictures, each with
__
106Dean, pp. p_i_t_., p. 207. 1°7Ibid., p. 220.
108Ibid., p. 22. 109Ibid., p. 220.
143
picturization value, whereas Dolman thinks Of film as having
a meaning in sequence but whose value as still pictures is
usually slight.110 Here seems to be a most refined point
Of contact between the views of movement as flow and as a
sequence Of still pictures. Dean is still dealing with
values that are primarily inherent in still pictures;
Dolman has changed his milieu to movement, and its meaning
apart from what it has in common with the still picture.
It is this study's view also that the motion picture
is not ideally nor really a sequence of still pictures.
In practice individual frames Of a motion picture film are
Often Slightly blurred; in effect each frame carries the
sequence between itself and the picture preceding and
following, belying the concept of a series of still pic-
tures. On the other hand, the cartoon, which usually is
actually a series Of still pictures, has a jerky quality
when projected because a series Of still pictures simply
is not the same as a flow Of movement. Aside from the
problem of the metaphor, it still seems that certain filmic
movements, caught at some instant, are undecipherable.
Neither direction nor purpose is clear. As Dolman con-
cludes, that is why movie "stills" are usually separate
posed shots, arranged in Appia's painting method Of implied
motion, and not actually reproduced from a segment of film.
_.
11ODOlman, _p, cit., p. 116.
144
Dean seems to conclude, however, with a view fairly
balanced between the two extremes. Movement exists in the
transitions from one to another still picturization; however,
the movement between the pictures is Just as important as
the pictures themselves.111
Dietrich states that one of the primary purposes of
movement is to dissolve one picture in order to form
another.112 This process Of dissolving and reforming is
called movement. In the process of dissolving and re-
forming, meaningful pictures can be held from approxi-
mately a second to over a minute and still hold audience
attention and carry a meaningful relationship to the
verbal context.113 Dietrich also makes a point similar to
that Of Canfield, and prior to Canfield, that a motivation
unit can Open by Showing the starting relationships of
characters, and can close with a foreshadowing picture.114
Dietrich's point gives a needed dimension to Canfield's
suggestion by showing how a closing picture may lead into
the next phase, or motivational unit.
Dietrich elaborates on pictorial continuity by
suggesting that each picture should relate to the preceding
and following ones.115 His tendency, on the whole, seems
'to be to consider movement, in its gross manifestation, to
111Dean, _p, cit., pp. 243, 245.
112Dietrich, _p, cit., p. 91. 113Ibid., p. 91.
114Ibid., p. 85. 115Ibid., p. 98.
145
be primarily a connecting link between meaningful still
pictures. Later, as will be discussed, Dietrich does
present movement in a context where it has meaning, but the
meaning is largely psychological; i.e., concerning the
motivation one character may have toward or away from a
point Of interest; the meaning of gross blocking elements,
the usual relationships that pertain in the still picture,
do not seem to be presented as having a counterpart in
meaningful moving elements, except in terms of psychological
motivation. Perhaps, however, the lack is only partial;
his previously referred to discussions of serial and
circular reSponses, as well as points of interest, do
suggest movements that have more meaning than the mere
dissolve from one still picture to another. Perhaps the
real lack is that Dietrich does not seem to have any
discussion of the meaning Of abstract elements Of design,
his view being that almost all meaning is dependent upon a
psychological context. The idea that shapes or patterns may
have meaning all their own, derived from previous experi-
ence by association, is not discussed.
Miner, in his chapter in Gassner's anthology, suggests
a relationship that sounds very poetic but is not too clear
in its practical application. It goes something like this:
An actor should never be still without creating the im-
pression of a capacity to move, nor move without creating
116
the impression of a capacity to stop. He further states
116Gassner, _p, cit., p. 255.
146
that movement is merely the interval between moments of
stillness, and stillness is merely the generation Of an
impulse to move; further, a common failing of the director
is to conceive Of a movement as an actionary interval
between static states.117 In clarification, he states that
a director must know the subject of design but never use
design in its frozen, or static, state; that the director's
pictures must be kept fluid;118 and that Miner prefers, in
general, schemes of movement to methods of grouping actors
in relation to each other.119 He feels that the essence of
movement is vibration; hence, though movement must be main-
tained at all times, the movement may, at certain times,
consist Of excitement within the mind which can be as
vibrant and arresting as a door slam or a scream. In
essence, let the actor's mind dance and his feet may rest%20
To further clarify, or confuse, the issue Miner proclaims
that movement is a cathode-annode oscillation between
character and plot.121
Just when it seems that Miner's meaning is clear
something throws doubt on the clarity. His notion Of the
capacity to move and to stop sounds more like a poetic
parallel statement than a helpful suggestion; but he may
only mean to suggest a principle of continuity in movement;
117Ibid., p. 256. 118Ibid., p. 258.
1191bid., p. 259. 1201bid., p. 276.
1211bid., p. 254.
147
each movement or still picture contains actors who have
potential for change. His use of "vibration" may be similar
to Selden's "sense Of life," in that a certain "elan
vitale" should never be missing from the actor. If this
is all, then the reader must hold Miner's use Of the word
"movement" suSpect. When he says "movement" he may only
mean a sense Of aliveness. In which case "movement" is
being used two ways: as appearance of "life force" and as
physical changing of position.
Perhaps Miner is really only advocating the continual
impression Of life rather than constant movement when he
uses such expressions as keeping the pictures "fluid," or
"schemes of movement" as opposed to "grouping." Certainly
he seems to be condemning the "dissolve" idea Of movement,
as suggested by Dietrich and others, when he proclaims that
it is an error to think Of movement as an actionary inter-
val between static states. If Miner's cathode-annode
oscillation refers to the vibration of alternating current,
then his metaphor is not clear to this study, but not be-
yond the interest Of this study, for it is a metaphor
which may well be useful to some director.
Most Of Smith's views have already been expressed by
others in the above discussions. Suffice it to remind the
reader here of Smith's notion Of the meaning Of symbolic
movement: a series Of changing relationships carries the
meaning of the blocking. But also, Smith says, the
148
director must give his series of pleasing pictures dramatic
meaning.122 Smith asks for a definite pattern Of movements
to make a series of well composed pictures, each Of which
has meaning in terms Of the scene.123 Smith also refers
to the series Of pictures as flowing naturally from one
into another.124 Exactly what "naturally" means is not
clear; it could be in the sense either Of illusionistically,
that is, drawn from life as in mimetic movement, or of
logically, that is, having understandable symbolic meaning
or sequence as in metaphoric or symbolic movement, or Smith
could mean "naturally" in both senses. The point is, that
Smith would seem to agree primarily with Dean in the view
that both movement and picture can be important in the
conveying of meaning.
It appears that there are three tendencies in the
authors' views about what kind Of movement best interprets
a script. Either movement is conceived Of as a series of
still pictures, each of which is held for some duration to
express the meaning Of a particular moment in the play, or
conceived of as a continual flux, pulsating or vibrating,
reflecting the constant inner and outer movement of human
beings; or, Of course, as some combination of these two.
Perhaps the majority approve at least of the impression of
122Smith, _p, 932,. p. 101.
12"Ibid., p. 98.
1231bid., p. 105.
149
continual life, a life that is communicated by movement that
reflects both inner and outer truths. Dean's concept seems
to be closest to the working midpoint; the constant move-
ment of the script is paralleled by constant movement by
actors, but the latter does not entail constant shifts in
basic blocking positions; major shifts in position would be
saved for major changes in idea; motivation, action, or
French scene.
0. Preparation for Blocking Completed
The director is now ready to apply the principles of
movement in context directly to his particular script.
After making some basic decisions about how much pre-
planning to do, how much thematic and how much psychologi-
cal analysis to make, what abstract line and form are
apprOpriate, what kinds of units to break his script into,
what kinds Of images to use, how much rest and how much
motion will be pertinent,he is ready to get specific. If
he wishes to take advantage Of the power available to him
in the meaning Of movement, he will be looking to his
script for Opportunities to interpret it through abstraction,
mimesis, metaphor, and symbol in motion. If he wishes to
prepare actors to do their best in interpreting his move-
ment script he will also be translating his analysis into
motivations for moving characters.
CHAPTER IV
PLOTTING THE MOVEMENT IN THE CONTEXT OF THE PLAY
A. Introduction: General Application of Blocking
Theory and Script Analysis to Plotting
When the director has made the basic decisions about
the use of motion and still picture, Of phrasing and pul-
sation, and Of the individual and progressive use Of stage
areas, all based on a script analysis Of theme and
motivational units that yield moving abstractions, meta-
phors, and symbols, he is ready to combine his analysis
with his blocking theory in the specific plotting of move-
ment for his script. The order of procedure he follows in
plotting will provide the order of this chapter.
14* Blocking Order: From Gross to Fine to Refined
Dean,and almost all the authors, suggests starting
with the larger abstract patterns and working down to the
smaller group movements, then to the many relationships
between actors in any particular scene, and finally to the
more refined movement of pantomime or business. In this
order, going from greater to lesser, the first step seems
to be to start either by selecting basic stage areas in
which each scene will occur, by plotting basic positions
for key climax scenes, or by plotting the movement pattern
150
151
Of key climax scenes.
2. Order Dependent Upon Principles Emplgyed
The order and method the director employs in plotting
will vary somewhat according to what blocking principles he
chooses. The first determinants will be his choices among
three ways of viewing the script: First, motivationally,
as a progression Of psychological interrelationships, or
second, symbolically, as a progression of metaphors, or
third, aesthetically, as a progression Of abstract elements
that reflect certain qualities within the play.
Once he has decided how to view the script his method
will be further modified by his choices among three sets of
variables: First, according to whether the director is
using as his basic analytical unit a French scene, a
motivational unit, or a thematic unit, or second, according
to whether he is preparing to devise basically a series Of
pictures or a sequence of movements, or third, whether he
is thinking of a series Of scenes localized in smaller
areas Of the stage, each with its inherent movement pattern,
or a sequence of scenes each using the entire stage but
each with its particular degree of movement and hesitation
and quality.
To some extent his choice Of style will also enter
into his blocking scheme, though at the plotting phase the
way in which moves are made is not so important as the
where and the when.
152
B. Matching Gross Movement to Script Analysis
The principles Of script analysis and gross movement
have been discussed. Now the specific plans for plotting
the blocking, as suggested by the authors studied, will be
presented.
1. Selecting Stage Areas to Match Meaning of French Scenes
At this stage in planning Canfield assigns each French
scene to an acting area in his ground plan; however, Can-
field does not overlook the fact that some scenes will need
to use the entire stage.l Canfield's ground plan, then,
would be ideally a complex of smaller stage plans (acting
areas) that together make up a unified setting. In effect,
the setting would correspond.in its parts and in its whole
to the script's French scenes and total play. Note that
Canfield seems to favor the still picture view in writing
Of an area apprOpriate to a scene rather than Of a move-
ment pattern appropriate to a scene.
a) Mpod, Theme, and Key as Determinants of Area.--Dean
suggests matching up the scene with the acting area whose
mood quality best depicts that scene. Since Dean feels
that each area not only has its own value Of strength
and weakness but also a definite feeling, or mood, value,
he naturally feels that each scene will convey its mood
lCanfield, pp, cit., p. 130.
153
more convincingly if it is played in its corresponding
area.2 However, Dean makes the point that he does not
consider these area meanings to be rigid principles, only
guides.3
Dean says the director may also decide scene by scene
what geographical location, climate, or emotional relation-
ships may help tO characterize the mood or atmOSphere of the
scene." To be sure, such a mood or atmOSphere will help
the director to choose the qualities of moves and business
Of a scene, but the mood will also help to choose the area
in prOper sequence and strength.
Brown concurs with those who feel that the director
should make strong and weak scenes correSpond to the strong
5
and weak areas. He adds an element, however, that may be
useful: a positive principle for repeating areas. In
essence, the director uses the same area for portrayal Of
the same dramatic value; the director may, in effect,
reserve certain areas for certain characters and ideas.6
Thus the director may establish by association a more
specific meaning for an area than can be had merely by
matching a scene with an area that may or may not inherent-
ly express the mood.
_k
2Dean, pp. 21.3., p. 211. 3;p_i_<1., p. 212.
"91.3... p. 297.
5Brown, pp, pip,, p. 11.
6_I_bgp., pp. 14, 15.
154
Dietrich introduces the idea of the "key" of a scene.
The degree of emotional tension, or key, Of each motiva-
tional unit ought to be taken into account to decide which
playing area or which kind Of movement pattern is appropri-
ate tO the scene.7 Dietrich characterizes key as the
combination Of a drive with the degree Of frustration of
that drive. A strong drive with no Opposition will not
result in tensions of any great magnitude. In effect, it
would seem that the key Of a scene is roughly at the level
of the weakest Of the two elements, drive and Opposition.
The key may help the director in choosing his sequence of
stage areas in terms of strength to weakness, or high to
low key.
2p, Selecting a Seqpence of Stage Areas and Reasons for
Choice
Selecting areas for individual scenes concerns match-
ing the moods of scenes with the meaning and strength of
playing areas, but the selection of a sequence of areas
involves creating a sequence Of scenic meanings and actions
that will build to a climax. Hence, the director really
has two potentially conflicting principles for the selection
of area sequences. The first is to choose scene by scene
according to the area that best expresses the mood Of
that scene; the second is to choose in some sort of
—__
7Dietrich, _p. cit., p. 165.
155
ascending order Of strength to insure that stronger scenes
will follow weaker ones in stage area. In practice, the
smaller climaxes Of the play, that diminish and build into
larger climaxes, will usually present a wave-like prO-
gression Of scenes, sequences of builds, that may or may
not fit into meaningful area sequences by both methods of
placement. If not, the director must choose which is more
important when a discrepancy appears, area to establish a
scene's mood or sequence Of areas to establish a build.
To complicate the selection, Dean suggests the use of
more than one stage area for each scene. TO create a build
within a scene the actors can move in a progression Of
areas from weaker to stronger.8 To preserve a sequence of
scenes that will still build to a climax Dean suggests a
principle of conservation Of movement.9 The principle
refers to saving the larger and faster movement for the
climaxes so it will have its greater impact then; not to
waste it on quieter, or less important scenes.
The director has a choice here of Dean's combination,
the use Of several stage areas for each scene and the
provision Of build through the conservation of motion, or
Canfield's combination, the use of one area for each scene
and the provision Of build through the conservation Of area,
SO that a strong area, or a special mood area, will not
8Dean, pp. cit., p. 246. 9Ibid., p. 247.
156
have been "worn out" when the scene best played there comes
along. Canfield says on this point that as long as the
area has not been overused it is usable.10 Just how the
decision Of "overuse" is arrived at is not made explicit.
Selden seems to take a view that is more extreme than
Dean's; he states that every part of the stage should be
used at least once before the scene is over.11 The
Observation is somewhat of a jolt to the reader after con-
sidering principles Of saving areas, of selecting a Specific
area for a specific scene, and of progressing from area to
area as the scenes progress in strength or mood. In his
context Selden's advice does not seem to be capable of
harmonizing with Dean and Canfield. The only sympathetic
treatment Of Selden's advice at this point that seems
possible is to suggest that Selden may be referring to a
scene larger than a French scene whose duration may be only
for a minute or less. If Selden refers to a larger unit,
a scene or act division between the drawing of curtains,
then there may be some wisdom to the suggestion. It would
mean that within the entire scene or act the director
avails himself of the maximum contrast and change possible.
However, to harmonize Selden's advice with that of Dean
and Canfield, this study would have to state that every
area Should be used at least once during the entire play,
—._
1C’canrield, pp. cit., p. 136.
11Selden, pp, cit., p. 5.
157
Or perhaps entire act or scene, but not during each
motivational unit. Even then, such advice might not be
appropriate for certain presentational forms of theatre
that may only use the down stage playing areas.
3;_ Relating Necessarngovement to Invented Movement in
Plotting
Once the scenes have been at least tentatively matched
to stage areas in some sequence that provides for meaning
and build, the director must decide how much movement he is
willing to invent both within and between scenes, if nothing
else to get his actors into different relationships to each
other and into different stage areas.
Dolman Opens the door to an interesting principle of how
much the director may invent when he suggests that the
purposes Of movement need be no more than associated, or at
least consistent, with the main purpose Of the scene and of
the play.12 Most other authors write in terms Of matching
a picture and a movement to a script as exactly as possible.
However, if the director accepts the role of author Of the
movement then he may wish to be more inventive. Dolman
seems to provide a bridge between the language purist who,
like the aforementioned Gielgud, feels movement should be
kept at a minimum so as not to get in the way Of the words,
and more creative directors, such as Tyrone Guthrie, who
k
12Dolman, _p, cit., p. 113-
158
are Often accused of being too inventive in blocking.
A director will certainly have to invent a great deal
Of movement if he chooses to follow Dean's suggestions for
the requirements of a dramatic build. Dean suggests that to
build the play the director may increase the length Of move-
ment, increase the number Of peOple moving, contrast the
direction of movement, increase the tension Of movement,
increase the numbers Of crosses, increase the amount Of small
movement (business), and also use Shorter movement.l3 Al-
though Dean is Speaking primarily Of building individual
scenes, the principles may well be applied to the entire
play as the macrocosm, with the French scene as the micro-
cosm. A scene may be characterized, along with its title,
as one Of short, medium or long moves, or as a scene of one,
a few, or many peOple moving. Thus building from one scene
to the next provides an overall build to the play, not
merely a series of smaller builds in each scene. Of course,
within each scene, even though characterized as, e.g., a
scene of groups in movement, the Size of the group, or the
speed Of movement, may increase during the course Of the
scene. TO implement these suggestions would seem to re-
quire much movement invention.
Dolman provides a principle for the extremes Of move-
ment invention possible in the play. The minimum of move-
ment is that which is absolutely necessary to get actors on
M
13Dean, _p. pip†p. 246.
159
and Off stage; the maximum would seem to be that which is at
least consistent with the play. The latter would allow for
any mimetic, metaphoric, or symbolic invented movement that
either supported or contrasted with the script words as long
as the audience saw or felt no inconsistency between the
words and the movement. The audience is mentioned here as
judge Of the extremes because another director, with his own
preconceptions of what best interprets a script, might well
see an inconsistency that the audience, prime goal of the
play, might not.
4. Choosingpa Scheme for Relatinngoving and Still Pictures
to the Scene
In effect, there are at least three possible conceptions
Of the sequence Of scene units; the resolution may well depend
upon the play that is being analyzed, but the director may
never see the possibilities for alternates unless they are
first understood and hence looked for. The first is the
view that each unit, or scene, is a still picture broken
and changed by movement to a new still picture; the change
of subject is the transition and carries the movement. The
meaningful, time consuming, scene is enacted during the
relatively still picture.
The second is the view that each scene is the movement
pattern, the working out of some imbalance, where the basic
meaning Of the scene is expressed by movement; the beginning
and end of each scene consists of a still picture, a rest;
160
the rest is the summation Of the previous scene and the
transition between scenes.
The third is the view that the scenes should alternate,
first a movement scene and then a still picture scene, in
effect, a wave theory. The fluctuations between moving
scenes and static scenes would give relatively equal weight
to each in alternation. Again it becomes even more Obvious
that the director will have to make his decisions in
conjunction with a script; however, at least he should
realize that the still picture is not the only major method
Of portraying relationships in scenes.
a) gpanging_the Spene by Movement.--Boyd suggests
movement at each new thought, thus providing the means Of
14 His suggestion fits the
changing the stage picture.
general formula of a phrasing or motivational unit that would
consist Of the picture expressing the basic meaning of the
play with movement between pictures. Although he states
there ought to be an observable reason for the move itself,
he is basically less concerned with motivated movement than
with expressive pictures.
b) Ipterpreting the Scene by_Movement.--Selden is
inclined to feel that the main content of the scene should
be interpreted by movement and the change should be made
with a hesitation, since the greatest flow brings the
14Boyd, pp, cit., p. 87.
161
(greatest excitement.15 In his context Selden is equating
greatest flow with greatest appearance of life. In general
his image might be a stream at spring flood. It would seem,
however, that the idea of flow needs modifying. An even
flow, no matter how great, may give a sense of life without
a sense Of excitement. His own principles of rhythm, pul-
sation, and tempo need inclusion. In fact, tying "flow"
to "excitement" might be misleading; for the Kabuki "mie,"
or "pose," that embodies the emotions and meanings of the
scene that precedes it, can be very exciting, as can any
motionlessness that is tense with potential.
Indeed, the degree Of flow may increase excitement, but
the felt flow is perhaps the important ingredient. The felt
tensions, felt Speed, felt barriers to movement overcome,
the felt mass, or the felt contrast with lesser flow may be
of as much, or of greater, importance than the actual flow.
However, in agreement, the degree of actual flow is one
important element in gauging the degree Of excitement in
movement patterns as they are matched to the motivational
units.
0) Alternatinngesitation and Movement.--Movement and
hesitation can both be exciting, in alternation, if the
director bears in mind Dietrich's Observation. He points
out that movement is always the resolution of tension.16
M
l5Selden, _p. cit., p. 197.
16Dietrich, _p. cit., p. 122.
162
If scenes Of tense hesitation alternate with scenes of move-
ment that resolve the preceding tensions, and perhaps set up
additional tensions, then excitement can be maintained with-
out a constant flow of movement.
It seems to this study that a similar exciting alter-
nation Of scenes would emerge from considering movement as
the restoring Of balance to an unbalanced situation. In a
balanced situation, as Dietrich points out, there may occur
an impulse within the script lines.17 This impulse, which
could also be the entrance Of a new character, could throw
the situation out Of apparent balance. A script line could
set up a force that would create imbalance; the entering
character could set up either an apparent physical imbalance
or an imbalance of forces depending upon his connotation in
the scene. The apparent imbalance Of either force or mass
can result in the plotting Of movement aimed at restoring
the balance.
The problem for a continuing alternation theory would
be how to restore balance, or resolve tension, in such a
way that the final restoration or resolution of each wave
was not static, such that it contained potential for future
movement. Of course the introduction of a new mass, or
character, or Of a new idea, or script line, can upset the
balance or create new tension. The alternative, for movement,
would be to maintain some degree Of tension or imbalance even
_—~
17;pgp,, p. 122.
163
in the restored or resolved, relatively unmoving, scene.
Now the director needs some guiding principles to help
him match pictures and movement to already determined French
scenes. One such principle might be this: if an impulse to
move comes at the conclusion of a French scene, or motiva—
tional unit, then the movement may be useful to change the
picture to a new physical (and psychical) relationship. If
the impulse comes at the beginning of a French scene then it
may provide the imbalance to create a movement pattern
throughout the scene, a pattern started and ended with a
balance-in-tension picture that portrays the starting and
ending relationship of the movement, a picture that carries
continuity from the Old scene and foreshadowing for the new
one .
5, Selecting Movement and Area to SatisfypBoth Thematic and
Ppychological Demands
At this point in his blocking, the director should make
sure that his movement within the scene, and between scenes,
portrays the larger thematic and mood meanings of the play.
Each area, sequence of areas, and formal move should fit
the thematic intent both of the play and of the scenes with-
in the play. Perhaps simultaneously he must see if latent
in every move is also a psychological motivation he can
suggest tO his actor. In other words, the large form must
be a good framework for the smaller details to come. Of
course, if the play is being performed in expressionistic
164
style or modern dance style the general progression Of stage
areas and larger action relationships may be sufficient
motivation for movement; however, if the play is at all
realistic, each move must lend itself to psychological
motivation as well as to thematic purposes. As Dietrich
suggests, even though a particular movement is primarily to
achieve a new position on stage, the movement still needs
psychological motivation.18
§;_ Summary} Checking the Gross Plotting Against the Script
Analysis and Principles of BlOckipg,
Before concluding his plotting of a sequence of areas
and of the relation Of move to still picture in the sequence,
the director should check his plotting with certain blocking
principles. He should see if he has made maximum use of the
potential Of each area, Of the power of changing areas, of
the establishment, by repetition, Of a meaning for each area,
and Of the surprise inherent in using an area for the first
time. He should also check to see if he has been consistent
in the assigning of strength, weakness, and meaning to each
kind of area and move. For an audience may well accept a play
using almost any concept Of meaning as long as that play is
internally consistent in the use of its own concept.
Up to this point in the plotting of gross movement the
director has still been dealing largely with elements that
18Ibid., p. 140.
165
give him degrees Of strength and weakness, elements of
emphasis. He needs more Of the play's context and more
details Of character relationships to be more Specific in
his meaning. Next, therefore, within his gross blocking
scheme, he may refine his picture and moves to include the
psychical and physical relationships of actor to actor on
the stage, with its related problem of actor to audience
relationship.
C. Matching Gross Movement to Analysis
of Character Relationships
This action is concerned with the plotting Of gross
movement relationships between actors and between the
actors and the audience within and between the scenes
already plotted into the gross blocking pattern.
14p Introduction: Possible Actor to Actor and Actor to
Apdience Relationships
The first actor to actor movement, and resultant
relationship, advocated by all the authors who Speak on the
.subject, is the retreat and advance. Variations on the move
are the cross and the punch which combine an advance with a
retreat. Second, less described, but still fairly frequent-
1y mentioned, is the rise andiall, or the elevation and
descent. The first pattern concerns horizontal relationships
and the second pattern vertical relationships. Variations in
these relationships are made with different line patterns
166
and with variations in speed of movement. Specificity is
added with the direction the body is facing and with body
posture. Once these basic actor relationships and their
variations (including the starting or resultant positions Of
close or distant, higher or lower) are considered, the
director then can think Of those same relationships between
actor and audience. The actor can advance or retreat, rise
or fall, in relationship tO the audience, or he may make a
lateral movement which may approximate a cross, or combin-
ation of advance and retreat, all in relationship to the
audience, or down center area.
g,_ Plotting the Qppositions: Approach-Retreat, Rise-Fall.
Since these four general types of character relation-
ship are the most common they shall be polled first.
Dietrich's treatment of these variables appears to be the
most comprehensive. His starting point is the need for
motivation, the necessity for seeing a reason for an action.19
As has been seen this means to Dietrich, in part, an approach
to, or a withdrawal from, a point of interest.20 He has
charted various varieties Of straight line moves an actor
may make in relation to this point Of interest and has
suggested possible contextual meanings for these moves. In
general, the move toward is made on positive script lines
191bid., p. 9.
20Ibid., p. 124.
167
and the move away is made on weak script lines.2l There are
Of course many nuances; the situation Of fear may call for a
retreat, but also the situation of disdain; the attitude Of
love may call for an approach but so may the attitude of
aggression, or hate. A cross may show indifference, or it
may Show an attempt to gain attention from the person who is
the point of interest. Be it first Observed, however, that
all of these moves do require a point Of interest, a point
that is usually, though not always, a character, in relation
to which the movement is made.
Dietrich adds another dimension to the Opposition; he
writes Of strong and weak moves. His central point concerns
the strength Of tension and the weakness of relaxation in
moves, that tension is a Sign of emotion.22
Another aspect of the Oppositions is the pictorial
result Of the approach and retreat, or what Dietrich calls
the "grouping by friends".23 When characters approach those
they like, and retreat from those they dislike, the result
will be, Of course, this grouping. These are character-
istics described by Smith previously as the metaphors of
Opposition and siding.
It should be noted that there are two distinct
elements: the process of siding and the pictorical result
Of siding. It is the contention Of several, including
__
elm-.9 p- 125 221b1d., p. 126.
231bid., p. 112.
168
Dolman previously cited, that the still picture may not be
clear unless the dynamic process of arriving at it is also
clear. Without: the whole movement for reference, an actor
could be walking toward or backing away from an Object of
interest.
There is also the problem of determining, without words,
whether the approach is really a siding with or an Opposition
to an Object. Tension alone cannot convey the difference,
as Dietrich points out, because it could be the tension of
hate, of love, or of any other emotion.
Dietrich does suggest ways Of making the various
parties to the position, or the move, dominant or subordin-
ate, e.g., by difference in level, centrality, focus, and
contrast,24 but these are merely compositional emphases, not
meanings. They succeed in attracting audience attention
with varying degrees of strength but not in saying anything
about the point of interest or the elements causing the
emphasis.
Canfield suggests additional Oppositions in movement
to reflect the progress Of struggle between two characters;
in general his idea involves first an inclination to move
and to group right, followed by the same tendency to the
left.25' Such change will help to indicate the changing
tide Of battle. His idea may stimulate thinking along
—¥
24Ibid., p. 110.
25Canfield, pp, cit., p. 164.
_—
169
Smith's line Of punch and retreat. In effect, Canfield seems
to be finding physical moves to express a sequence Of attacks
by one party that involve a retreat by the other party, then
a sequence that reverses the trend.
Canfield also talks of the retreat and advance combin-
ation in terms Of apart and together, or isolation and
grouping.26 Again the director may choose; if he thinks Of
"isolation" he tends to block the relationship as a still
picture; if he thinks of "isolating," he tends to block a
moving process. The balance between the approaches would
be to depict togetherness, then to move the scene in a
process Of isolating, and then to complete the process with
a fairly static grouping depicting isolation.
Dean speaks of retreat and advance with the variations
of starting weak and ending strong, or the other way
around.27 The result Of these variations would be to show
an alteration in motivation during the course Of the move.
A similar technique would be to end higher or lower than the
starting point to Show weakened or strengthened resolve.28
Again the meanings would seem to accrue from two general
sources: the higher-lower relationship seems to have both
a metaphorical significance and a suggestion of relative
physical strength; a change in these physical relationships
26Ibid., p. 202.
27Dean, pp, cit., p. 224. 28Ibid.
170
would tend to suggest a change, by association, in the
attitude, or resolve, Of the movers.
In changing Speeds another change in resolve occurs.
Perhaps the faster movement indicates a greater tension,
hence emotion, hence stronger purpose; at the point Of
change the purpose varies in tension along with the movement.
Perhaps, however, there is not a variance in the amount, but
in the balance, of tension. The strong, fast movement, that
is in tension, shows an imbalance seeking balance. The
redress is supposedly to occur at the point of interest
being approached. However, part way there the movement
slows; or, as Dietrich points out, the movement perhaps
changes direction, an even stronger indication of altered
motivation.29
The change in Speed or direction may be indicative Of a
new force Opposing the first force. Conflicting motives re-
sult in a near balance and slow the movement down. At any
rate, change in Speed, as Dean points out, and changes in
direction, as Dietrich points out, can both indicate changes
in motivation. Such changes seem to be based on psycho-
logical reality but may also be drawn from a physics
metaphor or from the emphasis principle that change draws
attention.
The only oppositions in movement Boyd mentions are
attraction and repulsion;3O Craig only asserts the faith,
_‘
29Dietrich, pp. cit., p. 130. 30Boyd, _p. cit., p. 89.
171
without saying how, that body movement can denote the re-
lationship between characters and their internal thoughts.31
He adds a warning to be sparse so as to stimulate the
imagination; sparse how or with what is not clarified.
Purdom proclaims that movements are subject to the control
Of a center Of interest, but he does not provide details as
Dietrich does;32 Fernald goes so far as to say there is a
type Of movement that may possess no dramatic value whatso-
ever; hence the director is entitled to use as many of this
type as he can get away with.33 Evidently these moves are
simply to keep the scene active in order to provide motor
responses in the audience. That such motor responses will
be Specific and perhaps provide specific desired or undesired
psychological meaning for a context does not seem to occur to
Fernald.
Jessner does not provide his readers with meanings for
his Opposition movements beyond suggesting that height is
soaring and depth is defeat, along with his faith that move-
ment is directly expressive Of feelings.3"
Selden takes the same basic Opposition movements ex-
pressed above and makes them typical of all man's motives.
Â¥
31Cole, pp, cit., p. 176.
32Purdom, pp, cit., p. 79.
33John Fernald The Play Produced (London: H.F.W.
Deane & Sons, n.d.), p. 47.
34Lewis, pp, cit., p. 203.
172
Life for man, he writes, is an alternation of aversions and
attraction;35 and the aversions and attractions may be
signified by certain kinds Of moves that derive from biology
and are modified by society. Gravity pulls man down and he
exerts himself against it to go up; man moves toward the
pleasant and away from the unpleasant; man moves to nurture
36
or to destroy. Upon these basic moves society has placed
restraints and inhibitions; hence these moves are rarely
seen in full force in a life situation, but the audience
must see these moves large enough to know what is going on
underneath the restraint.37
Selden's two pairs Of Opposition movements are, first,
a lifting, or overcoming, and a lowering, or giving up; and,
second, an approaching, either as an embracing or as a
destroying, and a retreating, or avoiding (or, ones Selden
doesn't mention, a fearing or reSpecting).
The problem still remains for this study to discover
if there is any way to identify which Of Selden's several
meanings a particular approach or retreat has without
resorting to the play context. Identifying specific mean-
ings is complicated still further by the vertical moves.
A forced lying down of a character in sickness and death is
not the same as a voluntary lowering of a body to give aid
35Se1den, _p. pip†p. 162.
35Ibid., p. 62. 373939,, p. 69.
173
or comfort to someone who has fallen; yet Selden makes no
distinction. The meaningpof‘the four moves seem to depend
on what occurrence in life the audience chooses for its
metaphor, aided by what details are given in the context.
Selden's oversimplification seems to spring from a too pat
categorizing into dialectical Oppositions. Certain plays
may lend themselves to such interpretation; but life, for
many people, isn't simply dialectical.
The difficulties in interpreting the opposites Of
approach and withdrawal without a context are inadvertently
illustrated by Dean and Selden. Dean maintains that move-
ment from a distance to close together will depict a move
from low key to high climax.38 Selden maintains that en-
larging the space between characters enlarges the conflict.39
It would seem that an enlarged conflict could constitute to
Selden a climax in the sense that Dean uses the word.
Selden further complicates his own Observation by stating
that a dislike involves a retreat, but that an approach
could be either a liking or an intent to destroy."0 If the
latter is true, then a wider separation on stage would not
seem to enlarge the conflict in any very meaningful way
except to enlarge the area used for the conflict.
It would seem that both Dean and Selden are merely
expecting tOO much of abstract position as it tells about
_—
38Dean, pp, p13,, p. 244.
39Selden, pp. p33,, p. 251. "01bid., p. 183.
174
character relationship. More Of the situation is needed,
expressed both in body and in speech, before any of these
metaphors can make any meaning more Specific. Dean seems to
provide some Of this material in his discussion of body
position. For instance, body weight balanced back or for-
ward may Show aggression or weakness, positive or negative
emotions; sitting may Show weakness both physically and
pictorially.41 However, here are body positions that still
go no further than the basic attack and retreat or raise and
lower Oppositions.
Must the director now use words to clarify the possible
ambiguities in the opposition meanings mentioned above?
Hopefully not yet. Dimensions Of posture and facing, mixed
with changes of pace, can bring him closer to specific mean-
ing before the final refinement, the script line, is needed.
3, Plottingpthe Direction the Actor Faces
Besides mere abstract emphasis, then, what impression
does the audience get from full face, three-quarter face,
profile, and back? What facings convey what moods, emotions,
or attitudes? Are these culturally learned symbols, or are
they rooted in psychology? Or are they both? If there are
any significant, generally communicated, meanings to facings
they must have some general psychological or symbolic mean-
ing as well as a unique meaning given to them by a Specific
—¥
41Dean, pp, cit., p. 224.
175
character in a Specific play context. If there are facing
relationships that convey emotion or clarify meaning, then
they may be used regardless of the character using them.
They may be specifically shaped according to the exact
character and Situation, but their general shape can convey
general characteristics. Just as tension alone does not
identify an emotion, still without the appearance Of tension
the audience will not believe that an emotion exists. SO
body relationships Of facings may help to indicate to the
audience a thematic or basic psychological relationship
without in any way hindering the details of body posture or
characterization that the director and actor may create
together. To put it another way, facings, indicating basic
emphasis, symbol, and psychological relationship need to be
plotted prior to the details of character pantomime, or fine
movement, as facings help to set up basic gross blocking
relationships.
Previously in this study facings have been discussed
primarily in their role Of emphasis; an actor may draw
attention to a point Of interest by facing it, or he may
draw attention to himself, and make himself stronger, to
the extent that his face is seen by the audience; however,
Selden's is the only directing text in this study to mention
What facings may mean. For most directions Of facing he
only suggests amounts Of emphasis or strength, but for more
specific meaning he suggests that the straight on face is
176
dramatic and frank."2 The frank facing emotionally involves
the person faced; and either he is held by the direct gaze or
he must compel himself to turn away. In effect a frank gaze
forces an actor to become involved. Selden elaborates by
suggesting that the body should always face in the same
direction as the eyes."3 However, certain problems may
arise. First, if the actor's eyes always face where his
head and body face the actor is always portraying a "frank"
character; the script may not call for a frank character.
Second, the accepted custom of "cheating" on stage is arbi-
trarily eliminated if a body cannot face more downstage than
the eyes; the director would have to lose the advantage Of
impressing the audience for the advantage of some notion Of
realism.
Another aspect Of direct facing that Selden suggests is
that the play Jumps out Of the frame of the proscenium if an
"4 Selden infers that an
actor faces directly down stage.
audience cannot be thus involved with a character without
losing its role as audience. He does not elaborate further;
however, it does seem that Selden's discussion only fits a
contemporary, turned-in approach to realistic staging; in
other words, although Selden doesn't 80 state, his suggestion
seems to pertain to only one style of play. TO eliminate the
down stage glance is certainly to eliminate the aside, the
"2Selden, pp, cit., p. 210.
44
"31bid., p. 26. Ibid., p. 215.
l77
presentational style, and also the strongest face and body
position for any style. Of course if arena theatre be
included as a style, all meanings of facing, as well as of
stage areas, need complete reexamination. The following
analogy may provide a bridge between Selden's suggestions
and other movement styles.
Selden's Observations about direct facing of an actor
to another actor and of an actor to the audience give rise
to an analogical conjecture by this study, a conjecture not
discussed by Selden. It may be that the same qualities of
frank meaning that are conveyed in actor to actor facings
may also be conveyed in actor to audience facings; that the
more directly an actor faces his partner the more frank he
is; the less directly he faces his partner, the less frank
he is to his partner. Analogically, possibly the more
directly the actor faces the audience, the more frank the
audience feels the actor is with the audience.
Such a facing could fit into any style; the most direct
application would be in presentational theatre where the
audience is being directly addressed and in effect takes the
place of the actor's partner on stage; but even in realistic
theatre the actor can be blocked to face, and almost to face,
an audience without addressing, or even seeming to be aware
of, the audience; in such situations possibly the degrees
Of facing the audience could convey degrees Of frankness
with the audience.
178
Similarly, it may also be that the same qualities of
strength conveyed by degrees Of actor to audience facing
may be conveyed by degrees of actor to actor facing; that
the audience would interpret the direct actor to actor
facing as one actor making a strong impression upon his
partner, based on projecting into the play the feeling of
strength the audience felt when the actor was facing the
audience. In support Of this View, it would seem that the
strengthening of an actor, as he turns more face toward the
audience, is predicated upon the two assumptions: that the
actor's face is potentially more expressive than any other
part Of his body and that a direct face concentrates the
actor's attention on the audience and hence the audience's
attention on him. If the assumptions are true, then an
actor to actor relationship may share these emphasis
qualities. The degree to which one actor faces another may
determine the audience's interpretation of the strength of
impression that the actor is making upon his partner on
stage. Further, if there are other nuances to meanings of
an actor facing an audience, the nuances may also be true of
the facing of one actor by another. Similarly, if there are
nuances Of meaning to the degrees of facing between char-
acters, these nuances may also hold true when translated in-
to degrees of facing the audience.
In effect, an audience identification relationship is
Suggested by the above analogy, a relationship that may have
179
important implications for arena as well as proscenium move-
ment. The member of the audience seems to feel a character
is frank when he faces his stage partner directly. The
audience member seems to put himself into the place of the
partner being faced. Realizing that a direct feeling would
give him the impression Of frankness, the audience member
assumes a frank relationship exists between the characters.
Further, if the audience member identifies with the partner,
the audience member may feel vicariously the frankness, or
whatever else is being conveyed, of the direct character.
The audience member may feel vicariously almost as much
frankness, or other, as if the direct character were facing
the audience member himself.
If audience identification will allow for such vicarious
feelings then a facing can have a double significance and
potential for strength based, first, on the degree to which
an actor's face is toward the audience and, second, on the
degree to which the actor's face is toward a character with
whom the audience is identifying. Suffice it to point out
here that arena theatre may have to depend almost entirely
upon the facing relationships between actor and actor and
depend, for the meanings Of the degrees of direct or in-
direct facing, almost entirely on the audience's ability to
identify with the actor faced, or at least on their ability
to draw an analogy between the way they would feel and the
way the character must feel.
180
D. Matching Final Ground Plan and Stage Setting
to the Gross and Character Movement
It is possible for a director to plot all the relation-
ships Of gross blocking and character movement before com-
pleting his ground plan; but if a director has not settled
on a final plan at this point in his plotting here seems to
be the outer limit. Now he is aware Of all the possibilities
Of relationship Of character and script to movement and area.
He needs no specific knowledge of the details Of his panto—
mime and business to determine the ground plan. The one
element still needed is an understanding Of the importance
of exits and entrances as beginnings and endings of French
scenes. However, he has already planned an important
position for the exit Of the character if the exit is
important. It only remains now to place a door where the
exit is planned and to reconcile his concept Of area meaning
to architectural design elements, or to an exterior setting.
It is not suggested that the process is a simple one. With-
out some knowledge Of set design surely the director may
devise movement that is meaningful but that cannot take place
in the style of setting he desires.
The director is looking for a stage setting that will
in general allow for all the variations of movement and
position for which his blocking scheme calls. To be ideal
it should be a versatile yet unified setting with many
acting areas to allow for scenes played in small areas or
181
on the whole stage; it should be a setting with levels, such
as Appia and Jessner recommended, that allow for vertical as
well as horizontal picturization and give greater clarity to
depth relationships; it should be a stage free enough from
clutter so that the actor can in fact move freely in the
area, and yet a stage with sufficient scenic units, prOps,
or furniture to allow for motivation for movement to almost
any place on it. Finally the director wants a setting with
solids, forms, and textures that will provide contrast for,
and hence emphasis upon, either the stationary, or the moving
actor.
E. Matching the Fine Movement to Gross Blocking,
Character Movement, Stage Setting, and Script Lines
After his ground plan is completed the director needs to
plot his fine movement to match his gross blocking scheme.
This fine movement will consist Of the pantomime of each
actor. The movement characteristics Of each actor's role,
character movement to interpret the relationships in each
scene, and movement in the handling Of stage properties, or
business, and all specific body movements will be considered
the pantomime, or what they do wherever they may be on stage
in the blocking scheme.
The first step in plotting the fine movement is to see
if there are any general principles of meaning to body move-
ment, any kinds of movement that generally convey meanings
182
in the non-verbal pantomime context. In short, this study
will consult the authors of directing texts studied to see
how close they come to a language Of pantomime.
1. Viewing Pantomime as a Language
Jacques COpeau said that the lines of arms and torsos
and knees Of his actors spoke directly to the audience."5
The problem is to discover his language and to have some
reasonable assurance that it indeed communicates what he
thought it did; COpeau was not explicit in his writings.
It is one thing to proclaim that accurate pantomime will
communicate accurate meanings; it is quite another thing
to describe accurately what the symptoms and symbols are
and mean.
It seems to avoid the meaning issue to say with Gassner
‘ will move naturally
that an actor, given a "thought line,‘
and unselfconsciously.46 If the actor fails to move thus,
Gassner could simply proclaim that the person is no actor.
The problem at issue is precisely what must go into
the actor's original training, or be supplied by a director
as an additional part of the actor's training, so that the
natural movements Of an actor can portray whatever language
there is in pantomime. Certainly if the director can give
only thought lines to an actor the director has a very in-
direct tool for implementing any pantomime plotting.
_—
uSMacGowan, pp, cit., p. 182.
"6Gassner, pp, cit., p. 142.
183
In any case, this study wishes to examine the use of
the word "naturally." If by "naturally" Gassner means
according to the actor's pantomime training, analysis of
character, and in response to the director, then a thought
line may be sufficient to move an actor "naturally" as the
character he is portraying; however, such a use Of "natural-
ly" presupposes an actor knows some language Of pantomime,
has reached some agreement with his director on its use,
and has made these pantomimic characteristics his own be-
fore the thought line is given. This process, however,
does not seem to fit any normal use Of the word "naturally";
it is a highly crafted process. In any case, Gassner's
Observation avoids the problem of the language Of pantomime.
From Gassner's context this study assumes he is using
"natural" in the neO-Stanislavsky New York method approach
to acting. Many Of the professional teachers Of method
acting there shun all approaches to studying general char-
acteristics Of emotions or attitudes or abstract, metaphoric,
or symbolic meanings Of body movement. Even character
analysis is usually taught strictly in terms of psychologi-
cal motivation except for certain extremes Of physical
deformity. Even the subject Of bodily changes because of
age is usually avoided since the actors are being trained
for the type-cast market. For example, in her teaching
sessions Stella Adler proclaims these physical elements to
be "resultants" and are not to be considered by the actor;
(W
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184
Mary Welch, in her teaching, maintains if the inner thought
is correct the outer form will naturally follow. The sense
of her statement is that the actor, uninhibited by learning
a body-language, will act naturally if his concentration is
accurate, or, in Gassner's words, his "thought line" is
good. Experiences with the American Academy of Dramatic
Arts, Sanford Meisner, and Lee Strasburg all bear out that
they have a similar approach to the pantomime aSpects Of
acting. It is this study's opinion, from experience with
Gassner and from the context Of his book, that Gassner's
use Of though line resulting in natural, unselfconscious
movement is part of the same context of method. Such an
approach maintains that no general language of movement
should be used by an actor, only specific movements that
arise in the context of the play as the result of the
actor's attempt to think in character.
Whether or not the above described position is that of
Gassner's, Gassner does introduce a problem for the director
interested in pantomimic language possibilities. Given the
above described method approach, the actor tends to move as
himself in the Situation of the play, not as the character
in the situation or as the thematic or non-mimetic require-
ments Of the play or director may demand. It is a common-
place in the theatre that certain method and natural actors
always play themselves. Given the type casting situation
where an actor is cast because he mentally and physically
185
fits the director's conception of the character, the actor
may never need to learn, nor the director to plot, any
pantomime of the mimetic variety. Thoughtline would be
sufficient. However, given the method approach, especially
with the inexperienced actor who has not absorbed certain
conventions through experience, an actor does not tend to
move such as to keep oriented toward the audience or to keep
within justifiable sight line conventions; nor does he tend
to express the larger ideas Of the play, only those of him-
self as actor, Or at best those psychological characteristics
wherein the actor may coincidentally resemble the character.
It seems that one must agree with Selden that the rightly
trained actor can move in rhythms, in stage conventions, and
with stage diction and exaggeration; i.e., that nothing, tO
be understood by an audience, is really natural on stage."7
SO the answer to the method problem suggested by Gassner
may be that an actor's natural moves as the result Of a
thought line can only be trusted if he has a mind and body
trained in the Special language of the stage and has a
Physical as well as a psychological character study com-
pleted and learned so that he will move automatically as
would the character. Whether or not Gassner assumes it,
such training is not stated or implied in his context.
In short, it seems that even to express the basic
mimetic movement, the symbol standing for a real life
47Selden, pp, cit., p. 56.
'rj
186
movement, conventions of stage movement may be needed. The
unselfconscious move, Of a thought line prompted actor, may
only be a step in an actor's training, not a method of ex-
pressing meaning from the stage. After all, Clurman, in
Gassner's book, has already pointed out that stage movement
is a special language and the expert "author" of that move-
ment is the director. As an illustration, certainly a
French thought line for a French actor would not help the
actor to express himself in English unless he first learned
the English language. Similarly, it is not too much to ex-
pect the "natural" actor first to learn the Special lan-
guages of the stage before expecting him to express himself
with only the aid Of a thought line and natural processes.
Gassner may well be right in condemning, as he does, any
pat system of pantomime that purports to be realistic, to be
founded on psychology, and to call upon some Special set Of
conventional moves and positions to portray certain emotional}8
He does not state what system he refers to though in context
it appears to be Delsarte. For Gassner to condemn a
supposedly realistic system devised fifty years or more ago
from a religious, or mystical, classification Of primitive
psychological data is one thing. To condemn all systems Of
portrayal of symptoms, or of conventional signs for emotions,
because some systems are outdated appears hasty. It appears
"8Gassner, _p, p;p,, p. 143.
187
analagous to condemning all psychology because a fifty year
Old psychology is outdated.
For an actor to duplicate, or reinstate in his body,
symptoms of emotions, of age, or of disease with accuracy,
and then to work to make these symptoms an organic part Of
his natural movement, is not more artificial than to take
the author's words, character, and situation and to work to
make them part of himself. Perhaps worse still, in tossing
out outmoded systems of pantomime, a director may toss out
the good with the bad. For example, Dietrich, who also holds
symptomatic portrayal in distrust feels there is a place for
the accepted conventional symbol, and that its roots are in
natural behavior. He states that stereotypes, conventions,
or physical symbols for emotion Often result from certain
characteristics having occurred enough in human behavior so
that the stereotype develops.“9 In effect, then, there is
some natural behavior at the root Of even the stereotyped
action. It is the contention Of this study that it is a
valuable procedure to try to discover principles of real
life movements and the roots Of stereotyped movements SO
»that a director can have a check on the actor's intuition
and the director's own planning.
§p_ Viewing Pantomime as Having Three Modes Of Meaning
There begin to appear, according to the authors studied,
49Dietrich, _p, cit., p. 165.
188
three approaches to how pantomime may have meaning. They
correspond in part to this study's four part division of
abstract, mimetic, metaphoric, and symbolic, but are ex-
pressed usually in a different kind of sequence ranging
from most natural to most unnatural within the realm of
recognizable human movement; however, a relationship between
the two classification systems will be suggested.
a) The Three Modes Defined: Natural, Heightened
Natural, Symbolic.--There are two divisions of the natural
mode Of pantomime both of which this study would classify
as mimetic. There is the American method actor's view that
the correct inner thought will yield the correct outer form,
and in an organic way; voice and body will express a unified
human being and be true to life. Then there is the approach,
which can be combined with method, that allows for the actor
to add natural body characteristics to his portrayal,
characteristics that may result from physiological or
psychological knowledge about human beings in general or a-
bout his character in particular. In both divisions the
result is hopefully a reasonable facsimile Of a natural
human being.
The second mode, heightened natural pantomime, is
closest to the view expressed by Selden, Dietrich, and
others that real human behavior is apt to be too small, too
dull, or too undifferentiated for clear communication from
the stage, and so methods of heightening the natural are
189
needed for the stage. Such heightening can be a simple
enlargement Of natural movement, or it can also be the
elimination Of certain less dramatic details Of body move-
ment, sometimes called selective realism, which for this
study would be a sort Of mimetic symbolism.
The third mode, or symbolic pantomime, is classified
into the three categories of abstraction, metaphor, and
symbol by this study. The symbolic view seems to be that
the body Should not try to imitate nature's moves at all in
verisimilitude or in a mimetic fashion, but rather the body
should be made to express by symbol, by metaphor, or by some
Special language the inner or universal truth of the char-
acter, the society, or the play. Of course the third mode
of meaning can combine quite easily with the heightened
natural mode to create characters heightened and distorted
in their pantomime by abstraction, metaphor, and symbol.
However, for the purposes Of this chapter, esoteric, pure
symbolic, forms will not be considered.
b) Natural Pantomime Explored.--The American method
actors' school Of thought expresses the first division of
natural pantomime, wherein the actor's pantomime is the
result of thought lines or inner feelings rather than super-
imposed physical characteristics. Gassner's view reflects
this school of thought, a school whose views are probably
more extremely thought centered than Stanislavsky's from
which the view supposedly originated. The view has been
vie
n1
190
adequately expressed on pages 182-186 of this study.
Somewhat surprisingly, Canfield, whose emphasis is upon
the craft of the theatre, seems to hold the natural pantomime
view. He states that in good acting the emotion proceeds
from a sense of truth within the actor.50 It would seem
that Canfield, within the natural mode, ought to give some
consideration to the view that in good acting the emotion
may proceed from an accurate and artistic depiction of
emotion based on a study of how peOple actually behave and
modified by whatever conventions are necessary to carry the
impression of a truthful emotion to the audience.
In any event, this study is more concerned with the
observable results in pantomime than in the method by which
the actor or director arrives at those results; and soon as
a director maintains the view of the second division of
natural pantomime, the addition of pantomimic characteris-
tics by design rather than by an actor thought process
alone, he usually allows exaggeration and selection, hence
his observable results belong more in the next mode.
0) Heightened Natural Pantomime Explored.--Such men as
Dietrich and Selden express ideas that place them more in
the heightened natural mode of pantomime, but they use
mimetic principles and incorporate symbols as well; however,
usually the symbols are merely stylized and conventionalized
mimesis.
—__
50Canfield, op, cit., p. 166.
191
They question chiefly how much pantomime is in fact
natural expression, how much is learned convention, and how
much is not a language but is dependent on a verbal context
to give it Specific meaning.
Dietrich has two important contributions to make to the
mode of heightened natural pantomime. The first is a con-
tention that may cast doubt on the possibility of communi-
cation by simple natural mimesis, the contention that
psychologists have found that the physiological changes in
emotion seem to be similar, if not identical, regardless of
the emotion experienced. Emotions are all patterns of
disorganization.51
The second is a contention that follows from the first;
as a result of the psychologists' findings the audience
would need the play context and conventional symbols of
emotion in order to differentiate pantomimic emotions. One
of the conventional symbols that Dietrich mentions is the
emotional stereotype.52
The stereotype is easier to deal with than the psycho-
logists' findings. It would appear to be a form of the
heightened natural in pantomime. It derives from natural
behavior that has been exaggerated and conventionalized
until the audience thinks of the symbol as a true symptom.
If the emotional stereotype is accepted as a real symptom
of emotion by the audience, and is performed in a way
_
51Dietrich, 92. cit., p. 151+ 521bid., p. 160.
yaw
y»:
..
a
1'16
ti
tc
192
appropriate to the character and situation, then neither
this study, nor Dietrich evidently would disapprove of its
use. Here is a theatrically acceptable mode of a symbolic
communication of emotion.
Dietrich's first contention, that the physiological
changes are the same regardless of the emotion experienced,
would seem to make the stereotype not only acceptable but
necessary. The contention is difficult to harmonize with
the view that there may be an understandable mimetic language
to be heightened.
The problem, however, seems more concerned with the con-
text in which the word "emotion" is used than with the
psychological aSpects expressed. In Dietrich's context the
word "emotion" seems to apply to the basic changes in heart
beat, blood pressure, breathing rate, and muscle tension.
If these symptoms express the meaning of "emotion" it may
well be true that all emotions are symptomatically alike.
However, this meaning perhaps unnecessarily restricts the
use of "emotion% emotion would no longer pertain to any
observable and felt state corresponding to such feelings as
anger, fear, hate, and love. "Emotion" would then have a
more basic meaning such as the preparation for action the
body makes at the time of any change in feelings.
What else need be added, then, before words are spoken,
and before stereotyped symbols for emotion are used, to give
some observable direction or feeling tone to the basic
to
mer
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193
physiological symptoms? Is there anything else, as some
authors feel, that is still a part of the natural, physical,
emotional behavior?
Dietrich himself gives this study a direction in which
to look for the solution to the problem of seeming disagree-
ment among authors. He mentions that the visual projection
of emotion, as it is rooted in actual physiological symptoms,
concerns muscle tension and relaxation; there are also
contracted and expanded states that are symptomatic of un-
pleasant and pleasant emotions.53 These are symptomatic
conditions that seem to add another dimension, actual
posture, to such symptoms as heart beat and breathing rate.
Perhaps once all the body characteristics that accompanyy
undifferentiated emotion are studied as symptoms, that is,
which muscles are expanded or contracted, what qualities and
rates of breathing are involved, and what facial expressions
are seen, then greater differentiation of emotions can be
perceived. Perhaps this is, in effect, putting the basic
undifferentiated physiological symptoms of emotion into a
context; however, it is still only a pantomimic and mimetic,
not yet either a verbal or symbolic, context.
This study feels that a word other than "emotion" can
be employed to mean the total set of symptoms that include
posture, body set, and typical movement reactions, but that
53Ib1d., p. 162.
194
do not include the context of a character in a play; the
term "body attitude" may be apprOpriate. Such attitudes
may well be responses that are consistently and naturally
differentiated even though the organic symptoms show little
differentiation. In short, even though a knowledge of the
play situation is imperative to the recognition of the
specific emotion, even as Dietrich says,54 still the play‘s
situation may be known to a great extent from its pantomimic
pattern, derived not from the stereotype of emotion alone
but also from assumed body attitudes similar to what a real
person might naturally assume in a real life situation. At
least, as will be seen, Selden seems to think so.
Selden includes as symptoms of emotion what this study
has Just defined as emotion and body attitude combined. He
feels that primitive emotions can be expressed with body
positions, both in movement and in repose; such emotions
include grief, despair, humility, indecision, and Joy.55
He bases this supposition on a theory that there are really
accurate and differentiated movements and positions for
emotions but that social restraints, by custom, have been
put upon the basic strong moves of biology.56 His lesson
for actors is, then, that a copy of the symptoms of emotion,
as found in their present cultural context, would not be
either large enough or differentiated enough to be "read"
h.—
541b1d., p. 164.
55Se1den, 92. 933., p. 83. 56Ibid., p. 69.
E
he
th
195
by an audience; hence, the audience needs "hints" of the
larger, primitive emotion that is underneath the restrained
exterior.57 In effect, Selden counsels to produce in outer
form the inner reSponse that isn't normally seen.58
That such symptoms can be known, and hence expressed in
their larger form, is to some extent assumed by Selden, but
he does give some principles for guidance. He feels that
the waist is the controlling point for primitive action.59
Similarly, all sincerely motivated gesture originates at
some central part of the body and extends to the extremities;
it does not originate in hands or feet. The extremities
symbolize in their gestures man's desire to make or break
contact.6O However, since most of his principles of meaning
of body areas, mentioned above, originate with Delsarte,
this study will postpone discussion of them until part II
that deals with the modern exponents of Delsarte.
Selden also suggests, in the heightened natural mode
of pantomime, simplification of movement to carry the essence
of the move, especially when several people are moving.61
His view is what this study calls selective natural panto-
mime, an editing of the strictly mimetic to create a
heightened natural effect.
d) Symbolic Pantomime Explored.--It is appropriate to
note that, although this study suggested that one method of
_—.¥
57Ib1d., p. 79. 58Ib1d., p. 93.
59;2;g,, p. 86 69;p;g,, p. 92. 61Ibid., p. 273.
196
heightening the natural in pantomime could be through the
addition of symbolic features, so far the views of heightened
natural pantomime have been characterized by suggestions to
exaggerate and to delete parts from what are basically
natural human moves. Methods of incorporating non-mimetic
movement seem to come primarily from the expressionist—
symbolists.
As an example of the symbolist View, Appia proclaims
that the human body, as theatre's means of expression, must
forsake the caprice and accident of life and try to express
its essential characteristics, its most important ideas,
more clearly and fully than in normal life.62 He enlarges
somewhat on this concept by saying that the human body must
63
undergo a "modification of relationships". In his context,
it is apparent that Appia means the body should be subject
to the same principles as any other art. It should derive
its material from nature, from the natural behavior of the
human body, but should so order, arrange, edit, simplify,
emphasize, distort, and otherwise pattern nature that the
end product is anything but nature; the result is art
expressing a definite point of view about nature and society.
He feels this is no more or less than should be expected of
any art. However, Just what his methods were, and what
results he achieved, he does not explain.
62Appia, 22, 233,, p. 24.
63Ibid., p. 55.
197
Beyond Appia's view, pantomime would become an esoteric
Special symbolism divorced from movement that is human.
Each such system is a language unto itself and not of
interest at this point in the study.
3, Viewing Pantomime as an Adjunct to Script Lines
In this section the director comes closer to the de-
tailed relationship of movement to script. In it the use
of prOperties and business, as well as the amount, duration,
intensity, and placement of moves in relationship to script
lines, will be discussed. According to the authors studied
movement's functions in this regard appear to be to empha-
size, to support, or to counter script meanings.
a) Movement to Emphasize Script Lines.--Most of the
books analyzed relate movement to lines in terms of emphasis
rather than meaning. The line is evidently considered, in
most cases, to carry the meaning; whereas some moves have
the purpose of maintaining good sight lines so the emphatic
character or object will be seen and heard. Here the mean-
ing again is assumed to lie ultimately in the words of the
Speaker, or possibly in the action of the dominant character.
The directing texts are not very explicit on how to make
that dominant action meaningful; mostly they provide a
variety of ways in which to point to it. Also there is
little analysis of what qualities of meanings various
methods of gaining script line emphasis will have; usually
there is only the relative strengths of the emphasis and
198
the methods of keeping the focus where the director desires.
Although this study is more concerned with the meaning
that movement contributes to lines than with movement's
function of drawing attention to those lines, the first
step will be to poll the methods of gaining emphasis in
order to have them available in discussing later their
possible special qualities.
1-General Relationship of Movement to Lines. MacGowan
suggests that characters in a group should remain immobile
while the principals are talking.64 The obvious reason is
to have no distraction from the main action, though he fails
to solve a problem of life-like-ness. If the characters are
truly immobile they serve little function in the scene; they
are apt to appear inhuman and contrast with the principals
almost as a painted tree does with a real tree.
Fernald suggests a principle of "one effect at a timeâ€;
where movement is of "dramatic significance it should not be
accompanied by dialogue"; and where "dialogue is of partic-
ular dramatic significance, it should not be accompanied by
movement".65 0n the surface this seems to contradict a
principle of Shaw's, that there should rarely be any silence
on stage; it also would seem to contradict a general prin-
ciple of Dietrich's, and others, that in general the length
of move and length of line coincide unless Special emphasis
64MacGowan, _p, gi§,, p. 139.
65Fernald, 92, gi§,, p. 4#.
199
is to fall on one or the other?6
It seems that Fernald is
saying in general that if either is to have "dramatic
significance," that moves should be made without words and
words be Spoken without moves. It would also appear on the
surface that Dietrich suggests that usually a move of the
Speaker starts and ends with the speaker's line. On closer
inSpection, however, the two ideas may combine to reveal
important principles. Dietrich points out that an actor
generally moves on his own line and generally moves through-
out his line, be the move a distance-covering move (gross
blocking move) or merely pantomime while the actor is
stationary. Generally the actor stOps movement and speech
while another actor takes over both movement and Speech.
Both Dietrich and Fernald point up important principles;
to avoid divided focus between actors, the mover is the
speaker; to avoid divided focus between movement and Speech,
the one is stopped while the other continues in sole focus.
This study would like to suggest a corollary to this
latter principle; a character who is not Speaking at the
moment may attract attention to himself by movement. The
attraction has its negative value of distraction, but it
also has a positive value. It can help to maintain a sense
of interaction even though only one person is speaking, or
it can provide comment or punctuation to a long speech.
66Dietrich, 92, cit., p. 127.
200
With these uses in mind MacGowan's idea of the motionless
crowd may well be replaced by an idea of Judicious, care-
fully Spotted, crowd movements to show a crowd interaction
with the principals. At other times the crowd may follow
Selden's advice and remain alert, involved, and interested
while being relatively motionless.67 The crowd can also
follow Selden's suggestion to make only simple, typical
moves even during their times of activity.68
Dean concurs with both Dietrich and Fernald when Dean
suggests that a movement on a line may call attention to
the Speaker and give him emphasis; but he adds that the
movement may also cloud the meaning of the line.69 His
advice is to analyze the line to see if the line carries
its meaning by itself or if it needs the move to clarify or
intensify its meaning. He is, in effect, suggesting the
avoidance of redundancy and of competition between line and
move. Gielgud and Krows, as has been seen, would rather
avoid moving at all if there is any chance of the movement
interfering with the words.
Dean further suggests ways of softening a move if the
move must be made by the nonspeaking character; the latter
may, for example, be pacing during a dialogue; in which case
he may pace in a weaker stage area while the Speaker stands
in a stronger stage area.70 In general he says that a play
_hl
68
67Se1den, pp, 923,, p. 65. Ibid., p. 273.
69Dean, pp, cit., p. 239. 7OIb1d., p. 241.
201
of ideas is apt to have less movement while a play lacking
in thought is apt to have more movement.71
Dietrich has additional suggestions concerning violent
action in relation to lines. When fighting or physical
violence must occur on stage there is a tendency for it to
take all of the focus and leave little for the words. In
effect his suggestion is to find ways of saying the lines
during quieter moments preceding, or during lulls in, the
violence and to surge into bursts of violence that involve
only a few words.72 Such actions may be plotted in waves
of quiet and activity throughout a scene, with a climax of
violence; or they may be in a progression, building from
quieter moments to a violent scene. It seems that such
alternation of emphasis would successfully maintain an
alternation of focus from speech to movement, following the
same principle of "one effect at a time" expressed by Fernald.
It might be added here that words may not be out of place
during the violence but, following Dean's suggestion about
plays that have less thought and adapting it to the violent
scene in any play, perhaps a dialogue of less thought could
be allowed during the violence. For example, primitive
sounds, ejaculations, repeated ideas or themes, or slogans
might help to carry the force of the violence without
competing with the violence.
73;g;g., p. 258.
72Dietrich, pp, 323,, p. 155.
202
Selden agrees with the above authors and suggests the
principle that a story must move forward every minute; when
the action cannot progress outwardly, it must continue in-
wardly.73 Dietrich's and Selden's ideas may combine
profitably this way: when the physical movement is strongest
the dialogue is weakest; when the dialogue is strongest the
movement is weakest.
2-Specific Relationship of Movement to Lines. When the
director comes to specific kinds of lines and situations
there is a catalogue of conventional stage movement, and
certain basic principles, to consider in terms of emphasis.
The catalogue seems to divide into two general categories:
movement to point up an important line or character, or
movement to deemphasize an unimportant line or character.
In effect the two are often complementary and sequential;
the latter move helps to make way for the former.
Such moves as are concerned with exits and entrances
seem to be the most prominent in the above category.
Dietrich suggests that an actor must disappear from sight
at the conclusion of the exit tag, or tag end of his line
or movement; the reason is to allow attention to revert
back to the actors on stage.74 Dietrich points out that an
additional move, in the wake of the departing actor so to
speak, may help to emphasize the exit in case attention is
73Se1den, 92, cit., p. 199.
7hDietrich, _p, cit., p. 137-
203
not wanted elsewhere immediately; a pause may accomplish the
same emphasis with eyes focused on the exit. Dietrich also
points out that exits and entrances are often climaxes to,
and limits of, the motivational units.75 Hence, they must
be constructed with care and usually with a high degree of
emphasis. To aid this purpose most of the authors list such
moves as up stage counters, movements to upstage to prepare
a character to be in focus, isolation moves, and all of the
previously discussed compositional movement elements. These
moves are discussed by Canfield in terms of their function as
conventions to allow the important elements to be seen and
heard in a proscenium, to uncover the point of interest and
draw attention to it.76
Dietrich suggests that a line following a move empha-
sizes the line, while a move following a line emphasizes
the move.77 The principle in general is that what happens
last in a sequence gains the most importance. Also, the
initial sound or sight draws attention to the actor and
then leaves an undivided focus on either the sight or the
sound that follows. Dean agrees with Dietrich when he says
that a move before a line emphasizes the line; a move after
the line emphasizes the move.78 He adds that a weak move
75;p;g,, p. 138.
76Canfie1d, pp, 933,, p. 168.
77Dietrich, 92, git,, p. 128.
78Dean, _p, gi§,, p. 234.
204
after the line still emphasizes the line; however, his
addition leads to a questioning of the whole principle.
There is a danger in what Dean says; it seems the
weak move following the line may weaken the line. Movement,
drawing attention to itself, may keep the audience's
attention for some seconds after the line and actually
supplant the line; or the move may be thought of by the
audience as a comment upon the line, since the Speaker is
making the move. The movement being weak could tend to
undermine the strength of the line, tend to extend the line
into a petering-out movement.
Another interpretation of Dean's observation seems like
a good example of emphasis but not an example of a move that
is weak. A single move or gesture followed by an exit, or
a repose, could have the effect of a punctuation mark, and
hence could strengthen the line preceding it rather than
call special attention to the single strong move itself.
A quick flourish for an exit, for example, may punctuate
a line and give it greater importance. To be sure, the
movement is last and makes a strong impression; still, it
is a supporting impression; the move underlines, rather
than supplants the script line. But such a punctuation mark
would be considered by this study to be a strong move.
It seems that the most sympathetic treatment of Dean's
principle would be to consider that the very weak move, one
that takes the actor almost immediately out of focus, per-
haps even off the stage, will leave a sort of visual vacuum
205
where the actor was. In addition to saying â€nothing more
of importance is coming from this character at the moment,
so remember his last remark," the vacuum can help to elimi-
nate any strong visual image following the line that might
distract from the line. Such a move borrows some of the
effectiveness of the "black-out," where a sudden elimination
of light will leave the audience with a strong impression of
whatever was last seen or heard. In either case, the place
where the audience's eyes were focused will no longer have
a strong visual point of interest. On the lighted stage,
as long as the rest of the stage picture is maintained
relatively static after the weak movement, there will be no
immediate distractions from the emphatic line.
Of course, such a "vacuum" is usually only felt for an
instant, and with much less force than the "black-out," but
the impression is strong enough to create some emphasis.
b) Movement to Support Script LineS.-—Related to the
way a move may emphasize a line is the way it may support.
In addition to drawing attention to a particular line, a
move may give the line either strength or weakness and may
even be able to add some nuance of Specific meaning that
correlates positively with the meaning of the script lines.
Dean suggests the director may correlate a strong move
with a strong line.79 His suggestion is based on a previous
view of his that each sentence of a play has an inherent
79Ibid., p. 234.
206
movement, even if it is a static move; i.e., pause, or rest?)0
If the director finds the inherent move he can match it to
the line. Such matching can be compared to Smith's symbolic
moves that supposedly grow out of lines that contain such
elements as inherent approaches, or encirclements, or
separations. In the same context Dean suggests that the
director may interpret the author's change of meanings that
occur line by line by choosing the apprOpriate set of
changing moves.
l-Support Through Duration. Another means of support for a
line is by the duration of a move. How it may support is
somewhat complex. Dean proclaims that a long move is
generally weaker than a short one.81 Dietrich supports
Dean's view by saying that the audience quickly perceives
the meaning of a movement so that if the movement takes too
82 These two statements can be
long, interest wanes.
puzzling. It would seem that the general Opinion supports
the idea that a static scene is tedious. If true, Dietrich's
statement may well be altered to say that an audience may
quickly perceive the meaning of a still picture and interest
wanes. It would seem that, given a choice, the director
might well sustain interest longer in a long movement than
he would with a long still picture. However, when the
length of a move is considered in conjunction with a script
Bogpig,, p. 234. 81;p;g,. p. 226.
82Dietrich, 22, cit., p. 127.
207
line, Dietrich's point of View seems to alter. As has been
pointed out, Dietrich has suggested that a norm is for the
length of the move to coincide with the length of the line.
Then a long line may well mean a long move. To combine
his statements sympathetically may result in the conclusion
that a long move unaccompanied by lines, may be tedious; that
is, when complete emphasis is on the move its meaning may be
discerned quickly and the audience become anxious for dia-
logue to continue. However, the speed of understanding would
depend upon the ingenuitycf the director. Perhaps the
audience is equally able to discern the meaning of the move-
ment, i.e., action, of the plot and can see where the plot
is going; hence the scene should be written in a less obvious
way or cut. The same principle can hold true of movement.
The director need not be obvious; he may provide a movement
sequence, as in dance or in wordless pantomime, that has
the same build, suSpense, and climax as a written script.
2-Support through Realism. Another variety of support that
movement can give to lines is psychological realism. ‘When
Boyd reminds an actor not to back into a move, he is using the
principle (without so saying) that in general people do not
orient themselves to where they have been but to where they are
going.83 When a character goes toward a point of interest
he is oriented toward it until there is a new point of
interest; then the character may turn toward the new point
L
83Boyd, 9p, 91.3., p. 89.
208
of interest. Therefore, the convention of "not backing into
a move" really calls into play the whole context of psycho-
logical motivation of moves.
Perhaps a more important psychological relationship
between move and line is the natural order of human re-
action. Dietrich maintains that the gesture normally
coincides with the line; a mistimed gesture after the line
is for comic effect.84 Possibly, however, even in drama a
gesture, in the rhythm of the speech, after the line may
support, and, in effect, supply the place of punctuation for,
the line. The gesture in effect may tell the audience what
the punctuation is and may also help to maintain the rhythm
of the scene. The gesture may also have the advantage of
not interfering, by either excess sight or sound, with the
line itself. Specifically annoying is the pounded fist that
obliterates the last, and usually the most important, phrase
in the line.
There is still another problem with the timing of
gesture or reaction moves. Emphasis as discussed above is
primarily of aesthetic or thematic interest. Timing that is
concerned with psychologically motivated characters involves
a different point of view and possibly a different timing.
There seems to be an easily observed reaction pattern in
human behavior; according to the teachings of Louise Gifford,
pantomime consultant for Theatre Guild in New York, it seems
84Dietrich, _p_. cit., p. 150.
209
that in normal human behavior gesture precedes speech. Of
course physical reaction may come during a Speech but the
reaction is generally in advance of the part of the speech
that expresses that reaction, i.e., a thought or emotion
results in overt movement, a new body set, and finally in
speech. The principle is that emotion and the accompanying
physical symptoms precede spontaneous sound, such as
ejaculation, which in turn precedes verbalization. Certain-
ly the problems and possibilities of the idea of the sequence
in a reaction pattern can be very important to both realistic
and stylized movement and emphasis.
3-Support through Prop Handling. Movements that accompany
the handling of prOps may partake of the same abstract
formal qualities of any other movement and also resemble,
or stand for, a similar movement as it may be found in a
real life situation. The additional elements are the
positive and negative uses of the prop itself.
Negatively, a prOp adds another element to a composi-
tion; it may steal, take, or at least divide the emphasis
and be distracting; if lines and movements are both involved
with the handling of a prOp then there is a three way,
rather than a two way, split in focus. Positively, the prOp
may be handled on simple supporting levels, such as to
reinforce the director's notion of the meaning of the line,
the character, or the situation.
As an example, Dietrich refers to the use of the
telephone in The Voice of the Turtle where the phone becomes
210
a symbol presumably for the party at the other end of the
line; the phone is threatened, cajoled, caressed, and beaten
to point up the attitude of the Speaker on the phone.85
Dietrich separates the above two basic meanings into denota-
tive and connotative. In terms of this study, "denotative"
comes closest to the simple correspondence that stage move-
ment would have to real movement in a similar situation in
real life. Connotative would be closest to the additional
comments that a move makes about the line, either to support,
to supplement, or to contradict.
c) Movement to Counter Script Lines.--Up until here only
two varieties of relationship have been used: methods of
gaining emphasis for line or move, and ways of supporting
the line with the move. In other words, the concern has
been to clarify the line by underscoring it or by supplying
it with moving buttresses that substantially say the same
thing as the line.
To alter a line meaning, to embroider it, to give it
new qualities, to comment on it, or on the characters saying
it, or even to deny the truth of the line entirely, is an
editorial function of movement that can be of great impor-
tance. In a sense such a movement usage can provide a whole
new sub-script. A simple example would be a retreat move
during a line that suggests positive attraction. The move-
ment comments that the character does not mean what he is
85Ibid., p. 147.
211
saying. Such a move may carry the emotion that underlies
the surface of words; it may carry the theme, mood, or
metaphor of the play that underlies and connects the
movement-to-movement meanings of the script; or it may
provide a commentary on some absurdity of the surface
meaning of the script or the insincerity of some character.
Harold Clurman states that in a sense the playwrights
text disappears the moment it reaches the stage; the text
becomes a part of an action; the change of a gesture, in-
flection, movement, rhythm, or physical background of the
speech may give it new significance.86 A movement that
contradicts, or at least contrasts with, the line holds in
its juxtaposition the power to create a depth, a dimension,
and a comment that the line itself could not achieve.
The principles of the meaning of the moves, as proposed
by the chosen authors, have already been discussed. It is
up to the director, in his initial analysis, to discover
counterpoints in the script, or to invent them if need be,
in order to bring depth of theme, emotion, or attitude to
the surface Speech; the director may do this harmoniously
by support or contrastingly by purposeful mismatching.
F. Matching Timing to the Movement: Discerning and.
Plotting Tempi and Rhythms ApprOpriate to
the Script and the Movement Plan
86Cble, op, gi§,, p. 276.
212
The one dimension left for the director to consider in
the meaning of his movement is the rhythmic use of time.
Rhythm and tempo have a powerful and relatively undeveloped
potential for stage movement meaning. Because of rhythm's
kinship to nature its potential for metaphoric and direct
empathic meaning is great. Because of its integral re-
lationship to music, rhythm's potential for direct symbolic
and associational meaning is also great. But rhythm's in-
clusion in the movement of a script seems to be both easy
to discuss and difficult to accomplish, possibly, in part,
because many directors do not plan for rhythm early enough
in their blocking scheme. Rhythm needs to be plotted into
the selection of French scenes, gross blocking, and fine
movement in order to implement most successfully the
rhythmic principles decided upon in early thematic analysis.
Of course, in part, the difficulty of including rhythm
to its greatest potential is the script itself. Most
contemporary scripts simply do not have, nor are they
expected to have, the built-in and clearly recognizable
rhythms of either nature or music. In any case, it seems
that many directors choose to wait to bring rhythm into
their movement until they have specific blocking, fine
movement, and script lines as material to organize into
rhythmic patterns. This study does not Oppose that procedure
so long as the director has blocked his rhythmic scheme into
the play at an earlier time, merely saved the last phases of
rehearsal to concentrate on timing factors.
213
1. Tempo and Rhythm Defined
Dean says that rhythm consists of a sequence of
impressions, ordered into a recurrence of accented groups,87
and that tempo, in essence, is the Speed of the established
88 Dietrich substantially agrees with him.89 For
rhythm.
this reason rhythm will be discussed first and then tempo
will be added to rhythm.
2. Puppose and Function of Rhythm
The function of rhythm is thought of variously as any-
thing from a training in grace for actors to a basic means
of empathic communication.
Ernst Ferand believes in training actors so their
bodies and speech can move in any rhythm or tempo that music
or line of design in a play may require.90 However, his
concern is not with what the rhythm may communicate so much
as it is with the grace, efficiency, and versatility rhythm
may supply the actor.
Canfield notes briefly that rhythm adds empathy because
it helps the audience to "get with" the play.91
Selden expands this notion to suggest that rhythm is
one of the basic stimulants for an audience. However, for
87Dean, pp, gi§,, p. 284. 88ipig,, p. 288.
89Dietrich, pp, pip,, p. 103.
90Gassner, pp, gi§,, p. 168.
91Canfield, pp, pip,, p. 286.
rn
214
now the study still concerns what the director believes he
is expressing, not what the audience is actually receiving,
though with rhythm the distinction is difficult to maintain
since the authors studied discuss the qualities of rhythm
chiefly in terms of empathic audience response.
As to their function in a play, pulsations and rhythm
express, according to Selden, health and a feeling of well-
being.92 Rhythms express general feelings which become
specific in the context or pattern of the play.93 Selden
also feels that modern man has repressed his natural movement
reactions to emotion, but that music, with its rhythm, has
to a large extent taken over as the media of emotional ex-
pression.94
In general, then, the functions of rhythm seem to be to
convey emotions and moods, that rely in part on the play
context and in part on prior association for their meaning,
and to induce direct empathic reinstatement of rhythms into
the audience while the rhythms are being expressed on stage.
Such reinstatement would supposedly carry with it whatever
emotions or attitudes the rhythm has. It may function to
support the script, by underlining the meanings and rhythms
of the script, or it may provide comment, or counter mean-
ings.
92Selden, _p. 21.3., p. 20.
93Ibid., p. 29.
941b1d.) pp. 35: 38.
(I)
rn
215
3, Sources for Rhythm Meanipgs
Selden makes the broad statement that the world is made
up of rhythms.95 Rhythms for adaptation to stage purposes
can be found anywhere. The body, perhaps,is the chief
source, as most authors agree. For example, Dean draws
attention to the heart beat and breathing rhythms as basic
sources.96
Dean also believes that each character and each scene,
as well as the play as a whole, have their own rhythms.97
The problem of the director is evidently to discover these
contributing rhythms and to coordinate them into an over~
all rhythm of the play. Usable script rhythms seem to
emerge from two sources: from the rhythm of the words and
from the way the script stimulates the director's imagination.
The former derives from the length of the lines in dialogue,
length of words, relationship of the phrases, and a larger
rhythm of the temporal relationship of French scene to
French scene. It would seem, though, that the script only
provides a springboard to the director's imagination. How
he conceives of the phrasing, the pauses, the accents, or
the emotional background of the character may indeed derive
from the script and be consistent with the script but it can
hardly be said to inhere in the script; otherwise each
95Ibid., p. 46.
96Dean, _p. 2i}, p. 284.
97Ibid., p. 285.
216
director would tend to evolve the same rhythms for the same
scene as inevitably as each uses the same words. Such is
simply not the case. The director's imagination, then,
Seems to be the most important factor in the finding of
rhythms.
Selden suggests a process of discovering script rhythms
in his discussion of buried rhythms. He feels that there
are rhythms to be discovered in passages that are not
obviously rhythmical.98 He adds that buried rhythms add
values of perSpective and expectancy through repetition,
values that neither life nor the script makes obvious often
enough to be noticed.99 Phrasing, which has been discussed
under motivational units and French scenes, is also a
source of rhythm discussed by Selden; however, he mainly
stresses rhythm's function in compositional emphasis, and
in aiding comprehension.lOO
Suffice it to summarize and to anticipate here that
the meaning of rhythms probably arise in the same way as
the meaning of movement, i.e., by association with natural
rhythms, with cultural rhythms, and with the Specific lan-
guage of rhythm which is music; in other words, there are
rhythms that denote, by direct imitation, the bodily functions
of heart beat, breathing, walking and running; that connote
98Selden, pp, cit., p. 62.
99Ibid., p. 184. lOOIbid., pp. 56,184,185.
217
nature's functions in the four seasons, day and night, and
animal movement; that connote cultural functions, such as
rhythms in machinery or in ceremony; or rhythms that derive
from the direct language of rhythm, music.
Music can establish meaning to rhythm by all of the
above associational means, but obviously music has gone far
beyond the nature from which the rhythms were abstracted.
Now the rhythm of the music itself can express directly a
country, a mood, a dance, a level in society, or any number
of special locales. By use of the rhythm found in a
selected piece of music the director can, by association with
the music, help to establish the same mood as the music would
have established.
Ultimately, then, rhythms may derive from the actual
rhythms of the script or from rhythms in nature, in culture,
or in music. The rhythms may be consistent with the script
but are not really inherent. Most rhythms may be suggested
to the imaginative director by the script but they usually
must be derived from other sources.
3p Tempo Added to Rrgpthm
Tempo is the time measure of rhythm; it is defined by
Dietrich primarily as the impression of rate of Speed of the
rhythm rather than the actual Speed.lOl AS such, a changing
tempo may give an audience an impression of a growing calm
or of a growing excitement, may actually communicate that
—_l
101Dietrich, pp, cit., p. 176.
J
D
in
DE
218
excitement by empathic means, but primarily its meaning is,
like compositional emphasis, contributory. As the rhythm
has meaning so the tempo will stress that rhythm and its
meaning. The rhythm carries more meaning than the tempo.
However, the rhythm needs a Specific context for a Specific
meaning so it in turn is contributory, by giving Special
qualities to specific movements or Speech. In turn, the
movement that is made rhythmically may carry a more Specific
meaning than the rhythm alone, but the movement needs the
verbal context to make of the situation a unique individual
occurrence with a meaning that is all its own.
Certain uses of tempo seem best attended to early in
rehearsal and others seem appropriate for inclusion in the
final phases. Dietrich points out that one normal element
in tempo is the fast cue.102 Its primary purpose is to
maintain concentrated attention. Such a tempo manifestation
need not be part of advanced preparation by the director.
However, Dietrich's observation that tempo is more the
impression of speed than actual speed gives rise to con-
jecture on the part of this study that some of the elements
of tempo seem best attended to early in plotting and
blocking. Such time factors as a sequence of sharp contrasts,
or an increase of accented beats, or a series of staccato
movements must be part of the basic composition to be most
integral and effective.
___
102Ibid., p. 174.
219
In plotting rhythm and tempo to match the scene, Dean's
general suggestion is that the rhythm of a scene Should
remain constant but that the tempo should vary.103 The
presumption evidently is that once the rhythm has helped to
get the audience with the play, the rhythm should be main-
tained to keep them there; then by increasing the tempo the
excitement is heightened to a crescendo to maintain and
increase that interest. The inference is that the rhythm
is a basic quality of the scene as much as atmosphere,
locale, or mood; hence the time changes Should be in quantity
rather than in quality. However, if the rhythm is derived
from character rather than from locale, or from mood, or
metaphor, possibly the scene may have to alter in rhythm as
well as in tempo.
The application of rhythm and tempo to a scene becomes
largely, it seems, a problem of continuity vs. change. Some
principle of rhythmic continuity ought to be maintained for
the audience to realize it is watching the same scene; some
principle of change seems to be needed to insure equal or
heightening attention and excitement.
Perhaps a compromise suggestion would be to establish
a basic beat for a rhythm and then to introduce new elements
to the beat as new elements are added to the scene; more
beats, contrapuntal beats, beats that half the time, or
syncopate the beat, depending upon the new mood or entering
g
103Dean, pp, cit., p. 287.
220
character. Thus the director would maintain his continuity
but would have two principles of variance to increase interest.
5, Production Elements That Communicate Tempo and Rhythm
One of the biggest problems of the director is in
specifics. What exactly will carry the rhythm? Of course
the general answer is simple: all of the visual and auditory
elements on the stage taken together. But how? Little ad-
vice is given at this point by any of the direction and
production texts. Movement's form, mass, line and pattern;
dialogue's punctuation and pause; business' pantomime and
prop handling; scenic elements of furniture, exits, and
setting; the sound effects and musical background's direct
beat, such as the drum beat in Emperor Jones, all have to
COOperate to carry the rhythm. Obviously rhythm is not
something superimposed at the last minute; it must be a
part of the basic analysis and built into the blocking even
though it may not be consciously stressed until run-through
rehearsals.
G. Summary Conclusion: Challenge to Make Pantomime
Serve a More Useful Communication Purpose
It seems then, in matching fine movement to gross, there
are many general possibilities for the meaning of pantomime
apart from its handling of properties or its relationship to
lines; pantomime may express formally through its use of
line, mass, shape, tempo and rhythm; it may express
221
psychologically and realistically by verisimilitude, by the
actor's doing what he would do if he were in the character's
situation; it can express with heightened realism by en-
larging the real symptoms of behavior to a recognizable
size; it may express emotion or idea symbolically by the use
of accepted conventional stereotypes of emotion; it may ex-
press metaphorically by using shapes and characteristics of
moves of other animate life or of moving objects in culture
or nature; it may express generally pleasant and unpleasant
emotions by the simulation of muscle tensions and contracted
or expanded states; and, possibly, it may express natural
Specific attitudes toward, or feelings about, various objects
of interest Should it be possible to discover principles of
posture and movement that normally accompany these attitudes
and feelings in life situations.
This last problem will be an important subject of
discussion for the chapter on the contribution of dance to
the meaning of movement. George Buswayer expresses the need
strongly when he writes that the dance's challenge to acting
today is to break through the wall that separates passion
and gesture, emotion and motion, in order to create gesture
from within.104 His challenge is to make the inner feeling
dynamically and truthfully manifest.
So movement and its qualities provide expression of a
wide range of meanings, according to our texts, that in—
clude the most general up to the most specific possible
L
1014Gassner, pp, cit., p. 478.
222
until the direct designation by verbal symbols pins the
meaning to a particular.
CHAPTER V
AUDIENCE RECEPTION OF MOVEMENT EXPRESSION
A. Introduction: Problems and Area of Interest
To complete the full process of the meaning of movement
it is necessary to take at least a brief look at the audience
as the recipient of the meaning, according to the authors of
directing texts studied. A director, to be successful, must
consider not only the meaning he feels he is expressing but
the meaning that the audience is actually receiving. To do
this he should know something of the processes of reception;
he needs to know what are the limitations as well as the
possibilities. The nature of the senses and the learning
processes, the differences between a single viewer and a
mass audience, the aesthetic and psychical relationships
that exist between audiences and productions, the audience
predispositions, and the audience's conventional expecta-
tions Should all be a part of his knowledge. However, be-
cause this facet of the meaning of movement is really more
the subject of audience psychology and of communication
theory than of expressed meaning, it will only be touched
on briefly; yet this facet is vital as the end product of
the communication process, and must be included. Un-
fortunately, results of Specific testing in this area are
223
Si
9)
224
still somewhat inconclusive and fragmentary, with Opposite
views being held by authorities in certain fields. There is
still great room for the testing of just what is received by
an audience when something is expressed in movement by an
artist.
There are related fields interconnecting with â€meaning"
of movement for an audience that are difficult to separate
from the central subject under investigation; such subjects
as the values of a play, the teaching potential, the degree
of effect it has upon behavior, or simply the stirring-up
of emotion by direct empathy are all peripheral investi-
gations; however, to some extent they are considered here
as they may influence the actual reception of meaning by an
audience.
B. Communication as the End Product of Dramatic Expression
Much has already been mentioned about how an audience
is supposed to receive impressions and how it is expected to
react. Now this study is concerned with theatre that exists
as a communication media with the end product that consists
in values to the audience. Theatre whose purpose is
primarily therapy or education for the performers is an
inept vehicle for communication. The playwright, director,
designer, producer, and actors are paid in professional
theatre because they combine to bring value to the audience.
If they cease to produce value for an audience, they cease
225
to perform. Training or therapy put aside communication
seems to be the only warranted purpose for expression.
It seems further that art is a designed product, and,
in the case of theatre, is expression designed to communi-
cate itself to a mass audience. Theatre art is successful
to the extent that each designed expression in fact is
communicated to an audience. This study maintains that
mass communication that is supposed to mean anything to
anybody, that is, nothing Specific to the entire audience,
is really a failure to design or is an artist's personal
catharsis. Such a production appears to be the result of
abdication of the artist from his function of communicator;
since so much is known about designing his movement and
production he ought to be able to stimulate the effect he
desires.
Expression that is supposed to be the result of how
the individual expressor feels, regardless of who receives
his feeling, seems at the other extreme from art. The
esoteric production is private, selfish, and unsuited to
the mass media. With a time-Space art, the esoteric
production seems completely futile. Unlike the painting,
the play cannot remain in museums until it is appreciated
by some future audience; esoteric communication in theatre
is really no communication at all, not even potential.
226
C. How Individuals and Mass Audiences Perceive
Perhaps two audience divisions would be helpful in
audience reception study: First, the psychological, or
perceptive, nature of the individual, and second, the
Special nature of peOple who congregate in a theatre to
watch a production.
1. How Movement is Perceived and Interpreted Generally
The authors, represented by Dean, have already pro-
claimed that peOple are more impressed by sight than heari'ngg,,
and more impressed by moving than stationary objects or
people.1 These statements lay the groundwork for the
relative strength of impressions received by audiences from
words, still picture, and movement. In essence the director
knows he has an instrument in movement that can easily over-
balance oreyen obliterate the impression gained by almost
any other means of expression, if Dean is correct. Dean
bases this power on the audience's mental and bodily con-
formity to the impressions received from the stage.2
In other terms, Selden proclaims that man is a
pulsating, singing, dancing, emotional being.3 Dance, music,
and rhythm are inherently stimulating because of man's, what
might be called above, cultural nature and from his
inherently rhythmic nature.4
1 2
Dean, _p, cit., p. 297. Ibid., p. 284.
3Selden,pp. cit., pp. 18,34,41. 4Ibid., p. 48.
227
Of course, there is a step missing in Selden's reasoning.
It is one thing to say man is inherently a rhythmic animal;
another to say he enjoys theatre because it is rhythmic.
Does theater's expression of rhythm, or other elements,
communicate itself to an audience, and if so is it positive
(pleasurable), and if so, how, and to what extent? The
differentiation is important because of the nature of Sel-
den's evidence. He draws upon history, anthrOpology, and
observation to Show, quite completely for most purposes,
that man everywhere, sings, dances, and feels. But this is
in man's function as performer, or participant; man is
exercising his own body and emotions. Does he enjoy the
witnessing of someone else doing the same? The prima facie,
evidence is that he does. Spectators are available in
droves to testify to the fact; however, what attracts them
to one expression and turns them away from another still
needs investigation.
In general, Selden suggests several "hows" and "whats."
He states that a musical expression of emotion stirs the
same emotion in the listeners; in fact, that the same
emotion which impelled a vocalist to sing is felt by his
audience.5 His statement has doubtful validity. That some
emotion is carried over seems plain; that the Singer, or
actor, or other artist, must feel anything at the time of
performance, or that what he feels is what he conveys, is
k
5Ibid., p. 38.
228
very doubtful. It is even more doubtful that an audience
can, does, or cares to, distinguish between an accurate
portrayal of the symbols and symptoms of emotion and the
real emotion. In fact, the real emotion, as has already
been pointed out by both Selden and Dietrich, is usually
too unSpecified and symptomatically small to even reach
the audience clearly.
a) The Nature of Empathy as a Communication Mechanism.--
The point here is to investigate the process of direct
communication of emotions to see what is received from
what expression. This process Selden and others refer to
as empathy, or the empathic motor reSponse, and is general-
ized by Selden into a concept of "feeling into" the
performance.6 This "feeling into" objects, either moving
or stationary, seems to involve a combination of perception
and participation.7 This empathic response produces both
incipient and overt muscular tensions and relaxations in
the observer in some direct relationship to the object
observed; greater (more overt) participation occurs with
8
moving characters than with still objects. In order to
"feel into" an object there seem to be two requirements:
first, that the object is presented to our senses; i.e., as
Dietrich points out, the audience is only affected by what
it can actually perceive;9 and second, as Selden and Dolman
point out, the objects must somehow be a part of the
___
6 8
Ibid., p. 298. 7Ibid., p. 289. Ibid., p. 290.
9Dietrich, pp. cit., p. 8.
229
previous experience of the perceiver.lO It is noted that
there does not seem to be any necessity for the exact
Object to be a part of the perceiver's experience. The
formal qualities of the Object, drawn from a metaphor, or
merely the Similarities of the object to one in the
audience's experience, are sufficient to allow for
participation in that object.
Dolman adds that the motor reSponses to movement
occur in empathy whether or not the perceiver has experience
of the object, but that his responses have no meaning with-
out prior experience either of the object or of the
particular motor reSponses.ll
b) How Empathy May Communicate.--On the surface, at
least, both Selden's and Dolman's views seem to depend to
some extent upon what Dolman describes as the James-Lange
12 In brief, it is that a motor
theory of emotions.
reSponse in a perceiver sets up an emotion in the perceiver
rather than an emotion setting up a motor reSponse. Gassner
proclaims that the James-Lange theory is outmoded, in
connection with certain remarks about it and modern acting.l3
In any event, it seems that perceiving tension-relaxation
relationships, either implied or actual, will set up similar
loSelden, pp, cit., p. 298; Dolman, pp, cit., p. 11.
llDolman, ibid.
12Ibid., p. 103.
l3Gassner, pp, cit., p. 140.
230
patterns in an individual. It is not for this study to
decide whether a felt emotion precedes and causes the
motor reSponse, or whether a motor response precedes and
causes a felt emotion; it is quite conceivable that the
process is to some extent reversible. If it is, then the
results for theatre are quite important. Accurate choice
of rhythms, compositions, and movements could then produce
a tension-relaxation pattern in a spectator that could make
him feel quite closely what the director desired. If the
process only works the one way, that observable connotations
alone, a mental process, result in physical audience
symptoms, then there can be less uniformity in reaction.
The individual backgrounds of the audience come more into
play; however, this needn't impede the process if the
director succeeds in expressing a symptom or symbol that is
generally known to his entire audience.
At any rate, it seems that motor reSponses are set up
in people from observing Objects that imply or express
tensions and relaxations. Such empathy is the psychological
tool for the communication of movement expression.
c) How Specific Empathic Communication May Be.--The
Specificity of communication seems to depend on the
specificity of symptoms and symbols. If there are Specific
symptoms, body tensions, and observable characteristics
for emotions and attitudes then empathic response should
be able to receive them specifically.
231
Some comment has already been made in an earlier
section concerning Dietrich's view about the difficulty of
expressing different emotions in a natural way. Gassner
supports the view in saying that the same bodily responses
are named differently by audiences depending upon the
14
Situation in which they occur. In other words, general
emotional symptoms and physical gesture (in Smith's sense)
are interpreted differently depending upon the context in
which they occur. Gassner, more than Dietrich, tends to
draw the conclusion from this that there are no Specific
body movement symptoms with which to identify Specific
emotions. His purpose is to suggest the elimination of
conventional attitudinizing in acting.15
What Gassner fails to point out is that there may be
a middle ground. Recognition of symptoms in a context may
not be a fair test. He doesn't give any details concerning
the kinds of emotions named. Dietrich's designation of
pleasant and unpleasant emotion, for instance, is more
Specific than mere generalized emotion. Different audience
interpretations may have grouped themselves under these
headings without all naming the same word. Further, there
is a power in words not primarily the concern of this paper.
Should accurate symptoms of anger, for instance, appear
while the situation seems appropriate to fear, and the words
1â€Ibid., p. 140. 15Ibid.
“
232
designate the feeling as fear, the audience is apt to
interpret the emotion as fear. The problem needs more
investigation than has been made by the author's chosen.
Nor do still pictures of facial expressions as tested by
John Tolchl6 suffice for empathy. Without complete body
response, in motion, under controlled circumstances, there
is no fair appraisal possible.
An interesting observation concerning Gassner's view
is that he runs into difficulty in applying his theory to
his method. If the actor is supposed to draw upon his own
experience in order for the details of emotion to ring true,
how can the actor achieve this Specific goal if specific
qualities of emotion are not communicable? After all, the
consensus seems to be that the inner is of no importance if
it does not take on an outer form.
The above discussion serves to compile the directing
authors' views on how movement is perceived and interpreted
generally. It certainly should point up some of the ways
the psychologist may help the director to get more detailed
answers .
l6Charles John Tolch, "Studies in The Measurement and
Analysis of Achievement with Some Visual Symbols of Speech,"
§peech Monographs Vol. XXVII (June 1960), No. 2. Ohio
State University.
233
2. How Movement is Perceived and Interpreted by The
Theatre Audience
What happens to individuals, to their empathy, to their
perceptions, and to their emotions when they voluntarily
become a part of an audience is a special problem. Certain
predispositions and expectancies begin to influence how and
what they receive.
a) Predisppsition to Unanimous Reaction.-—HOpkins says
that the theatre is seeking, and the audience is receptive
to, a unanimous reaction;17 to get this the play and the
~ director must appeal to the unconscious; the emotional re-
action must be secured first. Eventually thought may arise
out of emotion; Selden agrees.18
An intellectual discussion,
HOpkins claims, will only divide an audience up into
individuals without convincing them of the validity of any
presented argument.
Selden adds that an audience comes to a theatre set for
an active reSponse, ready for empathic feeling, ready to
enjoy vicariously more than it ever can in its own several
lives.19 The audience wants to participate, not merely to
perceive. In another place Selden says that the audience
comes with the desire to quicken its sense Of living; it
has to live vicariously because its ambition exceeds its
20
energy. Max Reinhardt suggests that in some sense an
17HOpkins, _p, cit., p. 8.
18Selden, _p. cit., p. 320. 19Ibid., p. 289
20Ibid., p. 135.
234
audience comes to the theatre to be "made one" with the
play or with some character, to become part of the whole, in
a sense to act as part Of a chorus.21
b) Predisposition to Aesthetic or Psychical Distance.--
There is a question, however, about the degree of identifi-
cation the audience may desire. The audience may also come
to the theatre to be "distanced participants" and involved
aesthetically but not practically.
Dolman, in his discussion of aesthetic distance, suggests
that an audience may come with the purpose of being a
spectator at a fictional event.22 From his writings, and
other works on the subject, it seems that an audience is pre-
diSposed to be entertained, to enjoy as a group, but to
agree that what is happening on stage is unreal. Aesthetic
or psychical distance seems to be imposed upon a production
by common audience consent when it enters a theatre. The
implications of this predisposition are far reaching. With
such a prediSposition, the audience can be swayed emotion-
ally, empathically, or vicariously, in a sort of cathartic
or exercise fashion, but the possibilities of the audience's
being influenced, of their relating the emotions or content
to the audience's practical lives, become slight.
The point here is that audience predisposition is apt
to determine what it is they hear, see, feel, and think. If
21MacGowan, pp, pip,, p. 163.
22Dolman, pp, pip,, p. 15.
235
the audience comes to enjoy vicariously, given any support
from the stage it will do so. If it does not come to be
taught it might be difficult, or even impossible, to teach
it. The closer a play may approach affecting the personal
lives of the audience, the more the audience may adjust to
maintain the predisposed psychical or aesthetic distance.
c) Predisposition to Accept Conventions.--It seems that
another predisposition of the audience is to enter into the
conventions of the theatre and of the particular play
presented. This in practice may be the audience pre-
disposition to hunt for, and to find, symbols, metaphors,
and psychological motivation, as well as to "read the
language“ of the compositions in color, form, rhythm, and
other abstract meanings. If the director is at all clear
or consistent, the audience usually matches his efforts with
its predisposition. Just how much it is able to decipher
metaphor and symbol will of course depend upon how well the
director has chosen from the common cultural and natural
background. AS Colby Lewis reports of Jessner, his symbols
ultimately require the intuition of the audience.23
The dangers of metaphors and symbols are of course;
first, that they may be so obvious that they insult the
intelligence of the audience, as apparently Jessner's critics
felt his did, or, second, that they are so remote from the
audience's experience that the audience reads into the symbol
_*
23Lewis, _p, cit., p. 205.
236
a wide variety of meanings, depending on its individual back-
grounds, and perhaps misses the director's intent.
A third danger of symbol in context is that of needless
repetition. The symbol may be redundant by only repeating
what the context already makes clear. The subtle balance
has to be judged by the experience of each director, to make
a movement metaphor add a unique quality to a scene without
its being obvious, esoteric, or redundant.
The audience reception of the meaning of movement, then,
seems to derive from these three sources: a basic empathic
response to the Simulation of psychological behavior, an
apprehension of a metaphorical relationship between the
movement and something else in the audience's experience, and
an apprehension of certain accepted conventions and symbols
whose meanings derive from the audience's culture in
general and from the theatre in particular.
D. Conclusion: A Challenge to Take Advantage of Audience
PrediSpositionS and to Expand the Meanings of Movement
If a director seeks to change audience behavior through
theatre movement he may encounter strong opposing pre-
dispositions; however, if he wishes to please his audience
then the predispositions all seem to be in his favor.
Further, the audience's large capacity and strong desire for
enjoyment, feeling, and understanding seem capable of further
expansion. It remains for the director to use the resources
at his diSposal and to uncover additional sources to enrich
237
his movement meaning so he may try to satisfy the audience's
expectations and capacities.
The next step this study will take to expand the
director's repetoire of movement meanings will move beyond
the directing authorities and into related media. Aided by
psychology, the disciplines of pantomime, dance, and motion
picture can all enhance the director's mimetic principles,
theatrical conventions, and cultural metaphors. And as
long as he takes advantage of, rather than opposing, his
audience's predispositions he can eXpect assistance from it
in many ways to make his task easier.
PART II
NORMS OF MOVEMENT MEANING EXPANDED
BY COMPARISON WITH RELATED SOURCES
CHAPTER VI
SCREEN PRINCIPLES AND TECHNIQUES ADAPTED
TO STAGE MOVEMENT AND PICTURE
A. Introduction: Relating Theatre Movement to Screen Arts.
In relating stage movement to screen movement, it is
useful to group both motion picture film and television
under the single category "screen", eSpecially when what
is being discussed is in common to both. When referring
to what is unique in each media the terms "film" and'live
television" will be used. Since television can use almost
anything that can be placed on film, and live television
can avail itself of camera movement, subject movement, and
the apparent movement of editing, the one designation that
seems most appropriate for the purposes of this chapter is
screen, with a sub-category of live television only necessary
in order to consider Special relationships between the
audience and the live performance. It is true that the size
and reactions of audiences may differ between the film and
television media, but presumably the screen products differ
only to the extent that television can use improvement in
clarity and size of picture.
1. Interdependency of Stage and Screen
The screen certainly follows the stage production in
historical time, and presumably to some extent uses
239
240
techniques derived from the stage.
Theorists have two general tendencies in relating
theatre to the screen. One is to point out the late comer's
dependency on its predecessor while the second is to defend
the later medium on the grounds of its unique characteristics.
Undoubtedly film and television owe a great deal in both
content and technique to theatre. And certainly all the
arts are based on certain common abstract compositional
principles, but the special techniques of the stage seem
particularly adaptable to the screen. On the other hand,
screen production methods, ways in which the audience
views the screen, and the versatility of the camera have
resulted in unique characteristics of the screen portrayal
that are not derived from the stage, and perhaps are
peculiarly adaptable to the stage.
gpp Purpose of AdaptingpScreen Movement to the Stpge
The purpose of this study is to take some principal
concepts and specific techniques that make the screen
unique and to apply them to the stage, thereby reversing
the usual process. Why should this application be made?
First, it seems fairly obvious that the screen image, in
some form, is reaching a tremendous number of peOple; its
popularity is ever increasing. Second, after nearly half
a century of motion picture images and over a decade of
television images, the screen has developed its own
aesthetic and technique to the point of a mature art. Its
241
popularity and its maturity suggest that perhaps the stage
can now profitably borrow some of the hard learned lessons
of the screen, even as the screen originally borrowed from
the stage. Of course whether or not the borrowing of
techniques is good will depend upon whether or not they
prove useful and fruitful.
3, Kinds of Screen Movement That May Be Adapted
In broad categories, movement on the screen seems to
be of two kinds: Real and apparent. Real movement is that
of the subject or the camera. Apparent movement is that of
either editing or animation. These last two are called
apparent because the movement is only suggested; in editing,
the change of content from one frame to another may suggest
that the subject is moving or at least is changing, or
accumulating, meanings; while in animation, a sequence of
drawn, still pictures, in sequential poses, photographed in
sequence, gives the impression of movement. Together these
categories seem to account for all the real and apparent
screen movement.
Generally the stage only avails itself of one of the
screen's possibilities for movement: the movement of the
subject when that subject is a live actor. The screen can
also portray the movement of inanimate objects with equal
facility, with either real or apparent motion. To be sure,
the stage cannot literally adopt most of the screen
principles without becoming the screen art itself; however,
242
there are several ways in which the imaginative stage
director can adapt screen movement to his purposes. He
can accomplish much on the stage that camera, subject, and
editing movement can on the screen.
4. Methods of Adapting Screen Movement to The Stage
The stage director may adapt screen movement to the
stage either directly or indirectly. The first method is
to use the Specific screen technique directly on the stage;
the second is to use the concept, or principle, of the move-
ment, or to borrow what the screen movement has accomplished,
and to incorporate that into the stage movement. The latter
course uses either analogy, the substitution of analogous
parts, or abstraction, the borrowing of a principle while
clothing that principle in a different concrete application.
Both specific techniques and movement concepts of the
screen may be divided into two categories: those that are
held in common with other arts and those that are unique to
the screen. It is with the latter category that this
chapter is chiefly concerned.
In this chapter attention is called to the special
role of the camera and to what it can produce by way of
shots and montages, but also to what it can produce by way
of audience identification and point of view. Of concern
will be the screen's place in the continua of immediacy and
Spontaneity, and how these qualities may be adapted to the
stage. Also of special interest will be the special filmic
243
relationships between sight and sound as they apply to
stage movement.
In his method, the stage director may take from any
screen element its purpose, its form, its movement
principle, its visual impression, or some aspect of its
internal relationship. He may use so many of these ele-
ments that a screen technique is transferred almost intact
to the stage or he may use the screen form with an entirely
new purpose, or the same or similar screen purpose embodied
in a different stage form.
As each concept or technique is discussed, a method
of abstraction will be employed to help adapt it to the
stage. Then a specific way in which the screen idea can
work for the stage will be suggested. It is not intended
that such a method will be exhaustive but merely suggestive
of the ways in which one moving medium may stimulate ideas
for movement meaning in another moving medium. However,
the specific application of principles, in the form of
examples, will be a vital part of the process.
B. Screen Techniques Adapted to the stage:
Individual Shots and Sequences of Shots
The motion picture is composed of individual shots that
are edited together into sequences. According to this study,
a Shot is any strip of film that is exposed consecutively,
without a splice in it, or any television image that is
viewed by one camera consecutively without a break. A group
244
of such shots, spliced together, or electronically joined
together, constitutes a sequence. Sequences are formed in
order to produce some cumulative effect that cannot be
obtained by any one shot alone. And since such a cumula-
tive effect is largely in the domain of the montage this
study will refer to any such sequence as a montage, even
though some editors restrict the use of montage to certain
types of sequences. The individual shots in a montage may
partake of two kinds of movement, camera and subject, while
the apparent movement of editing is restricted to the
montage. The apparent movement of animation is really the
art of still photography made to look like movement and is
really not concerned with the shot or the montage as
described above.
The possibilities for movement meaning within in-
dividual shots and because of the way individual Shots are
Spliced together are of primary interest to this study.
l, Individual Shots Adapted tothe Stagp
a) Shots Defined, Varieties and Labels.--Individual
shots have Special pecularities in the film apart from
their inclusion in a montage. Many of these peculiarities
can suggest movement possibilities to the stage director.
Among the more common types of shots are those in which
the camera is in motion; Shots which get their names from
their dominant movement characteristic. They are the pan,
the tilt, the dolly in, the dolly out, the elevator, and
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the zoom. Other Shots are those in which the actor is in
motion, where he may move toward, away from, or across the
camera. Other shots are identified by the composition of
the material in the shot such as a two Shot, a shot of two
actors. Some shots deal with the amount of material shown
in the frame because of camera distance to the subject.
These are the long shot, medium shot, close up, and various
variations of these. Of course, any particular shot may
involve elements from each classification, such as a panned
long shot of two walking characters that dollys in to a
close-up.
Other shots are identified by the speed or point of
View of the camera. More frames exposed per second with a
normal projection Speed results in slow motion. Fewer
frames exposed per second results in Speeded up action on
the screen. Shot from a low angle or point of view, an
Object seems to loom in height because of foreshortening
in perspective. Shot from above, an object seems to lose
strength or significance.
Of course there are numerous other variations possible
for the Single shot, including, for example, the effects
of different lenses; however, the stage parallels to be
drawn are of greater importance to this study than an in-
clusive list of shots.
b) Function of the Shots.--Perhaps the greatest
aesthetic importance of the screen is its ability to control
the audience's attention and its manipulation of time and
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Space. Each Shot mentioned involves some way in which the
director composes in a frame exactly what he wishes his
audience to see, in the order in which he wishes it seen,
and in the space relationships he chooses. This ability to
manipulate time and Space is of course augmented by the
montage, but even the single Shot has much potential. If
a stage director could in any way approximate this mani-
pulation of time and Space so that he could more closely
determine what an audience will look at and what he will
feel about what he sees at any particular moment, his
control of his art medium and his audience would certainly
be increased. How then can these Shots suggest stage move-
ment to the director who is interested in similar control
of time, space and audience? A few samples are in order.
c) Sample of Shots Adapted to Stage Use.--This study
will use three basic examples of the adaptation of screen
shots to the stage. The pan, involving the moving camera;
the long, medium, and close-up shots, involving distance
from the camera; and the slow and fast motion shots, in-
volving the speed of the camera.
l-Moving Camera: The Pan Shot. The pan, or panorama, shot
usually consists of a slow sweeping view that moves in the
plane of the horizontal. Of course the Speed can be increased
all the way to a swish, or blur pan that renders all but
the beginning and end of the shot unrecognizable. One of
the purposes of the slow pan is to reveal a wide subject
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gradually, much as a man might sweep the horizon with his
eyes. Another purpose is to provide a connection and
transition between two objects that are at either end of
the shot. The point is that the screen audience is com-
pelled to see the horizontally arranged objects in the pan
in the order the director presents them, culminating with
a subject in focus at the end of the pan.
Applied to the stage, the pan may help to compel a
serial order of audience perception. In the theatre the
audience may look around the stage in various patterns and
sequences that may not develop the director's or play-
wright's idea nearly so well as some one way of looking,
such as in the gradual revelation of the pan. In adapting
the pan, by analogy, the director's ingenuity in selecting
and switching analogous parts often can result in ingenious
new ways of looking at his subject matter and controlling
his audiences.
One set of analogous parts in the pan shot is as
follows: let the camera take the position of the audience's
eyes; let the arbitrary cutting off of material by the
frame be the control of the director; let the object at the
beginning of the pan be an actor in focus at stage right
and an actor at the end of the pan be the object in focus
on stage left. Between these two actors there is a group
of peOple; the director wants to emphasize each person in
the group briefly and in sequence. All the parts of the
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analogy match with no difficulty except the enforced moving
frame. Here is where the director's ingenuity and knowledge
of stage composition help to complete the analogy.
From previous discussions this study has arrived at
certain opinions: on stage a moving object gets more
attention than a still one, the direction in which actors
look tends to be the direction in which an audience looks,
the center of a composition tends to be in focus, and an
isolated or different object tends to be in focus. These
principles of composition substitute for the camera's ability
to enforce a focus. The final problem for the director is
to shift his focus gradually across the stage to conclude
with a stationary focus on stage left.
Of course the purposes of the script come before the
pan, but without a knowledge of the screen technique a film
director might not see the possibilities of interpreting a
particular script purpose into a screen derived movement
pattern, such as the pan. The important new element in these
examples is that they combine the purpose of the pan,
learned from the camera, with the principles of composition,
learned from the still picture, into a moving composition
that shifts the focus gradually as would a pan.
The basic element in the moving focus is the moving
object on which to center attention. An actor may move
from right to left across the stage, or an object may be
passed from actor to actor. The moving element may be more
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Subtle; that is, the conversation may pass from right to
left without any physical object passing. A moving object
may pass across a relatively static grouping, thus emphasizing
its movement and keeping greater focus.
While the Object is moving the additional problem is to
focus on each man it passes in turn. For example, if a
photo is being passed, and each man makes a comment as the
photo reaches him,both the moving Object and the new
speaker will help to move the focus, and to emphasize in
turn each new Speaker. If the eyes of the group travel
with the paper and to the new speaker another element
enforces focus. Should there be a subtle grouping change to
make each new character the apex of a small composition, or
else to put him in slight isolation, then further enforce-
ment of focus takes place. The result is a wave of subtly
changing compositions to carry the focus across the stage
in simulation of a pan and fulfilling the purpose of a
pan.
Of course it is not expected that this particular
example will occur very often on stage; however, the
Opportunities to use the method of adaptation of the moving
shot will depend only upon the director's ability to see
moving parallels in his script.
2-Distance of Camera to Subject: The Long, Medium, and
Close-up shots. The screen director has at his disposal
a movable point of view. He can get at any distance from his
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subject he desires, either by changing lenses or by moving
his camera. The basic varieties of these shots, according
to the distance of camera to subject, are called the long,
the medium, and the close—up shots.
One main advantage to the camera's ability to change
distance is the increased amount of control the director
has concerning how much context will appear around his
subject. The long shot Shows the total context in which a
subject appears, the medium shot a smaller context, and
the close-up can eliminate the context and Show only the
subject. The stage director can do thistp some extent by
eliminating excess scenery, prOperties, or distractions, but
he cannot eliminate the scenery or other actors as completely
from the stage, as can the film director in the close—up,
which allows for intense concentration on a detail. The
stage director is usually confined to one continual long Shot
with his total context always Showing. How may he accomplish
the purpose of the close-up, that of concentration on one
small area at a time? First it seems necessary to try to
find out how the screen close-up functions in relation to
the longer shots and to its stage counterparts.
The screen director has discovered certain basic
qualities of the various size shots at his diSposal. First,
the less meaningful material there is in the shot, the
shorter attention is held; conversely, the more meaningful
material there is in a shot the longer attention is held,
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although the attention is apt to be looser, more diverse, or
scattered, and hence less controlled, than in the close-up.
Of course, the movement of a camera into a close-up is
not to be equated with the diminishing of meaningful material,
although there would appear to be some positive relationship.
The closer the camera, the more context is eliminated, but
the more detailed and the more complex becomes the subject
itself. However, supposedly the subject has gained at least
part of its meaning from its relationship to the larger
context from which it was extracted, and hence tends to have
less meaningful material than a more distant shot, even
though the close-up may give a very intense statement of its
lesser meaning. For this reason, the screen director must
learn not to hold his close-ups too long at the risk of
irritating or boring his audience.
The stage director, not having the advantage of making
more detail apparent, because of the immobility of his live
audience point of view, and not being able wholly to
eliminate a context for his subject, must be even more
careful about how long he attempts to maintain a close
view. On the stage more than a few seconds concentration of
a face, a hand held prop, or a hand gesture will probably
cause the audience eye to wander through the total stage
context uncontrolled by the director.
Learning from the screen close-up, however, the stage
director may gain longer concentration on a portion of a
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composition by having that portion more complex than its
context, more meaningful in the relationship of its details,
and more moving and changing in those internal relationships.
Such additional meaningful details and changing relationships
should maintain audience attention on a small area for
longer than seems possible on a more static and Simple
subject.
3-Combination of the Pan with the Long,Medium,and Close-up
shots. Here is one way in which screen shots may be combined
to provide additional material for stage movement. The
director may use three variants on the stage pan: the panned
long shot, the panned medium shot, and the panned close-up.
In the panned long shot, there is perhaps a group of smaller
groups of peOple standing around the stage in animated dis-
cussion, sipping cocktails; the chief character on stage
right is served a cocktail by a waiter. He thanks the
waiter, drawing some slight new attention to himself. The
waiter weaves across the stage to the left, serving cock-
tails as he goes. Each new character acknowledges the
drink and has something to say, but fundamentally the entire
stage is a moving composition with the audience eye casually
sweeping the stage, carried by the movement of the waiter.
One way of accomplishing a pan in a medium shot would
be for the chief actor, rather than a mere waiter, to move,
carrying the focus with him. Each place he goes a new small
composition forms around him, reacts to him, and dissolves
around him as he moves into a new small composition.
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Relatively static characters, predominance of backs of
actors, and slow motion movement, will de-emphasize the areas
outside the focus while greater animation, more faces and
voices and a downstage isolated composition will tend to
keep the entire little moving composition in focus, unlike
the long shot where the entire stage is relatively active.
The passed document is a good example of how to
achieve a close-up pan. Attention is directed to the hands
and face of the person viewing the passing Object. The
Object itself, for this purpose, would only be seen by the
viewer, other actors would be relatively static, and the
lower parts of actor's bodies would be relatively stationary
so as not to distract from the head and hands. Those
actors in the periphery could even be blocked with their
backs to the audience.
The role of the close-up and long shot and of the
moving camera adapted to the stage is then only a matter of
the ingenuity of the director and his ability to see script
purposes served thereby. He can even add new dimensions to
the same shots. There can be achieved a fast pan that
resembles a wave of activity peaking across the stage, a
blur pan that hurls the audience attention across the stage
by a sudden movement of heads and bodies to set new lines
of focus, or the combination of waves of movement with
sudden concentration on a single moving object at the end
of the pan. A pan might be used that employs other line
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patterns of composition and, for example, zig zags across the
stage ending up in the down center position, or snakes, lead-
ing the eye around the stage in swivels, and ends in the
remote but important up center position. The combinations
for application are unlimited once the purpose of the camera
movement is discovered, the pattern of the total scene in
focus is determined, and the concept of manipulating the
audience's attention in size, shape, and direction is seen.
4-Speed of Camera: Slow and Fast Motion Shot. The camera
shot can be characterized by lengthening or shortening on
screen the time actually taken by a subject to move; such
shots would be slow or fast motion. One purpose of slow
and fast motion that this study will use as an example is
the purpose of making actual time fit closer to psychological
time, i.e., closer to interest Span than to realistic time.
If all the details of a movement are important, or the
lengthening of a movement may create desired suSpense or
languor, the camera extends this movement in time. In real
life, efficient business and excited reactions tend to be too
rapid and too small to be effective on stage; an adaptation
of slow motion, that includes increase in size as well as in
time, may increase stage effectiveness. For example, a man
on stage is about to steal money from a safe. For suSpense,
the safe opening is extended in time. Movements are larger,
slower, and more firmly planted than in real life. Each
movement is defined with a beginning, middle, and end. In
other words, each move of the hand on the safe is phrased,
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without overlapping into another movement, one move at a
time.
If the details are not important, if group rather than
individual reaction is important, or a feeling of excitement
is required then a Speeded up action may be used. Actual
speeding of movement, judicious cutting of pauses (such as
shock reactions and hesitations), simplification of movement,
and overlapping of movement can all result in less time
consumed and in the appearance of greater speed.
One specific fast motion screen effect was achieved on
stage in New Girl in Town. The effect desired was that of
the silent film going through a more modern high Speed
projector resulting in the familiar speeded-up-action
sequence. The effect was created with a rotating mask over
a high powered spotlight that alternately revealed and
concealed the stage action in a flickering light. The
blacking out of bits of action on stage actually approximated
the effect of cutting out, or of substituting black for,
every other frame in a motion picture film. The single
spot beam also simulated the beam from a motion picture
projector. Since the stage action was a rapid dance sequence
the effect very closely resembled the desired filmic shortcom-
ing and hence made direct use of a screen device.
The further use of screen shots for stage purposes
is limited only by the director's analogical imagination
and script insight.
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2. Sequences of Shots Adapted to the Stage
a) Montage as it is Used on Screen.--The screen's
manipulation of time and space concerns the montage even
more than the single shot. The screen not only manipulates
attention, time, and space by the Shots presented but also
by order in which they are presented and the way in which
they are joined.
l-The Three Types Of Screen Montage. The order of Shot
sequences fits into three categories defined by this study
as three types of montage. They will be called here the
continuous, the simultaneous, and the cumulative. There
are many more designations possible but these three are
selected as representative.
The continuous montage is a sequence whereby each Shot
matches with its predecessor and its successor to form the
impression of a single continuous action. One of the chief
exponents of this type is the succession from long shot to
medium shot to close-up where each succeeding shot contains
part of the content of the previous shot and each follows in
time from the previous shot. Another common example is
where the subject moves out of the frame at the end of one
shot and moves into frame in the beginning of the next.
The simultaneous montage is a sequence whereby different
actions are occurring at the same time but pictured alternate-
ly. A typical example Of this type is the chase wherein the
shots of the chaser alternate with Shots of the chased. The
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simultaneous montage need not, however, involve actions
wherein both parties are aware of each other merely wherein
it is obvious that both actions are happening at the same
time.
The third or cumulative type perhaps overlaps somewhat
with the second and comes in many varieties. One variety
is the dialectical: the first shot in a sequence states a
thesis, the second an antithesis, and the third shot is
either omitted, leaving the audience to draw a synthesis, or
the third shot is included to synthesize the first two. The
simultaneous montage overlaps the dialectical because in both
types the audience draws a conclusion from the juxtaposed
shots. A man running and looking back out with a man
running and looking ahead, determine the conclusion, or
synthesis, that the former is being chased by the latter.
Another version of the cumulative montage and the most
commonly called "montage" is one in which a whole series of
pictures add up to a single concept, such as "war is hell."
An explosiOn, an infantry charge, a cannon shot, a falling
soldier, a dead man, a tank, a barbed wire entanglement,
and so on, combined with apprOpriate sounds, have a cumula-
tive effect. They not only show a total context, usually
drawing attention to more universal characteristics of the
individual situation of the film, they also Show a point of
view toward both the context and the smaller situation.
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2-Method of Joining Shots in a Montage. The ways in which
the shots in a montage are connected also come in for some
consideration. The cut, wipe, dissolve, and fade are the
usual methods. In the out there is an immediate jump to the
new picture; in the wipe an edge shape crosses the screen
wiping out the old picture and wiping in the new. In the
dissolve, one image becomes weaker and fades out while
another fades in to replace it. In the fade out, usually
the picture dissolves to black; in the fade in the black is
replaced by another picture dissolving in.
b) Purpose of Screen Montage Adapted to the Stage.--
Certain Special effects, purposes, and prOperties of the
montages, and the methods of connecting the Shots in the
montage, hold Special interest for this study. The larger
principle involved is the ability of the film to juxtapose
ideas in order to draw attention to special relationships
they have to each other. Certain pictures of actions or of
subject matter not only express certain ideas and feelings a-
bout those ideas by their form and content, but they can be
compared or contrasted in idea, form, and content immediately
with other pictures through the immediate replacement of one
picture with another on the screen. One example is chosen
from each type of montage and each type of joining to see how
it is possible to use these screen principles on the stage.
1- Shot Joinings Applied to the Stage: Fade, Dissolve, Wipe,
Out. The joinings are simplest and hence taken first. The
fade out and the act curtain or the black out are approximately
259
equivalent in meaning and effect. They all cut off the
action either gradually or quickly and do not replace the
action with another action until the first is completely
eliminated. They all have the effect of suggesting a passage
of time and of ending a large playing unit such as an act, a
scene, or a series of sequences.
In both stage and screen, once the fade out or curtain,
has occurred the symbol for a change is complete. Actual
time need not pass for the audience to accept the idea of
passage.
The one accomplishment the screen blackout has that
surpasses the stage blackout, or curtain, usually is its
ability to fade in again immediately with an entirely new
location. The pace of stage movement can be immeasurably
increased with the attempt to emulate the films easy and Speedy
transition. At present the theatre already employs re-
volving and wagon stages, or moving wings and drops, to
change locations with speed. A budget solution to the same
device is the multiple stage where one area blacks out and
another is lit. Other solutions are the unit setting, back-
drop projection, and the abstract setting. Each in its own
way can change location with almost as much rapidity as the
film fade out and can symbolize the same time and space change.
The theatre, then, it seems already has sufficient equivalent
for the fade out.
The dissolve most commonly reflects a passage of time
260
that is somewhat less than that of the fade. The passage
may also involve a change of location and a change of mood.
In stage terms the dissolve would be appropriate for the
connecting of two French scenes, a paragraph change. However,
the dissolve has special uses that make it more interesting
to adapt to the stage. Because of its nature, the dissolve
passes through a phase wherein two pictures are temporarily
superimposed. The superimposition allows for a comparison
or a contrast between the contents or the Shapes or the
movement of the two shots whether or not the director wants
that comparison. If the comparison is used the transition
is usually called a matched dissolve.
The matched dissolve says, in effect, this Shape is
like that shape. By analogy the audience draws an inference.
If this shape is like that shape, then this subject is like
that subject, this activity is like that activity, this man
is like that man, or this motive is like that motive. In
short, the superficial resemblance becomes symbolic Of a
deeper resemblance. The problem becomes one of the director's
ingenuity on stage to juxtapose superficial resemblances
close enough to each other for the audience to get the
suggestion that deeper relationships also exist. There
are several ways this may be accomplished.
The first approach to adapting the associational
purposes of the dissolve to the stage is the literal, the
attempt to juxtapose images on stage in both time and space.
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For this method a scrimm curtain can be employed such that
a person actually does fade out while another replaces him
in front of the curtain at the same location. Unless
carefully used, however, the scrimm attracts more attention
to the trick than to the comparison. A dissolve in Space
but not in time, that might be called a matched fade out-
fade in, is possible with less distraction. A fade out
occurs and during the darkness another character replaces
the first.
Such a dissolve replacement can have several kinds
of meanings. If first the father is in his favorite chair,
reading the neWSpaper, and then the son, the mother, a tramp,
or the butler is in the chair there is the obvious suggestion
that a new person has replaced the father in his role of
authority and prestige--either comically or seriously. If
the new figure is engaged in the same typical activity
as the old figure, the suggestion is that the new person
has the same personality and character traits as the old.
Conversely, a matched fade where there is a contrasting
element says strongly that there is one way, at least, in
which these two characters are quite different. There
have been some changes made. Usurping has taken place
but with a difference.
A similar matched purpose can be achieved with a slight
change in both time and space. If there is a Split stage,
a multiple setting, such as in the two rooms in Epice of the
262
Turtle by John Van Druten or the two rooms in Summer and
Sppkp_by Tennessee Williams, there is ample Opportunity for
matched moves and positions to illustrate relationships.
On one side of the stage a scene may fade out with a
character walking in a dignified way down a flight of stairs.
The scene fades in on the other side with someone also on a
pair of stairs. The comment is up to the director. If the
new character is a child dressed in adult clothes, a satirical
comment is made on the first character. For example, the
second character may be doing one of the following: running
down stairs, in dignified manner going up the stairs, or
wearing clothing that is different from the first character.
The principle is this: the superficial activity is the same.
Both characters are pictured in sequence moving on a pair of
stairs; both characters are to be compared to each other.
In the comparison, if the differences stand out a contrast
is being made. This difference is what distinguishes these
two alike characters. If in the comparison, the difference
is of a certain variety, the audience may conclude there is
no difference. In effect, if the difference is one of age,
then the audience may decide the difference is really a
symbol for the deeper truth about the first character. The
child walking in adult clothes in a dignified way may suggest
that the first adult character is really child-like in his
attempt to be dignified. The possibilities of matching
shapes and moves, of creating parallel situations to suggest
parallel meanings, is only limited by the director's ability
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to see analogous meanings in juxtaposed scenes and characters.
The wipe creates an impression of two pictures on the
screen with the first being progressively covered by the second.
Literally the effect can be Obtained on stage with a scene
shift, a wagon or flat drop and wing set moving in to replace
the old set. In human terms an actor, or group of actors,
can move across stage to replace a group already there.
The effect is very useful if the script idea concerns the
Old giving way for the new or one group, or idea, replacing
another.
A second useful suggestion for the stage is to use the
wipe's passing impression of two distinct and separate
pictures on the screen at the same time. Again the Split
stage, as in Summer and Smoke or other plays, will serve as
a visual example of the method. The Split screen showing
two locations allows for two actions to be occurring
simultaneously, or alternately, letting the audience observe
relationships in two ways. First, the audience can compare
the two actions for Similarities and differences, movement
by movement. Matched dialogue or movement makes possible
the same contrast or comparison as in the dissolve. Second,
the relationships can be contained in two entire, progressive,
building sequences. The director merely needs to be con-
cerned with keeping focus on one scene at a time while keep-
ing up the impression of simultaneous scenes.
The purpose of the screen out is accomplished on stage
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by the eye of the audience as it shifts attention. The
screen cut is the direct and immediate following of one
Shot by another; the effect is that of a jump and usually
suggests there has been no passage in time and that there
is a very strong relationship between the subject matters
of the two shots.
The stage director learns from the film director that
the cut must be motivated; that is, the audience must want
to see the new picture because of the movement, content,
and implications of the old picture. A person on the screen
points with horror; the film cuts to the cause of the horror.
On stage a director often loses sight of his obligation to
point, and the audience eye does not jump to the new picture.
The stage director needs to motivate his alternation of
focus from one Speaker to the next, in part by motivating
the Shifting eye movement.
The fact of pointing changes the emphasis to the new
character. The way the pointing takes place will lead the
audience to establish a point of view about the conversation
and the participants.
On stage, however, the transition needs something
further than the point. It will be useful to use the
metaphor of a game of catch. Not only must the first
character throw the ball, but the second must catch it
before throwing it back. In effect, two new components
of transition are added through this simple analogy: a
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connecting link and a reception process. If some moving
object, person, line, or compositional element can lead
the audience eye to the new speaker, the eye movement is
more certain and more strong. If the receiver moves, re-
acts, and then speaks, it is assured that the eye is
attracted to him in order to witness his contribution.
For a more complete way in which such an inter-
change may occur principles of the montage need to be
employed.
2-Shot Sequences Applied to the Stage: Continuity,
Simultaneous, Cumulative Montages. It is the contention of
this study that any editing of shots into a sequence is for
the purpose of giving the effect of a spatial or ideational
relationship between subjects, a relationship that cannot
be as immediately conveyed by any one point of view or
continuous view. Each edited sequence creates some sort
of addition of ideas, or subjects, that results in
relational statements more Significant than any single
shot would make. Each sequence provides a cumulative
effect of some sort. For these reasons this study uses
one term to cover all shot sequences, and that term is
the montage. It is understood that many screen authors
reserve this term, however, for the cumulative, the sequence
of shots wherein there is no recognizable temporal or
Spatial relationship between shots, often not even a
subject relationship, but merely some common theme that
266
ties each of the subjects together. To this study such
a montage is only the most abstract of the category, the
extreme in a continuum of shot sequences.
For convenience this study seeks to use classification
terms that are in common usage in the screen industry; how-
ever, the definitions are not identical to the industry.
The montage types seem to group most easily into three
basic, but not mutually exclusive, categories according to
purpose and proximity to reality. They are the continuity,
the simultaneous, and the cumulative montages.
The continuity montage, like mimetic movement, comes
the closest to simulating a real life sequence, and so is
not always thought of as an effect dependent upon editing;
but like stage mimetic movement the continuity montage needs
careful distortion and manipulation of the real to create
the impression of the real.
The purpose of the continuity montage is to create the
impression of a continuous sequence in time without any
lapses or jumps. The two basic forms of it to be discussed
here are the continuity of subject alone and the continuity
of both subject and context, each of which offers principles
for the stage director.
The continuity of subject alone is the succession where-
in the subject moves out of frame in the first shot and into
frame in the second shot. The usual purpose is to suggest
a subject continuity between changing contexts. The back-
grounds of the two shots are different such that the montage
267
suggests the subject has left one context and entered a new
context. The passage of time between the shots is suggested
by the degree of disparity between the backgrounds. If
the backgrounds are on the same street it is assumed by the
audience that no great passage of time has taken place. If
the backgrounds are in different countries, a large passage
of time has taken place: but in either case nothing
significant is supposed by the audience to have happened in
between. Hence a psychological continuity is established.
The significant continuous action is seen rather than all
the insignificant details of actual continuity.
To some extent the stage already shares the continuity-
of-subjects montage's ability to compress action by the
elimination of non-essentials in writing, by allowing a
single Object or movement to stand for many, and by letting
time lapse between scenes. But the foreshortening or
lengthening of time that is usually only filmic as accomplished
by this variety of continuity montage is the elimination of
segments of time right out of what seems like continuous
action, time that is not needed, not useful, and hence not
missed. For example, a man walks toward the bottom of a
staircase; the film cuts to his approaching the top of the
stairs. The man's purpose is seen by his approach; the
fulfillment of his purpose is seen by his arriVal at the
tOp. The climb is not essential and is not missed.
268
A close look at the continuity montage of the man on
the stairs will show at least four reasons why the elimin-
ation of a middle phase of action is accepted. First, the
cut, or jump may cause enough of a shock in itself to pro-
vide a slight distraction from the missing time and space;
second, the initial shot in a sequence ends with a location
without the subject, a location from which the subject has
just moved, while the following shot begins with a location
without the character, a location into which the character
moves; hence, there isn't the jarring immediate juxtaposition
of a character in first one then another location; third,
enough action may be taking place to distract from the mis-
matching Of time; and fourth, perhaps the most important,
the audience's desire, or at least willingness, to see only
the significant parts of the action usually results in
welcoming the elimination of an insignificant middle phase.
On stage the climb must be made because the actor
cannot make the physical or temporal jump. How, then, can
the stage benefit from the screen's discovery that fore-
shortening of realistic action may take place, and greater
selectivity be made, by using only the portion of a movement
that is significant? There are several ways. For example,
when an action, for instance a realistic piece of business
such as eating dinner, would take too long on stage, fore-
shortening is appropriate. Carrying the focus away from
the business temporarily, much as in the screen technique
269
of the cut away shot, will distract the audience from the
business and allow them to accept the idea that the bulk of
the business was completed while its eye was elsewhere.
Although the cut away, or reaction Shot, on screen is really
another variation on the simultaneous montage, it is some-
times inserted into the continuity montage to allow, among
other reasons, a continuous action to be foreshortened.
Even within a single shot, however, if the concentration
shifts from movement to words, or from one person to another
on the sofa, enough of a distraction has taken place to
allow making many bits of business more compact, even to
substituting props that are part of beginning bits of
business (e.g., knitting), for some prOps already finished.
This can be especially helpful when a particularly difficult
process is supposed to be started and completed in front of
the audience.
Temporarily eliminating the subject from the screen
frame has its easiest application on stage in temporarily
eliminating the actor from the stage. Much can be assumed
accomplished Off stage in a few seconds when the character
is out of the audience sight. For instance, a twenty minute
action will be presumed complete in but a few minutes.
For a longer passage of time, or assumption of business
completed, the curtain may have to be drawn on stage. The
director may well use, then, the continuity montage of
subject alone to help him maintain continuity through a change
270
of scenes. If, for example, the director wishes to make the
comment that nothing significant has taken place between
scenes, during the change, and further, that the action of
the play, or of a particular character, is continuous from
the preceding scene, he may find elements to repeat from the
end of one scene to the beginning of the next. By direct
adaptation of the montage principle, the director may have
a character move out of a scene at its conclusion and move
into the next scene near its beginning, using types and
directions of movement, clothing, motivation, and mood that
are the same in both scenes. Even if the scene change is
relatively time consuming the impression of continuity can
be quite startling.
A reversal of the above scene-break use of screen
continuity was effectively translated on to the stage in
New Girl in Town. Most audience members are already aware
of the continuity problem raised by having only one projector
to Show a two reel film. A particular action is usually
stOpped somewhere in the middle, then five minutes later the
action takes up right where it left off. The Shock of
realizing that the film characters did not complete the
action during the transition is usually a humorous one.
This principle was used for the act break in the musical
comedy New Girl in Town; George Abbot had all his principals
involved in a chase and a fight around a vigorously kicking
chorus of can can girls. The curtain descended at the height
271
of the action. About fifteen minutes later, the audience
assembled and the curtain went up on the same place in the
action where it had previously fallen. The analogy to a
common film experience, uniquely used, was brilliantly comic
and was applauded heartily. Partially because the audience
is used to the convention that action has progressed when
the camera, or the stage, cuts back to a previous location,
the impression was that the dancing had continued unabated
during the entire intermission. And since it was but one
of several filmic oddities that Abbot employed the filmic
frame of reference was clear to his audience.
The montage that involves continuity of both subject
and context is the succession that starts with a long shot,
proceeds to a medium Shot, and ends with a close-up. The
opposite order, from close-up to long shot, is also common,
though less frequently seen. The method of the sequence
of long shot to close-up is to take an Opening long, or
establishing, shot and then to take additional Shots of
increasingly smaller portions of that Opening shot; the
purpose is to provide a context for action, then to provide
the action which is in turn the context for a detail, and
then to provide the detail. The reason for such a sequence,
of course, is to match the emphasis pattern frequently
implied by a script, but Often the implication is not
obvious. To use the montage requires an interpretation of
the script, aided by a knowledge of the montage. The
272
montage rarely occurs to a director as a solution without
prior knowledge of it.
The long shot to close-up sequence may be applied to
the stage in many forms but one example should suffice. In
the sequence, a cut changes two relationships at once: a
large amount of the context of a subject is eliminated and
the subject itself is greatly enlarged. TO accomplish both
of these relationships on the stage may not be possible
except in quite different terms.
To reconstruct the montage on stage there is first
the equivalent of the long, or establishing shot. The
entire context of the scene is on diSplay. To insure the
audience eye roving casually all over the stage, action
can be going on throughout, as in the manner of the crowd
scene, but milder in import and intensity. Or the scene
can be empty of actors allowing for a casual audience
survey of the scene's static content. Into one of these
establishing situations, one character draws attention to
himself and his activity. He may be looking for something,
and the composition of actors converges into his area to
aid him in the search. Action in other parts of the stage
ceases and a narrowing of attention occurs to include only
a small group. The lost object is found and focus is
desired on the Object found. All movement ceases except for
that of the character who has found the object and of the
object itself. Lines of composition point to the object as
273
it is turned over in the hands of the finder. Audience
perception has been successively narrowed down until it is
concentrated in a close—up. However, the narrowing down
does not yet accomplish the change in scale permitted by the
film close up.
To accomplish the close-up at the conclusion of the
above sequence, every technique of emphasis is needed, and
audience attention cannot be maintained for long. In
addition to lines of composition, also a sudden movement, a
sudden freeze, an enlarged movement, exaggerated concentra-
tion on the part of the character on stage, and subtle
lighting changes can all contribute to the apparent enlarge-
ment of the object in focus. Even a sudden sound from the
Object itself will help the feeling of focus. The book
slammed on the table, the piece of pottery tapped like a
bell, or the sudden expletive from the discoverer may all
help to provide a close up feeling.
The next problem the director faces is how to loosen
the close-up and to keep the loosening under control. The
audience's mind and eye will quickly leave the close up
and start to wander. Such wandering should be anticipated
and controlled as much as possible. Reactions from members
of the group, vocal and physical, the passing of the object
and setting up of new physical relationships of the object
to other objects or characters, will help to provide the
equivalent of a montage of new focal points. When interest
274
in the object is exhausted, the group may be dissolved
into new movement patterns and sounds, thus loosening the
close up to another long shot with general movement and
widespread attention.
A Special application of the continuity montage concerns
creating the impression of continuity through lengthening
rather than foreshortening the screen time. Although fore-
shortening is the more usual need, the converse is some-
times the case.
As has been previously discussed under the subject of
slow motion, simultaneous actions may be presented
successively in order to spread them out for scrutiny. Some-
times in film part of an action may be presented not only
in isolation but twice; actual overlapping shots are
joined without an overlap being apparent. If a great deal of
excitement is in a long shot on the screen and the hero is
moving up some stairs and into a door, some of his action
may escape notice. He may Open the door and start to enter
the house. At this point the director chooses to cut to in-
side the house and to Show the hero entering. He may Show
again the Opening of the door from the inside without the
audience being aware of the overlap.
Applied on stage the overlapping action is perhaps
not literally usable except possibly to end one scene and
to begin another. The most usable application is apt to be
the sequential or lag version of lengthening time where a
275
simultaneous action is broken down into parts and performed
consecutively. Here are two possible stage examples. In
real life the Opening of a window shade is simultaneous
with the light streaming in. On stage if the director
wishes to draw attention to both the act and the result the
hero raises the window shade and then the light streams in;
or some light comes in as he opens the shade but then the
whole room gradually becomes lighter. Since attention is
first upon the action of the Opening of the shade the
audience can accept a slight lag in the results of the
Opening.
In another example, the hero leaves the house amidst
general crowd hubbub--the slamming door freezes the crowd.
Someone runs to the window and the hero passes. In real
life the hero would have been by the window much sooner but
distractions allow either the screen or stage director to
delay the hero's passing somewhat until the second character
can rush to the window, until, that is, the psychologically
ideal time. Hence by lengthening real time through appli-
cation of a continuity montage principle, apparent continuity
is produced.
The simultaneous montage, the second basic type, tends
to suggest the existence of two actions occuring at the same
time; it does so by cutting back and forth between the two
actions. The alternate presentation of the two is usually
necessary because the actions, even though occurring at the
276
same time are too remote in space to be encompassed in the
same frame at the same time. Sometimes the two actions are
purposely separated in space in order to take advantage of
the particular qualities of the simultaneous montage.
The prime use of the simultaneous montage is to share
focus alternately instead of simultaneously while creating
the impression that two actions are occurring simultaneously
and are related. In the screen version only one character,
subject, or action appears at a time, though it appears that
the actions continue even when they are off screen; hence
individual focus is assured as much as is humanly possible
with simultaneous action. On stage both actions actually
appear simultaneously, and so focus must be made to alter-
nate primarily by compositional structure. Of course in
all cases the director must realize that the audience's eye
is free to wander at will over his composition; he can never
hOpe to control focus absolutely; however, the techniques
suggested are hoped to show what has been derived from
screen directors to increase the stage director's control
of attention, and to narrow the range of uncontrolled
attention.
There are two general types of simultaneous montage.
The first is where the subjects are too remote to be aware
of each other's actions at the moment, and the second is
where the subjects are shown to be aware of each other.
277
In the first version, the relationships between the
two subjects are not of action and reaction, but of matched
purposes, actions, or themes whose matching B for the purpose
of showing a comparison or contrast, or to suggest a future
coming together of the two remote actions. Most of the
suggestions this study would like to make concerning this
variety of montage have already been made in connection with
the previous discussion of the matched dissolve. The split
stage technique would seem to be the most apt adaptation,
wherein two remote locations are depicted simultaneously
with alternating focus maintained by lighting. It remains
to note that in the remote simultaneous montage the char-
acters are unaware of the parallel situations. Each is only
a participant in his own scene. It is the director, in
conjunction with the playwright, who alternates parallel
movement and words to suggest that one scene, character, or
object symbolizes another; one contrasting element explains
a fundamental difference between the scenes or else is
symbolic of an underlying similarity.
The second variety of the simultaneous montage borders
on the purpose of the continuity montage in that it involves
alternate attention on two subjects who are reacting to each
other. For example, two characters in the same room are in
conversation with each other, but are too spread out to be
seen in one camera shot, or, on stage, to be seen in one
eye fixation; they may receive the alternating cutting
278
technique, or on stage the alternating eye fixation. TO be
sure, on the screen a fast pan would serve a similar purpose,
but it is usually the case that the context between the
characters is not important enough to get that much attention.
Two basic images for the second variety of simultaneous
montage might be the chase and the game of catch. The chase
suggests a situation where there is continuous independent )
action by both participants in the montage, though the
director actually saves his significant action to be carried \
out by a character when he is in focus and usually the
director motivates the cut by some pointing device that
makes the audience want to see the second character.
The game of catch suggests a situation where there may
be continuous simultaneous action but where the audience may
feel that a particular action must be completed in order to
receive a reaction, and in turn that reaction must be
completed in order for it to receive a counter action. In
other words, the significant action always seems to the
audience to be in focus in a cause and effect continuity
sequence. In the game of catch image, if there is really
some counter part for the ball that carries audience
attention between characters in a series of alternating
cuts, and the subject of the scene is the ball, then the
sequence is a continuity montage. If there is no actual
object passing between two characters, or the object is
not the subject of the scene, then the montage is of the
279
simultaneous, alternating focus, variety.
One example of this type of Simultaneous montage in
action involves a safe cracker and the safe owner. Focus
can be alternated between the two characters as follows:
In the scene a noise occurs; a metal case bangs against the
safe door as the case is extracted. In real life the owner
would turn around immediately, discover the theft, react,
and the thief would fight or run. The whole procedure would
be lost in its simultaneous presentation.
The director has decided the process is important and
is not to be covered by divided focus. Therefore, when the
case hits the safe the thief freezes, then he Slowly looks
around at the owner. At that point the focus switches to
the owner. Now the audience is expecting a reaction and is
ready for it. The audience sees the owner stOp talking and
Slowly turn around, puzzled, looking at the thief. Since
the focus now switches to the thief, the owner freezes while
the thief startles, grabs the box, slams the safe door, and
looks back at the owner before he starts to flee. The
owner recovers from his Shock and starts shouting and
chasing; the thief runs.
In the above example, a serial reaction is employed
along with a slowing down of the individual component
actions. Two purposes of the screen montage are thereby
accomplished on stage. First, the alternating focus is
controlled by movement and pointing, and second, the intense
280
interest in the significance of that movement keeps the
audience from noticing that there is something unrealistic
about the pace or the serial presentation.
An example of the serial presentation of simultaneous
reactions already exists in the Kabuki theatre. Using the
convention, all characters but one freeze on stage. The
one goes through a stylized version of his complete reaction
to an event, then he freezes. This process is carried out
until each chief character has displayed his unique reaction
to the event. It is Similar to the Simultaneous montage
in that there is a controlled alternating focus and that the
same portion of time is shown over and over again but from
a different point of view, with a different content, and in
a different location.
Another, more realistic, method of alternating focus
during simultaneous action on stage is by a wave technique.
Larger, more rapid movement is carried by the speaker in
focus; his movement subsides, becomes slower and smaller, as
the second speaker takes over. The completion of a wave's
peak of focus may be followed by a gesture, a look, a body
facing, or an inflexion that tosses the scene back to a
second character. Carrying the montage analogy still
further, the screen director can totally obliterate one
character while a second is in focus. The stage director
may accomplish this purpose imperfectly perhaps by placing
his in-focus character in strong body positions and stage
281
areas while the out-of-focus character is in weak body
positions and stage areas. In the extreme, the non-speaking
character may work to an up stage position with his back to
the audience while the Speaker is downstage facing the
audience. If the style of the play allows, lights may dim
out on the character not in focus, or the in-focus character
may reappear from doorways or from behind scenery. If
realism is necessary, then a subtle combination of all of
these methods of changing focus may be used to isolate the
character in focus as much as the style will allow. When
the Speaking character must be the most in isolation, the
second character can be temporarily off stage. When the
speaking character needs only to be in dominance the least
isolating relationship can be used, almost approximating a
camera two shot.
Of course the analogical possibilities of the Simultaneous
montage are not exhausted here; but the images of the chase
and the game of catch combined with examples of the Split
stage, the serial reaction of the Kabuki theatre and its
more realistic counterpart in a wave pattern of reaction
should start the director's analogical imagination working.
The third basic sequence of Shots is the cumulative
montage, the least realistic and the most complex sequence
to create either on screen or on stage. It is made up of a
juxtaposition of shots, obviously not Of continuous action,
Often of subjects unrelated in time or space, subjects
282
largely related in theme. Of the two basic varieties, the
dialectical tends to create a cumulative effect of action
and reaction while the single concept variety tends to
create the cumulative effect of a particular mood, a large
event, an unusual comment, or an over meaning that is
greater than the sum of the shots and is not contained in
any single shot. .
The dialectical variety is basically a cause and effect
montage of two shots, or of two divisions of shots, juxta-
posed in such a way that the audience is expected to draw a
conclusion. A simple example is a shot of an animal with
bloody teeth followed by one of a man with a wound. The
conclusion expected, of course, is that the animal bit the
man. A larger framework for the same kind of relationship
would be society as a whole. Shots of the rich getting
richer and the poor getting poorer could tend to suggest
several conclusions depending upon the editing of the shots
and the exact nature of their content. The conclusion might
concern revolution, extinction of the poor, the necessity
of unions, or the richly deserved stations in life. And, of
course, the less realistic, the less Spelled out, the more
the conclusion will depend upon production context and
audience experience.
The social application of the dialectical variety
obviously overlaps into the single concept version of the
cumulative montage, which is the least realistic of the two.
283
Usually it doesn't even suggest a time, space, or causal
relationship between any two juxtaposed shots, rather it
suggests that each shot has in common with its companion
shots the substantiation of a common theme, mood, or
concept. Each shot suggests a different aSpect of the
common theme until the audience is expected to draw a
conclusion, much as in the inductive method of collecting
data, that the single concept has been established. De-
pending upon the director's decision, such a montage may
or may not actually depict the conclusion. If it does then
the audience should be ready to say with the director that
they too have come to that conclusion. In effect, then,
a statement of a conclusion, a summation of the shots, may
be redundant if the montage is well designed.
The applications this study has employed and will
suggest for the cumulative montage will be less analogical
than for the other montages and more direct. The most
literal application would be the use of an actual film
insert on stage. Using a wide angle projection lense, or
a rear screen projection technique, the back cloth of the
stage setting can become a screen. The insert sequence
could use the actors who are in the play or stock Shots
that provide a larger context to the play. Such a method
not only Shows exteriors that cannot be shown on stage but
allows the screen's techniques of enlargement, selective
focus, and compression to have a direct effect upon the
284
play. Such a use also allows for more traumatic dramatic
action to be presented because of the increased psychical
distance of film. Dangerous, exotic, erotic, or horrifying
sequences, Shown with the actual stage actors can have the
impact of the screen without having the consequences of
the audience being as revolted, antagonistic, or fearful
as the same sequence live on stage would make them.
One technique of combining media was employed in New
York in 1964 under the title of Laterna Magika with results
that can be a warning to the stage director. Originating
in Czechoslovakia, the technique employed from three to
thirteen screens and many projectors in a three ring circus
tour de force of live actors and filmic representations of
them. According to several critics the effects were startling
and even amusing, but not really well integrated. 1323;
magazine felt that the live actors just couldn't compete in
volume or size with their screen counterparts;l
while Tpp
Nation, agreeing with Tipp, felt the actors were an actual
intrusion, as if theatre ushers had ascended the stage and
were getting in the way of the filmic action.2 Of course
Laterna Magika was produced not for integration but for
shock, for spectacle, for trickery, and for technical
"Magic". For a comparison, Laterna Magika is to the
Â¥
1nA Trick, Not a Treat," Time, Vol. 84, No. 7 (August
14, 1964), p. 67.
(August 24, 1964), pp. 79480.
285
adaptations this study is suggesting what vaudeville, the
circus, or Hell's a POppin' are to the legitimate theatre.
Unfortunately Laterna Magika utilized the unique
powers of the screen media to the point of overpowering
the stage. The producers chose to overlook the problems
of scale in both volume and size, and completely mixed,
in the same stage plane and at the same time, the oil of
the film image, that is flat but appears three dimensional,
with the water of the live actor, who is three dimensional
but often appears, to the distant live audience, to be flat.
The live tree and the painted tree can fit on stage to-
gether, but not naively, Side by side, without any doctor-
ing or accounting for their differences.
For those stage directors who feel the actual screen
image on stage would be an intrusion, the second most
direct method of adapting the cumulative montage to the
stage could be used: the live staging of the montage.
Such an adaptation can be made in several ways and for a
variety of purposes. A few examples will suffice. First,
the director must determine what kinds of situations or
sequences will lend themselves to stage montage, and second,
how they may be staged to allow for maximum integration
into the script.
Some sequences that can be replaced or augmented by
montage are as follows: the messenger reporting an off~
stage event, a subplot, a large event such as a battle that
286
occurs off stage between scenes, crowd movement, an
emotional climax that occurs at the conclusion Of a scene,
group attitudes in contrast to each other or to the attitudes
of the main character, and various background actions that
may be parallel to, or symbolic of the main action. Of
these, two types of scenes emerge. First is the on stage
depiction Of what is usually large off stage action; second ‘
is the on stage depiction of an underlying or contrasting
mood or emotion. \
An example of how cumulative montage may be employed to
revitalize off stage action is in the example of the Greek
messenger. Perhaps in the original scene the messenger is
describing the fall of an army in battle following which
description the victorious general enters the scene. To
integrate the montage technique into a Greek play the chorus
and general may enact the montage. A symbolic battle, in
small scenes in various parts of the stage, may Show in
montage fashion the onslaught, turning of the tide, and
defeat of the army. Such a sequence can be stylized in
dance choreography. The speech of the messenger may be
foreshortened, edited, deleted, spoken antiphonally with
the action, or whatever seems appropriate to the scene.
Melodic or rhythmic instruments may help to stylize the
action so the audience does not expect realism.
To be sure, musical comedy has already employed
techniques of expression similar to the montage. It remains
287
for the play director to make adaptations that suit his
particular stage form. Borrowing old ideas and giving them
a new form and context is one of the most rewarding methods
of creation. The familiar and the new are combined to give
fresh perSpective on both meaning and matter. The dance
sequence is one such example. Pantomimic scenes in plays
would use a combination of the dance sequence of the
musical and the montage of the film, and, perhaps in more
realistic fashion than the dance, draw attention to the
pictorial aspects of theme and plot.
A typical pantomimic sequence, illustrating the second
major category of filmic cumulative montage, might be an
insertion of a montage in the conclusion of a love scene.
The montage would enact the dimensions of the emotion
instead of the mere proximity of the individuals. To
illustrate, usually in the conclusion of a love scene, when
two people find each other, there is an embrace. The
positions are relatively static but the emotions are strong.
The realistic approach is to fade out on the embrace. The
motion does not reflect the emotion. Often music carries the
emotion of the climax and builds during and beyond the fade,
or curtain, to suggest the growing passion of the embrace.
An alternative, used by musical comedy, is to have a couple
dance or sing together, usually also followed by the static
embrace. The montage approach could result in an action
conclusion and punctuation, combining screen montage with
288
musical comedy. A choreographed sequence between the two
actors, with accompanying music, could pantomime their
relationship in abstract line patterns combined with
stylized realistic pantomime; such a sequence could use
as its metaphor a chase, or the bubbling brook, or a bouncing
ball, or whatever seems appropriate.
The choreographed sequence could, alternatively, in-
volve background action that takes over as a foreground
fade out occurs on the main action. As an example, the
lovers could sink into an embrace on a foreground couch,
either concealed or in silhouette. Behind a scrim,_ or
outside a picture window, movement starts. Happy laughing
peOple, conflict scenes, shouting, chasing, horn blowing,
music playing, all build to a climax. In a fantastic
interpretation, either two dancers portray the two lovers, or
else other characters in the play provide the montage,
while a fantastic lighting separates them from the two
lovers.
Such a montage of underlying emotion could also pro-
vide contrast as much as support to the main action. In
fact, the kinds of elements chosen for the montage will
determine what comment the director wishes to make on the
emotional realistic scene.
Less direct methods of applying cumulative montage
principles abound. Crowd scenes, climax scenes, rapid
dialogue repartee scenes, action sequences, and scenes
289
whose meaning is largely carried by movement all can profit
from montage principles.
The crowd scene is perhaps the easiest to adapt. The
screen battle, or crowd, montage usually starts with an
establishing shot, to give a context to the whole sequence.
Then occurs rapid and rhythmic intercutting of typical
actions, facial expressions, parts of bodies, and objects
that express in sequence rather than Simultaneously the
idea of the battle or of the crowd's purpose. On the stage
the simultaneous presentation is difficult to avoid but the
eye can be directed in staccato and rhythmic fashion to
various places in the action to create the excitement of
the montage sequential crowd depiction.
The staged crowd Scene usually suffers from either
of two extremes: it is too active or it is not active
enough. The too active distracts not only from the main
action but also from itself; it eventually becomes tedious,
giving the audience too much perSpective and not enough
immediacy; it reduces the crowd to mass, undifferentiated
movement with which it is difficult to empathize. Also it
may allow the attention of the audience to wander at will
with little control of focus by the director. Often
weaknesses in staging are spotted more easily if un~
differentiated movement continues. However, if the eye is
led on stage (as it is more forced by the screen montage)
the entire audience, to some extent, can be swayed by the
290
rhythm of the sequence and be led to the same details at
the same time.
One way to adapt the consecutive crbwd Shots of the
cumulative montage to the simultaneous stage scene, while
retaining some of the qualities of the screen, is to plan
consecutive focal points in the action. A quick move
accompanying a shout, or other sound, will draw attention
to itself; a temporary isolation of a character or a unique
body position, or a rapid physical interplay, or a place-
ment in compositional emphasis, or a combination of all
these, will alternate the person in focus in the crowd.
These attracting sounds or larger actions can be timed to
provide a beat, or a rhythm, desired by the director for
the scene. Surrounding the accented movement the rest of
the crowd can keep moving, reacting, acting, or whatever,
but in ways which will keep it deemphasized until some
segment of the total scene needs to be again in focus. Thus
by using stage compositional elements, carefully choreo-
graphed, various individuals are alternately emphasized and
deemphasized at appropriate moments. The simultaneous stage
crowd can thus isolate typical details in rhythmic sequence
as does the screen consecutive montage.
3-Conclusion: Advantages and Limitations of Montage
Adaptation. How the director introduces elements into his
montage adaptation is largely a matter of his analogical
imagination. What can substitute for a close up, for a shot
291
of some object-symbol, or for nature as an actor? Perhaps
nothing will substitute directly, but the purposes of each
may be fulfilled in different ways. For example, the screen
use of fields of waving grass, storm clouds blowing, ocean
waves dashing, and streams bubbling may be difficult to
apply to the stage. Still, they may be applied, possibly
as metaphors to supply qualities of movement for the actor;
or, more closely approximated, as pantomimic dance ac-
companied by music. Certainly a direct stage application of
the screen's ability to present nature as an active partici-
pant may not be practical. However, the other possibilities
of both direct and analogical adaptation of screen montage
to stage purposes seem to be well worth the adaptation
effort.
3p Composition in Motion Within the Screen Frame, Adapted
pp the Stage
Now that some of the screen's abilities to manipulate
time and Space with shots, joinings, and sequences have
been related to the stage, attention is turned to the
peculiarities of the screen picture itself, principally to
its composition in movement.
a) Eppnomy Within The Frame.--From the television
field, Biegeleisen advocates overlap of scenic units com-
bined with simplicity of composition.3 His points are that
8 3J. I. Biegeleisen, Poster Design (New York, 1945),
p0 90
292
the overlapping of compositional elements helps to lead the
eye around the composition, while a minimum Of elements
helps to make a clearer statement of compositional intention,
or meaning.
From Biegeleisen's suggestions the stage director
can learn to maintain an interconnected but uncluttered
stage picture. Nothing on stage should be without purpose.
Further, if something on stage is not actually, physically
used perhaps it should be removed. If something on stage
is a symbol and only used as background, perhaps it can be
made to have a more practical purpose. If something is
seen to carry the same symbolic connotation as something
else, perhaps one of the two things can be eliminated. In
short, from the television screen, the stage director should
learn economy of means. Cluttered ideas, cluttered symbols,
redundancies, and elaborate compositions are apt to confuse
the audience and conceal the purpose of the symbols. Even a
script that requires ornate production can well use a
modified selective realism, that is, one simplified symbol
can stand for the ornate whole, and thus convey the idea
"ornate" graphically and immediately without actually being
ornate.
b) Mpvement Within the Frame.--The moving content of
a screen picture uses ideas from the still picture but
with certain definite modifications and for certain definite
purposes that can, in many cases, be readily adapted to the
293
stage. The more important movement purposes served seem to
be for contrast and impact, for motivation, and for depth.
l-Movement for Contrast and Impact. For greater contrast
and impact screen composition of elements is usually
sequential rather than simultaneous. Eisenstein points out
that alternation of contrasting pictures makes a stronger
contrast than Simultaneous contrast within a single frame;
a background, no matter how it contrasts with foreground
action, is static and is soon unnoticed.“ However, he notes,
if the background is presented in alternation with the fore-
ground, both will have a stronger impact and consequently so
will the contrast. Of course the stage director is less
able than the screen director to move his static background
in and out of the stage picture; however, he can still be
warned by the principle of moving contrasts. He can be
reminded that his scenery, his static furniture arrangements,
his color schemes, even his pictures composed of stationary
actors are quickly assessed by an audience and almost as
quickly become unnoticed. So from the principle of contrast
by alternation the stage director can more readily assess
how actively or inactively involved are his scenic elements
in telling the story of his play.
43ergei Eisenstein, Film Form and The Film Sense,
Edited and Trans. Jay Leyda (New York: Meridian BOOKS,
1957), p. 172.
294
2-Movement for Motivation. Television findings concerning
eye movement seem to have important implications for the
necessity of motivating subject movement. Bettinger, in
the field of television, has learned that the audience eye
tends to lead a movement, as if to see where the movement
is going. If a character is moving, the audience eye tends
to move ahead of him to divine the actor's purpose .5 Not
only does the eye lead but Bettinger points out it tends
to move along contours and lines and to jump from greater
to lesser contrasting points, or intersections. Such a
discovery supports strongly the need for motivated movement
in all its motivational dimensions.
A character needs, in order to take advantage of all
of his potentialities for communication of meanings, at
least a three part motivation for every move. What
Bettinger's study supports is the need for a motivating
destination, for the audience eye seeks a destination out
and should only be disappointed for some very good reason.
His study also supports the careful use of line and contour
for the movement since the eye follows this contour, dis-
cerns it, and interprets it.
The use of internal motivation, the outward appearance
of the character's inner purpose, is supported by every
5Hoyland Bettinger, Television Techniques. Revised by
$01 Cornberg (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1955), p. 170.
295
author who discusses motivation for a cut in television or
in film. Some anticipation, some pointing, some expectancy
is set up within a shot to motivate cutting to a new shot.
Often this motivation to cut is supplied by an actor showing
an interest in something outside the frame. The interest
is satisfied by cutting to the object of his interest. On
stage the audience interest is satisfied by the actor's
eye movement to the object of interest and then the audience
eye leading the actor's movement to the object. The screen
in this, and many other ways, can enrich the stage director's
conception of motivating movement for suspense, audience
satisfaction, clarity, and believability.
3-Movement for Depth. Film can also contribute to the
pictorial staging of movement in the use of three dimension-
ality. Spottiswoode discusses the phenomenon of the screen's
two dimensionality appearing to be three dimensional.6
Part of the effect is, of course, produced because the camera
can record great depth in actual surroundings; the screen
picture can record the contrasts in size of objects and
speed of movements that result from actual perspective.
The screen's own adaptation of the location camera's ability
to catch perspective is the multiplane camera. It allows,
for example, Disney, in his more elaborate cell animation
6Raymond Spottiswoode, Film and Its Techniques
(Berkeley: university of California Press, 1958), p. 40,
296
process, to reproduce the effect of three dimensionality
within a small studio.7 An application of its principle
can be of value to the stage director who also has limited
actual depth. The purpose of the multiplane camera is to
create the impression of depth through varying the Speeds of
motion and the size of objects at different depths in the
picture. It creates a forced movement perspective. It
also uses alternations of dark and light moving depths both
to contrast the depths with each other and to lead the eye
past the dark foreground framing plane into the depth of
the picture. One way to illustrate the effect in real life
is with the view from a moving train. The foreground objects,
telephone poles and the like, seem to go by at a rapid rate;
middle ground objects such as houses and trees, go by slower;
while background objects, such as mountains, go by with al-
most imperceptible Speed. The multiplane camera uses
drawings placed in planes several inches apart and drawn to
resemble the objects in the various foreground to background
planes. As the animation camera takes pictures of the fore-
ground cartoon character the various planes are moved be-
hind him at varying rates to resemble the apparent rates of
Speed of planes at different distances from the plane in
which the cartoon character moves. The result is the
appearance of great depth. Of course the stage director
7Ibid., p. 138.
297
cannot easily move the audience point of view, as in the
illustration of the moving train, except possibly with
revolving and wagon stages; however, he can use some of the
principles of this screen effect.even with a stationary
audience, to return to his stage more of the feeling of
depth that it often lacks.
The stage director can adopt the multiplane idea
directly onto his stage by analogy. The background plane
is his background static scenery. His foreground is his
downstage actors in focus. Here are his two limits: un-
moving background and rapidly moving, enlarged moving,
animatedly moving downstage characters. He now needs to
establish one or two other planes of movement and possibly
a dark downstage frame, in addition to the ever present
proscenium, if he wants to create the impression of greater
depth.
Each plane can have its own appropriate speed and Size
of motion and possibly even size of objects, without the
audience point of view necessarily moving by the stage. In
effect, the stage composition moves by, or in relation to,
the audience.
In a crowd scene, the participants can best be grouped
in depth either on a raked or a stepped stage. To suggest
the reduction in scale, upstage people can be shorter, or
seated. To give the impression of reduced scale without
actual size change, movement can substitute for size.
298
Smaller moves, Slower moves, less distance covering moves,
graded in planes, can to some extent capture the idea of
the multiplane camera and increase depth of stage through
stage movement. The relatively shallow stage picture can
thus recapture some of its three dimensionality through
analogy with the screen.
0) Camera's Point of View Reflected in The Frame.--The
composition of the frame's content and its meaning are
functions in part of the camera's special ability to adOpt
almost any point of view while using a variety of lenses.
This Special ability can provide some instructive analogies
for the stage director.
The camera's versatile point of view is something for
which the stage provides no simple substitute. The camera
can be in a variety of planes and move in a variety of ways
whereas the audience for a stage play must always see the
action of the play from its seat in the auditorium.
Many of the typical camera movements and positions,
such as the pan, the tilt, the close up, and the long shot,
have already been discussed. However, the meanings that are
imparted to the screen because of the camera's point of view
and their implications for the stage, are the more subtle
subjects to be covered here.
l-Point of View of Camera as Point of View of Audience. One
of the normal assumptions that needs to be questioned and
clarified is that the camera's point of view becomes the
299
audience's point of view. To clarify the concept two of the
camera's vieWpoints need to be examined. Subjective and
objective viewpoints are described as those which view the
action from inside the story and those which view it from
without. A typical subjective camera technique is the follow
shot, usually a trucking, or dolly, shot, where the camera
goes right along with the action. Perhaps the camera follows
beside a man walking. An even more subjective technique is
described by Spottiswoode as the result of a hand held
camera. The cameraman walks, runs, or falls while holding
the camera. The effect supposedly places the audience in
8
the position of the moving person. By convention, present
day audiences seem willing to enter into the technique and
pretend they are seeing the action as if they were a part of
it. The problems arise when it is attempted to discover
with whom or what the audience is identifying. Is it with
a character, with some mysterious third person who is going
along within the action, or is it with a complex multiple
person who now sees from one subjective view and now from
another?
The first observation is that the point of view of the
camera seems to vary independent from the audience identity
with one or more of the characters. For example, an over
the heroine's shoulder shot of the hero, as seen by a woman,
8Spottiswoode, _p, cit., p. 31.
300
may make her think of herself as the heroine. But the same
shot probably makes a man think of himself as the hero. A
follow shot of the hero probably puts the audience beside
the hero, from the point of view of the camera, at the same
time the audience identifies with the hero. If the follow
shot then cuts to a hand held moving camera shot probably
the audience point of view is suddenly the same as that of
the hero and as that of the camera. Such a cut may be
disturbing, for example, if a woman was imagining herself
beside the hero and suddenly finds herself inside the hero.
When a camera point of view is over the shoulder of a
monster attacking a hero, the point of view of the camera
would seem to be that of the monster, but it certainly
isn't intended that the audience adOpt that point of view,
or identify with the monster. Instead the audience
empathizes with the hero and in turn fears the looming
foreground figure.
Possibly the audience does not think of itself as the
hero through seeing what the hero sees so much as through
seeing the hero himself; it is only through the latter that
it may empathize with the hero, though it is through the
former that it may feel the same motivation as the hero. In
effect, the audience would seem to adopt a point of view
in film according to where its sympathy lies, and its
sympathy is usually aroused by the emotional content of
the scene, rather than by the point of view of the camera.
30l
2-Point of View of Camera as Ideal Point of View. The
camera, then, seems to provide an ideal audience point of
view rather than any simple objective or subjective audience
vieWpoint. It seems to fulfill its chief role in present-
ing characters in relationship to each other. The camera
presents them in ways that will best express the under-
lying meaning of the script more than it substitutes for
the point of view of the audience. The camera gives the
audience an ideal viewing position, whether it is in the
middle of the action or at some distance from it. The
camera allows the audience to see over a shoulder, up from
the floor, through the window, or wherever it can best see
what is going on. The camera's contribution to point of
view seems to be more subtle than simply the replacing of the
audience point of View, except point of view in the above
very practical and physical way, rather than in an identi-
fication way.
3-Point of View of Camera as Revealer and Concealer. One
of the subtleties of camera point of view consists in what
the camera can reveal and conceal. In the over-the-
Shoulder shot the camera reveals a reaction by one character
while concealing the reaction of another. By Simple
inclusion or exclusion from the frame any subject may be
revealed or concealed with ease. Of course the over-the-
shoulder shot has a special significance in that the
person whose reaction is being concealed is in the frame.
302
By reversing the angles the revealed becomes the concealed
while the concealed immediately becomes the revealed.
On stage the director can use this principle to greater
advantage than he usually does by using more alternation of
face and back by his characters. Many directors seem to
prefer a relatively shared stage position between two
characters even though the script may not always call for
an equal emphasis upon both characters.
Of course a rapid repartee scene on stage is difficult
to transcribe into reverse angle technique, Since it is the
actor who must move back and forth in order to change the
audience point of view, but the ingenious director can
devise an equivalent for Short periods of time. An up-to-
down-stage pacing maneuver would be one such device.
4-Point of View of Camera as Distorter of Reality. Another
subtlety consists in the way the camera's vieWpoint can
distort reality in order to provide a comment about that
reality. For example, in the low angle shot a character
looms large over the camera and is thus expressed to the
audience as looming large over them, as being strong and
portentious. A feeling of looming may be possible on stage
when principles of facing, of elevation, and of audience
identification are combined. A character may be Sitting
with his back to the audience, which will make him weak but
in a way that may arouse audience curiosity; another
character may stand facing both the weak character and the
303
audience, making him strong by contrast, by facing, and
by elevation. As the audience watches the action of the
scene described above, with the standing figure looming
over the sitting one, the audience may be objective and
merely recognize the relationships between the two char-
acters. To include the equivalent of the camera point of
view, however, the script and the director should have
established prior to this scene a strong audience identi-
fication with one or the other of the two characters. If
the audience has identified with the character who is
Sitting the audience may imaginatively assume the low angle
camera point Of view, and the standing figure will appear to
loom with greater force. Should the audience identify with
the standing character, the audience is more apt to assume
the equivalent of the high camera angle and to feel secure
in the role of the "loomer."
The audience may feel suspense to add to the feeling
of looming. Identified with the standing figure, the
audience may wonder what he sees; identified with the
sitting character, the audience may wonder what his reaction
will be. The suSpense of not knowing is apt to increase
the sense of looming. Given the same relationships between
characters but the standing man with his back to the audience,
perhaps the suspense and mystery will increase the looming
even more .
304
5-Point of View of Camera as a Function of Lenses. Another
role the camera plays is dependent upon its lenses. The
wide angle lens will serve as a sufficient example for
adaptation to the stage. When viewed through a wide angle
lens, a straight line of peOple, at right angles to the
point of view of the camera, appears to be curved. The two
ends of the line appear to curve back away from the camera.
Therefore, to create the impression of a straight line the
line must actually be curved such that each person is at
the same distance from, and facing, the camera. A person
in the front row of a theatre audience has a comparable
sensation when a man crosses the stage. Although the
audience member knows the character is walking in a straight
line, parallel to the plane of the proscenium, still the
character is first approaching and then retreating from
the audience. The character's face, then side, then back
is seen as he crosses.
This optical illusion of the wide angle lens and of
the close member of the audience may suggest some ideas to
the stage director. First, if the director wishes to
simulate the purposes of the screen follow shot, that is,
to have the audience maintain a constant focus on a crossing
character, then he will wish to maintain a consistent and
constant relationship between the audience and the char-
acter; a curved cross may be the most effective way.
The long curved cross may also be strong because of
audience eye movement. It is generally agreed that the
305
eye jumps from subject to subject over a static scene, or
from phrase to phrase when reading words from a static page.
During the jump there is no focus, and there is only a blur.
The eye does not seem able to move gradually across a field
and remain in focus; however, when the eye is following a
moving object, the eye seems to maintain a stationary focus
on the moving object, and the background is blurred. Hence,
in a camera follow shot, and in a focus maintained on an
actor during a cross, the background can become blurred thus
strengthening the actor. If the actor keeps the same
relationship to the audience as he moves the eye is not
tempted to, and need not, make a jump, and the actor may
maintain a greater strength than in an actually straight
cross. The director may thus minimize the weakening effect
of the long cross and maintain a stronger focus on a moving
character.
6-Point of View of Camera: Conclusions. Conjectures about
how the camera point of view can be adapted to the stage
and audience relationship have infinite possibilities for
formation and testing. Simply by, first, replacing the
camera with the audience in an analogy and then, second,
seeing how the added dimension of audience identification
may influence where the audience thinks of itself as
being, the director may open the door to all kinds of new
movement possibilities. One of the most daring, perhaps,
is to reinstate some version of the mystery play stage in
306
which the audience actually moves about. Thus the modern
director could experiment with giving his audience physically
the "ideal" point of view of the action.
C. Principles of Live Television Considered
for Adaptation to the Stage
1. Introduction: Immediacy and Spontaneity of Live
Television
For this study immediacy is defined as a combination of
proximity and ideal point of view, whereas spontaneity is
defined as the appearance of, or actual, first time un-
rehearsed presentation, hence a presentation whose outcome
is uncertain. It seems that live television may be the
medium that has these qualities together more than any other
medium, and these qualities seem to have certain values
for the stage.
The film and the stage both present what is usually
pre-planned material. The stage play is usually well
rehearsed while the film is, rehearsed or not, permanently
set on a plastic strip in an unchanging performance. Film
brings the audience closer to the action than the stage but
is canned; the stage presents live action, but it is pre-
set. Only live television,though often as pre-planned as
the stage play, can provide an audience both with the
immediacy of close-up and ideal point of view and with the
Spontaneity of reporting an actual event while it is
307
happening. Such qualities distinguish the medium and are
its chief attraction. The quiz show, the football game, and
the interview all picture events whose outcome is uncertain,
yet events which are usually structured for maximum interest,
conflict, and suspense.
The order of Spontaneity and the order of immediacy
among the media seem to be quite different. Perhaps the
order of Spontaneity might be as follows: first the
live event, then the televised event, the radio broadcast
event, the stage presentation and finally the film. The
order of immediacy, on the other hand, seems to be first
the film, just slightly more than live television, then the
stage, then the live event, and least of all the radio
broadcast. It seems that the screen can get an audience
closer and more ideal views than can a live event. Hence,
it would seem that the medium with the greatest combination
of immediacy and Spontaneity would be live television rather
than either the live event or the motion picture film.
Can the stage director in any way avail himself of the
values that television has found in immediacy and Spontaneity?
a) §pontaneity Applied to the Stage.--First, what are
the factors that contribute to the Spontaneity of the tele-
vision show? One is the audience knowledge that the
performance is live and unrehearsed. Second is the structure
that enforces conflict. Third is an unknown conclusion that
is built to by suSpense. Fourth is the fact of people
appearing as themselves, not as actors portraying characters.
308
All of these factors make the live show a real life event
instead of a fictional story. To follow the television lead,
the stage director needs to experiment with making the stage
play a real life event.
Toward that end, the stage is already familiar with
the semi-scripted form of commedia dell'arte; a revision of
some of its techniques exist today in the Broadway per-
formances of a Bea Lillie or a Mike Nicols and Elaine May.
Even certain method actors vary their timing, thoughts,
actions, and even lines from night to night to keep per-
formances fresh. However, there is still a wide gulf between
the improvisational stage show and the spontaneous television
Show.
One of the chief obstacles to Spontaneity in the stage
play is its fictional nature; events are being enacted,not
lived. ‘When an actor, rather than his character, is in
danger, changes the script, or talks to an audience, the frame
of the stage is broken and the illusion with it. The
fictional character disappears and the actor emerges. In
other words, the audience predisposition toward psychical
distance militates against extreme Spontaneity, and immediacy
as well, and of course stage spontaneity is useless unless
it is known to be spontaneous; the audience will believe it
is rehearsed. Perhaps the stage needs a new form in order
to gain the spontaneity of the live television show.
b) Immediapy Applied to the Stage.--Many theatre
experiments in immediacy have been performed, but somehow
309
they remain the exceptional productions; they are the
oddities whose form never seems to become pOpular. It is
this study's surmise that an audience generally dislikes the
forced breaking of psychical or aesthetic distance through
immediacy, as well as through Spontaneity; they do not seem
to like an illusion broken by an actor either addressing them
or being in their midst. If in a particular play, or method
of production, the audience does like the effect of im-
mediacy, they are probably beginning to react to the performer
and not to either the character he is portraying or to the
situation of the play. Either that or the immediacy effect
is accepted as part of an illusion and ceases to be im-
mediate or Spontaneous. The director, it seems, is rarely
successful in having both audience involvement in an illusion
and the effect of a real life event.
Two reasonably successful experiments in immediacy are
Waiting for Lefty and The Night of January 16th. The latter
aims for both immediacy and spontaneity but usually achieves
status as a curiosity. The play uses a jury made up of
audience members who each night have to bring in a verdict
in a trial. Even with this amount of uncertain outcome and
direct involvement, however, the audience knows the basic
play is not changed and that two endings have been written
to account for either verdict. It is a kind of game where
the audience role is ambiguous. They really don't change
the progress of the play and yet they are asked to pretend
310
they do. They are not quite audience and not quite
performer; however, it seems the experiment deserves
modification and repetition until its principles of im-
mediacy and spontaneity for the stage can be clarified.
In the case of waiting for Lefty the audience is drawn
into the plot through being addressed directly by the
players and by having players in their midst. Players on
stage address the audience as if they were in a union
meeting; players in the audience respond to the stage as
if they really were in the union meeting.
Reactions to the play's immediacy effects have been
quite varied all the way from reports of complete involve-
ment to reports of complete alienation. However, this
study feels that the form of Waiting for Lefpl expects too
much of its audience; it expects them to change roles in
the middle of the production. Sometimes the audience is
watching an intimate scene in a house, something they could
not realistically expect to see and overhear; they are at
such a point a conventional proscenium audience. Suddenly
they are participants; their privacy as onlookers is invaded
and they are expected to react to peOple in a wholly new
way, not as part of an illusion but as part of a meeting in
which they are participants. Yet at the same time the
audience realizes it should not reSpond by Speaking out in
the meeting. In other words, the play forces involvement
and withholds ultimate participation. The split is more
311
than a director should reasonably expect from his audience.
Other forms such as arena theatre, theatre on all four
sides of an audience, or theatre in the audience have also
been tried with mixed success. It would appear to this
study that none of them quite achieve the Spontaneity or
immediacy of live television, primarily because the audience
knows of the production's pre-planned nature and quickly
accepts the new conventions in order to maintain apprOpriate
aesthetic distance. Possibly the only way to achieve an
effect on stage Similar to live television is to have a
carefully structured production whose details throughout
are dependent upon the improvisation of actor and audience,
a production whose ending is deliberately in doubt even to
the performers, performers who are playing themselves in a
battle of dramatic wit. In other words, perhaps the theatre
could gain some of the advantages of live television by a
Special contemporary version of Commedia dell'Arte.
D. Relationship Between Sight and Sound on
the Screen: Adapted to the Stage
Highly sophisticated relationships between sight and
sound have been developed by the screen media, relationships
which can suggest both direct and analogical adaptations
to the stage. What seems to account for the sophistication
is a combination of the precision possible when a production
can be set in plastic and the unique historical backgrounds
Of the media.
312
The sound film can perhaps give the stage director a
unique view of movement because of its background in the
silent film. When the film makers were without sound they
had to discover what meanings could be conveyed almost
exclusively with movement. They developed Special insights
into filmic movement thereby. Conversely, television, with
its origin in radio, already knew what sound alone could do.
It had develOped audio communication to a high degree. The
resulting Observations from the two screen media, after
having combined their Specialties to use both Sight and
sound, can add a Special dimension to the stage, the medium
which has always been able to take both sight and sound for
granted.
ip_ Some Relationships Between Sight and Sound Suggested by
phe Screen Media
Generally, the old guard film theorists, remembering
the silent film with pleasure, draw attention to the
tendency of sight and sound together being in conflict or
competition with each other. At least one or the other is
usually supposed to be superfluous. The assumption is
that either sight or sound has its own special language as
a pure art form. Neither needs the use of the other. The
isolationist and reactionary view is only useful to this
study, however, to challenge the director to discover the
strength of, and to perfect both his pictorial and his
sound techniques and to find how they can best be integrated
313
into a sound and sight medium. Also, the director needs to
find ways of keeping the Sight and sound, as Arnheim puts
it, from "fighting each other for attention."9
a) Relationship of Parallelism and Hierarchy,—-Arnheim
proposes a parallelism and a hierarchy for the relationship
Of sight and sound. He maintains that both the dialogue and
the picture story must be complete, that one cannot substitute
10 His
for the other Since they are different media.
labelling sight and sound as different media recalls that
Arnheim tends to think of sound film as the combination of
film and recording, and not yet a single integrated medium.
His solution is to advocate a complete movement script
coupled to a complete verbal script such that each tells the
story in its own way.11 He adds that one should dominate
the other, and they should complete each other by dealing
with the same subject differently.l2 In effect he maintains
that there is a hierarchy of media in any work of art and
for film the image, the picture, is dominant while the
dialogue is recessive.13 He feels, like many film theorists,
that the reverse is true on stage; that, for example,
Shakespeare and Moliere are complete without movement.14
____
9Rudolphe Arnheim, Film as Art (Berkeley: University
of California Press), 1957):'p.‘l99.
10Ibid., p. 208.
11Ibid., p. 211. 12Ibid., p. 216.
14
13Ibid., p. 224. Ibid., p. 221.
314
There may be some justification for saying that
Shakespeare is complete without movement; certainly many
literary theorists have so maintained, though this study
disagrees. Certainly in the case of Moliere, who wrote
using the traditions of elaborate stage business of both
the French Farce and the Commedia dell'Arte, in many cases
seemingly presupposing specific bits of comedy business, it
seems Arnheim is mistaken. In any case, it seems to this
study that the stage can profit more from Arnheim by treat-
ing the stage the way Arnheim describes the screen than by
accepting his evaluation of the stage.
Arnheim's theory of parallelism for the screen has a
certain importance to the stage director in suggesting that
movement does not nearly occupy the prominance it ought to
on stage since, as a general rule, sight draws so much more
concentrated attention than sound. His challenge adapted
to the stage director seems to be to experiment with the
stage as a visual art; to see if stage can make anything
like the screen impact by also making the picture dominant.
b) Relationship of Alternating_Balance.--Bettinger
supplies an alternate to Arnheim's Parallelism theory. He
refers to it as the "attention balance"; "the mind can con-
centrate only on one thing at a time"; therefore attention
must be switched back and forth between sight and sound,
because attention cannot effectively be maintained on both
at once.15 His relationship, in summary, calls for
_— l
5Bettinger, pp, cit., p. 14.
315
restraining the dialogue when the impact is carried by the
visual and the reverse when the impact is carried by the
dialogue. He allows that for a brief moment of climax,
possibly, both sight and sound may be accented.
Bettinger maintains that sound is more effective than
sight in stimulating imagination but visual memory and
believability are stronger than aural.l6
His point, how-
ever, only seems to suggest to this study that the more
abstract a representation, or the less content it has, the
more the imagination is stimulated; sounds conjure up
visual images in the mind. This study is not Opposed to
stimulating the imagination; however, the study is more
directly concerned with the attempt to communicate specific
meanings, hence with the designed visual picture which is
the image itself and is director controlled. ‘When actually
presented on stage the image is the same for the whole
audience; the audience's mental image obviously varies
according to the background of the individual audience
member.
However, one positive point that Bettinger's ideas
suggest to this study is for the stage director to consider
adding a sound track to his play script, a sound track more
elaborate than merely the required doorbell or fire siren,
but a complete effects track, possibly with almost con-
tinuous music as a stimulant for audience imagination.
L
16Ibid., p. 18.
316
Such a track could easily supply the larger context, geo-
graphical Or emotional, in which the smaller play exists.
The play might even float in a pool of sound, including
the ambient sound that would be present if the stage set
were really in its larger context, sound that is, however,
orchestrated with the movement and dialogue. Of course the
screen technique would require a degree of synchronization
and precise relationship between sound and dialogue that is
more than most live actors can achieve. Ultimately, as
with the music in a musical production, the director would
probably have to decide whether the actor or the sound
track would lead.
c) Pprallelism vs. Attention Balance.--In the main,
this study prefers Bettinger's attention balance relation-
ship over Arnheim's parallelism. It seems that picture and
sound may express different things, or the same thing in
different ways, but that for both to be expressing a
complete story in parallel may well result in a ponderous
redundancy. To avoid the redundancy, at times the sound
can be dominant, at times the sight, at times one or the
other need express practically nothing, even be missing.
In other words, sight and sound seem most capable of
providing a variety of expression in a combination of
contrasting with or supporting each other, and in waves of
dominant and recessive relationship.
317
d) Relationship of Sight and Sound Analogous to a
Montage.--The relationship of sight to sound described
above finds a parallel in the montage. For the stage,
perhaps one of the most effective translations of that mon-
tage is the juxtaposition of movement and Speech to create
patterns of meaning. 'Where a movement fundamentally tells
the same story as the dialogue there is a support, or a
cumulative montage. Where the movement tells a contrasting
story there is a dynamic, or dialectical, version of the
cumulative montage.
Such stage montages may present both sight and sound
simultaneously, but Bettinger's advice appears to be best.
If Sight and sound impacts are alternated, they can each
have an effect without clouding the other. In practice,
both sight and sound continue in a flow, parallel in a way,
but the element making the point takes dominance at any one
moment. Such a sight and sound sequence may reflect a chase
sequence (simultaneous montage), a normal time sequence (a
continuity montage), or a contrasting sequence (the dia-
lectical cumulative montage) all to good effect.
e) Sight as a Commentary Upon Sound.-—Usually the
script words are thought of as providing the commentary and
the context that clarify the meaning of movement. One
example that reverses that relationship, where sight
comments on sound, should hold special interest for the
stage director; it is what Pudovkin calls "unsynchronized
318
Speech"17 and what Reisz means when he says "it is frequent-
ly more important to Show a reaction than the speaker."18
In effect, the screen technique is to place the listening
character on the screen while the Speaker is temporarily
either out of the frame or has his back to the camera. The
technique can accomplish several things the stage director
may use. It helps continuity by bringing the reacting
character prominently into the scene before he Speaks; that
is, it provides an overlap. On stage, this overlap could
be one of position; for example, the reacting character
has his face to the audience, the Speaker his back. The
overlap could be one of movement; for example, the reacting
character starts a gesture or turn to gain focus before the
Speaker has finished talking. In other words, the stage
director can break the general rule (which is to keep the
speaker in focus and to allow movement only from the speaker)
in order to present a vital reversal. A montage-like con-
trast will result between the Speaker and the listener, a
more dynamic interrelationship of sight and sound, than the
mere alternation of attention.
17v. I. Pudovkin, Film Technique and Film Acting.
Trans. Ivor MOntagu (London: ViSiOn Press, Ltd., 1954),
p. 165.
l8Kare1 Reisz, The Technique of Film Editing (New York:
Farrar, Straus & Cudahy, 1958), p. 87.
319
2. Special Relationships Between Sight and Sound on Stagp
There are certain relationships between Sight and
sound on stage that the screen director may help the stage
director to clarify and to turn to his advantage. One of
those is the necessity for simultaneous effects on stage,
and another is the probable dominance of sight on stage
in spite of the prominence of the script lines.
a) Sight Congruent with Sound.--Although both stage
and screen directors may advise one thing at a time,
usually on stage one thing does not occur at a time. In a
screen montage, often one thing does because of the selectiv-
ity of the camera; on stage there is usually a relationship
of dominant and recessive with many things happening at
once, including both in sight and in sound. The point to
be made is this: even though an audience may only con-
centrate on one thing at a time the audience is quickly
aware of discrepancies around the point of concentration.
Although the audience is listening at a given moment, the
Sight factors need to be congruent with, or Obviously in con-
trast with, the sound. Peripheral vision and its aural
counterpart both exist. If they did not, the director
would find it difficult to redirect attention away from an
Old focus and toward a new one; a movement or sound else-
where in the audience's field of vision or hearing could
not serve to control a change of audience focus. The only
instrument of redirecting attention would be the object in
focus itself. Since peripheral awareness does exist, the
320
stage director needs to supply enough movement and sound
around the point of focus so the audience realizes the
focus has a context. At the same time he needs to allow
no sound or movement of a speed or a magnitude to distract
the audience until the director desires a transition.
b) Sight Dominant Over Sound.--Because screen movement
is so prominent much attention has been paid to what kind
it is. Arnheim, and others, have observed that the variety
of pantomime that usually accompanies screen dialogue is
insufficient, unexpressive, and monotonous. The arms and
head usually beat time to the rhythm of the dialogue, but
the movements contribute little more to the scene than a
punctuation or an emphasis.19 His suggestion is to re-
place the man who talks with the man who acts. Bettinger
supports this view by suggesting limits to the screen
dialogue. Dialogue should convey only the minimum informa-
tion necessary for exposition and characterization. The
screen image should do the rest.20 Curran supports the
Opinion further by proclaiming that the screen reaches its
greatest heights as a medium of pantomimic expression;
dialogue ought to be kept to a minimum.21 Herein is another
19
Arnheim, _p, cit., p. 228.
2OBettinger, _p, cit., p. 76-
21Charles W. Curran, Screen Writing and Production
Ipchnique (New York: Hastings House, 1958), p.‘2l.
321
challenge to the stage director. Need the play script be
so wordy? Can't the visual on the stage have almost as
much prominence as the visual on the screen?
Although the pantomimists and dancers will reveal to
this study additional insight into what movement with few
or no words can mean, the film can lead the way in suggest-
ing fruitful relationships between sight and sound where
sound is still important but sight is predominate. Indeed,
perhaps the dominance may already be as true for the stage
as Stasheff maintains it is for television. When scripts,
whose main interest was verbal, were adapted to television
Stasheff says that a strange reversal took place; the
picture became prominent.22 Possibly the same relationship
is true on stage whether or not the director knows or wants
it. If so, then the director might well take advantage of
this prominence and not let it do trivial things or suppress
it in favor of the less impressive words.
E. Summary Conclusion: Screen's Challenge
to the Stage Director
The conclusion of this chapter consists of two
suggestions to the Stage director. They are to use the
analogical method of adapting Screen techniques to the stage,
and to adOpt the screen's creative directing role.
—_.
22Edward Stasheff and Rudy Bretz, The Television Prpgram,
ips Writing, Direction, and Production (New York: A.A. Wyn,
Inc., 1951), p. 24.
322
1. Challenge of Analogy.
By the method of analogy the stage director can borrow
creatively and imaginatively from the screen. He can start
by letting the audience substitute for the camera, the
scenery for the horizon, or anything substitute for anything
else in moving relationships until some new idea occurs to
him that may be fruitful. In the process he may adapt to
the stage screen techniques, larger screen principles, or
merely small screen idiosyncrasies. For examples, he may
use the large principle of the free manipulation of time
and Space all the way to merely the results of an early
imperfect motion picture projector. The possibilities
are unlimited for the imaginative director. All he needs
is a knowledge of the techniques and principles of the two
screen media, a few methods of abstraction, and the desire
to experiment.
2. Challenge of Creativity
The desire to experiment is perhaps the director's
biggest asset in relating film to stage; for a Special
challenge to be creative by analogy and by example is
clearly implied in this entire chapter. But perhaps more
than the screen techniques themselves, or even a method of
adaptation, the stage director needs the point of view and
the creative freedom of the screen director. And to use
that freedom, he also needs a thorough knowledge of his own
medium to fulfill the responsibility that the freedom
323
implies. The chief freedom the screen director has is the
emancipated view that the written script is only a scenario,
a skeleton which he must dress. The Scenario is usually
not considered a work of art, but a story line from which a
plan, a shooting script, derives and from which a work of art
hOpefully will emerge.
The stage director on Broadway, or wherever original
Scripts are produced, often feels as does the director of
film. The script is incomplete; it needs rewriting and
testing. The stage director can aid not only in inter—
preting but in creating both the script and the visual
production. Such freedom to create must be assumed by a
stage director, both with original scripts and with those
scripts which were original dozens or hundreds of years
ago, before they too had undergone testing, otherwise he
can never be anything but tied to the decisions of other
artists.
'Specifically, as Tyler suggests, the director should
look through his script to "translate his feelings into
images as though the words did not exist'.‘23 Not because
the stage director must become filmic, but because the
filmic idea will add one more powerful string to the
director's bow. He should look for places to interpret
23Parker Tyler, The Three Faces of the Film (New
York: Thomas Yoseloff, i960), p. 57.
324
feelings visually, places for pantomime scenes, places for
montage bridges, places for fully orchestrated sound effects
and musical backgrounds, places where special points of
view or distortions are possible through character identi-
fication, places where people and ideas may be freshly
presented by alternating relevation and concealment, and
places where the depth and scale of pictures can be changed
by application of filmic concepts. In short, perhaps the
stage director should be more daring than an interpreter;
he Should seriously consider being an originator, looking
for places where he can originate not only pictorial but
also verbal script in order to provide for stronger pictorial
representation. In order to availthimself of bolder and more
expressive movement techniques a director needs to be at
least a play doctor if not an actual playwright. He needs
not only to be aware of the potential for movement on stage
but to be able to provide himself with the script framework
that will help him to realize that potential.
CHAPTER‘VII
MOVEMENT WITHOUT SPEECH: CERTAIN PRINCIPLES OF
DANCE, PANTOMIME, AND PSYCHOLOGY
ADAPTED TO STAGE PLAY MOVEMENT
A. Introduction: Special Contributions of Pantomime ‘
and Dance to Dramatic Movement:
from The Theatre and Life
Even as with the silent film makers, the dancers and
pantomimists have Special light to throw on the meaning of
stage movement because of their reliance on theatrical
movement without speech. When movement is presented by
itself, divorced from words, a language of movement takes
on much greater importance. Without a verbal context to
explain the meaning of a movement, the dancer or pantomimist
must depend upon the movement pattern to supply a meaning
context, and upon each individual move to contribute to
that context as well as to supply specific individual
meanings.
Many of the principles and techniques of movement in
both dance and pantomime draw from the same theatre heritage
as the play. Much is held in common by all three art forms
They use the same stage, the same audiences, and seek
Similar goals of expression, communication, and entertain-
ment.
325
326
All three forms also draw directly from an observation
of life, partially from the psychological and physiological
aspects of body movement and motivation but also from move-
ment that has been learned in cultural life. Consequently
similar conventions and principles are practiced by all
three forms. This chapter is concerned primarily, there-
fore, with what the pantomimist and dancer can add from
their interpretation of theatre and life to what has al-
ready been accumulated in this study.
1. Theatre's Contribution: Conventional Language
Because of dance and pantomime's need to communicate
with movement alone they have adapted theatre's movement
heritage in more complete and special ways than has the
stage play. Conventions of stage areas, the meaning of
abstractions, the use of metaphors, and the stage stereo-
types of emotion and attitude have all been explored in
greater depth. The peripheral aspects of stage movement,
such as rhythm and tempo, have become central and powerful.
The size and shape of movements have become enlarged,
simplified, and more explicit because there is no verbal
context to clarify their meanings. Hopefully the stage
director can benefit from the deeper and broader search
into the common theatrical movement heritage.
2. Life's Contribution: Human Behavior
This study is also interested in dance and pantomime's
327
sources in their observations of life, largely because both
art forms maintain a partial dependence upon these observa-
tions. From the beginnings in Delsarte both forms have
maintained some dependence upon clinical observation of
behavior and the meanings behavior apparently has, that is,
Observation of the real life situations to which that
behavior seems appropriate.
The psychologist is of interest in this chapter,
partially, then, to the extent that he may support or
counteract the Specific claims of the pantomimists and
dancers concerning the meaning of body movement; but perhaps
even more the psychologist is of interest to the extent that
he can clarify the source of the pantomimist's body language.
PsycholOgy is to the meaning of body movement, after all,
like the study of etymology is to the verbal language. The
Origins of the verbal language help to explain its meanings,
but the language now has taken on certain meanings through
usage apart from its origins. So it is with pantomime and
dance. The backgrounds are of interest, but can neither
affirm nor deny the current cultural meanings of movement.
They may, however, suggest ways to help modify or enrich
the current modes. The psychologist is not brought into
this chapter for the purpose of testing what is communicated
by the movement language to an audience. This approach is
beyond the scOpe of the present study, even if such specific
tests were available. The experience of this study is that
328
most available related investigations do not bear directly
upon the problems at issue in this study; the investigations
would have to be related analogically and hence would loose
their scientific authority in the application. It is the
opinion of this study that special tests would have to be
devised if psychological testing were the aim.
At any rate, the dancers and pantomimists are primarily
dependent upon studies of behavior in real life contexts,
studies conducted by Delsarte over half a century ago,
studies that did not separate out the psychological, physiolog-
ical, or cultural bases from the observed movement forms. So
that movement drawn from observed life, rather than from
psychology in particular, is the second main source for
pantomime and dance's movement meanings, while the testing
of the language currently used by those arts, to see what
is communicated, is the subject of another study.
3p Order of Presentation: From Gross to Fine
It is the job of this chapter to combine the concepts
and observations of those concerned with the meaning of
movement as movement is divorced from words in order to
garner for the stage director whatever may be useful in his
art. To be consistent with the rest of this study the
material will be presented in order from gross to fine move-
ment. The imitations of life and the theatrical conventions
will be discussed simultaneously as they become apprOpriate
to the discussion of gross and fine movement.
329
The choreographer is the artist in this chapter most
correSponding with the stage director and most concerned
with the meanings of the gross movement in blocking. The
choreographer's view of the use of the abstract elements of
mass, line, form, balance, emphasis, and rhythm will con-
tribute new insights to the stage director's use of com-
position and picturization.
The section on fine movement will be divided into the
same movement divisions this study used in Part I: Mimesis,
metaphor, and symbol. The mimetic basis for dance and
pantomime is drawn in part from certain psychological
principles, in part from Delsarte's views of natural move-
ment meaning as classified into a language, and in part from
the direct observations of life made by the dancer's and
pantomimists. The metaphorical and symbolic basis for move-
ment meaning in this chapter derives almost entirely from
the use of theatrical convention and stereotyped behavior
as used by the dancers.
flpp Movement as Expression or Communication in Dance and
Ppntomime
There are many schools of thought amongst dancers and
pantomimists as to what the role of movement should be. Some
feel movement should merely express the feelings of the
mover with no necessity to communicate to an audience.
There are those who insist that dance exists for its own
sake and not for communication. Their view will be discussed;
330
however, strictly speaking, their view falls outside the
realm of the meaning of movement. The majority, however,
consider movement as a method of communication.
The practitioners and theorists herein consulted con-
cern themselves with meaning, that is with derivation of
stage movement from natural behavior, from moving objects
in life beyond the stage, and from culturally symbolic
languages that have grown out of stage practice. There
are those who insist there is a universal language of the
body, with a definite body movement or position correspond-
int to each feeling or attitude, and those who maintain that
only a very general emotional mood can be conveyed by natural
body movement. Still others have an eclectic point of view
and suggest combining observation, abstractions from nature,
metaphor, symbol, psychological principles, and established
theatrical conventions into a more or less integrated
system. The latter course is the one this study will
suggest for the stage in more detail at the conclusion of
the chapter.
B. Gross Movement Composition Elements
Interpreted By the Choreographer
When the choreographer plots group movement he employs
gross composition principles that are very similar to those
the stage director uses in the gross blocking of his play.
Because of the similarity much of the choreographers art
331
needs little translation to be used by the director. In-
deed, because Of the media's common heritage much that
both artists use has already been discussed fully in the
first part of this study. It remains here to collect what
additional principles and techniques the choreographers
have to suggest.
Both Hayes and Humphries cover the compositional
principles of group movement quite completely and concisely.
They include mass, line, form and balance, emphasis, and
rhythm. However, certain special aspects of some Of the
above elements emerge that might be useful to the stage
director.
1. Mass Considered as Density
Mass has been previously defined by this study as the
appearance of weight; it can also be considered as the
appearance of density. The idea of density is really a
poetic image with an analogical basis. Hayes employs the
image to suggest a Special quality of group movement on
stage. The term density derives from physics. The density
of the medium (air) through which the dancers move, deter-
mines certain qualities of movement.1 To try to apply the
idea, if the air is thought of as being more dense than
normal, even as dense as water, the dancer moves in a sort
-__.
tElizabeth R. Hayes, Dance Composition and Production
(New York, 1955), p. 46.
332
of slow motion. However, the slow motion is distinct from
the filmic variety. A motion occurs that is Slow because it
appears to be overcoming opposition. On the other hand the
air could be thought of as having no density and movement
becomes rapid and flitting. Coupled with analogical variants
on other physical laws, such as gravity, density of movement
can suggest a great deal toward setting the overall mood of
a play.
2. Line Considered as Abstraction and Textural Dynamic
Line has also been discussed at length in the first
part of this study; however, Humphries has some interesting
additional comments on some of the connotations of line
patterns in opposition. Opposed lines suggest force,
energy, and vitality, whereas successional lines that flow
or curve suggest grace and languor.2 Her special point is
that Opposed lines seem to hold in, or retain, energy while
unopposed lines of movement allow for energy loss from the
body.3 Her way of expressing herself sounds at first rather
mystical, but there is an important principle involved. A
sympathetic illustration would be this: if an actor moves
up against another actor, or his line of march is cut off by
2Doris Humphries, The Art of Making_DanceS (New York:
1959). p. 57.
3Ihid., p. 58.
333
another's line of march, his movement comes to a halt, or
at least his line pattern stOps abruptly. This stOpping
gives the audience an impression something like that of
water being held back by a dam, or of a sentence being
held in by a period. The movement is restricted, enclosed,
and hence retains its energy. If the movement simply flows
unimpeded, it is like the stream without the dam; water
flows away and is lost. The impression of force is not
present until that force is opposed. Or, to change the
metaphor, the unopposed movement is like the sentence that
ends with a series of dashes. It is weak; energy seems
to escape with a sigh at its conclusion. As this chapter
continues it can be seen that many of the choreographers'
abstract compositional elements, like the above, have a
metaphorical basis.
Line can also be considered in terms of the shapes and
patterns it forms that will give a certain dynamic impression
to certain movement textures. Dynamics for Humphries
4
include what she calls variables in texture. Texture it-
self is also a concept that seems to be more analogical
than literal. In materials, such as fabric, texture refers
to such qualities as Smooth and rough. In movement, texture
refers to Similar qualities such as angular, sharp, circular,
and smooth, but also to gradations in tension. These com-
positional components are expressed by various parts of the
_
“Ibid., p. 97.
334
body. Sharpness is usually conveyed by small movements of
knee and elbow, while smoothness is expressed by the large
muscles of arm and leg prOpelling the whole body in space.
The meaning of these textural variations is closely associ-
ated with the meaning of abstract line patterns. The sharp
and angular are supposed to be stimulating, while the smooth
are supposed to be soothing. Humphries combines two dynamics
to form a contrapuntal effect; an example would be for one
arm to move sharply while another is moving smoothly.5 She
notes that the Spanish dance uses simultaneous dynamics;
sharp foot movements combine with smooth arm movements.
How may the stage director use dynamics in his move-
ment? Direct adoption is, of course, quite possible.
Actors can aid their characterizations by using textures
that Show emotional qualities or attitudes. The director
can create an underlying mood to a scene by these same
textures of movement. However, Simultaneous dynamics
provide the most exciting possibilities. Any part of a
scene, or of a human body, that contrasts with another
part affords fine opportunity for directoral comment on the
scene. Two moving elements are apt to be more noticeably
contrasted than one moving (the actor) and one static (the
scenery). The director needs only to decide what two moving
elements will best express the two different textures of
5Ibid., p. 101.
335
movement. The two dynamics, or textures, may occur within
the same actor. For example, two dynamics may help to
provide a revelation of a hidden facet of his character's
personality. A smoothly moving torso and head with fidget-
ing hands and elbows behind the back can reveal a surface
calm with an underlying tension. One arm gently enfolding
a young lady while the other arm is nervously reaching for
a wallet, can suggest a conscious effort to be suave with a
hidden fear of not being able to pay the bill. Or, in such
a stylized form as Gilbert and Sullivan, a director may
support the author's comments with less realistic simul-
taneous dynamics. The upper part of the actors' bodies can
be carried proudly erect, in a smooth flowing static symbol
for ego and breeding. Meanwhile the feet can be moved in
an almost acrobatic fashion, in a satirical comment on the
upper part of the body. The impression is almost of two
bodies in one, as if a mischievious bottom man were carrying
around on his shoulders, and ridiculing, a pompous top man.
3, Form and Balance Considered as Abstraction and Image
Generally, Humphries considers balance as a prOperty
of form rather than as a separate category. Balanced or
unbalanced forms exist in many kinds; but there seem to be
two general varieties as discussed by Humphries; there are
forms that seem to derive mostly from compositional abstracts,
and forms that more Obviously derive from objects or ideas
external to themselves. In other words, there are abstract
336
form and analogical form. The abstract formal elements of
new interest to this study are symmetry and linear two
dimensionality.
To Humphries, symmetrical compositions have the same
stability, repose, and harmony that they do for stage
directors. She does, however, mention a unique set of uses
for the form. Symmetry can be employed prior to or after
the operation of will and desire; it can also be used for
conclusions.6
The stimulus her suggestion offers to the director's
imagination can be far reaching. Symmetry followed by
asymmetry followed by symmetry may well help to interpret a
scene that should start calm, become excited, and end calm.
Balance, unbalance, then balance might be added to the
same sequence. Smooth, angular, then smooth might also be
used. To avoid redundance, and to allowibr some anticipation
of the middle phase, asymmetry, perhaps an opposition sequence
would match better than a supporting one. Such a sequence
could start with rough texture matched with symmetrical
balance, followed by smooth texture matched with asymmetrical
balance, as passion operates and overcomes its Opposition,
and completed by the repose of symmetry and the equal re-
pose of an even smoother texture.
6Ibid., p. 160.
337
Humphries' linear two dimensional composition is useful,
she maintains, only for ritual, impersonal, and cold
sequences. At all other times linear two dimensional
compositions are too devitalizing, lifeless, monotonous,
and inhuman.7 Here her observations are not so new to the
study as they are more Specific, and specificity is usually
what stage directors most lack. It seems the need to find
out how to apply principles may be more pressing than the
need for more principles.
Form in its aSpects of complexity and simplicity
receives additional attention from the choreographer.
Humphries says that "the solo instrument can be quite
elaborate," as it "has the sole reSponsibility of expressing
the total group movement'.’8 On the other hand, the larger
the group, the simpler each individual should be. For the
total grouping will still be more complex than the most
complex, single individual alone on stage. In effect, no
element in a group Should be complete in itself; only the
whole composition should be complete. When music, costume,
and lights are added to all the movements, the stage picture
should be complete, but not before. The stage director can
learn a great deal from this formal principle. In realistic
theatre the director often tends to be Victorian. Every
realistic detail is often present in costume, gesture,
8Ib1d., p. 61.
7Ibid., p. 160.
338
prOperty, and scene. The result is an interesting museum
piece around which the audience eye may at first wander
fascinated. The result, though a unity of style, is not
a unity of production. The whole may fall apart if each
part is a whole. In effect, the suggestion for the director
is to use selective realism especially applied in relation
to the number of characters and scenic elements on stage.
Form is also considered by Humphries in terms of its
metaphorical sources. She notes that early modern dancers
abstracted their forms from as wide a variety of objects as
buildings, people, dynamic relationships, trees, and
machinery.9 There seemed to be interest primarily in seeing
just what could be expressed with movement, what could be
done by the new medium. Such forms are still expressed, but
more and more the theme dominates the form. Humphries suggests
starting to look for themes and formal elements by being
attuned to the spirit Of the times. To her this century is
symbolized formally by the right angle.10 She maintains
that a keen observer of his life and times will find an
"inevitable relationship between the accumulated store of
visual and mental attitudes dominant in our age, and
composition.ll Among these compositional principles
Humphries derives, such as the right angle, is the demo-
cratic grouping. The latter she likens to the Greek chorus,
wherein the group is important as a group, and also as
k
9Ibid., p. 22. 1°1bid., p. 29. 111bid., p. 20.
339
individuals.12
Her decision about what is the Spirit of the times is
perhaps not so important to the stage director as her
method. By comparing ideas, concepts, architectural shapes,
or typical styles of a particular time, or play, a director
can derive images and forms that can be depicted in move-
ment.
4. Emphasis Considered as a Function of Stage Space
In the emphatic use and meaning of stage Space
Humphries fundamentally agrees with the findings of the
stage directors. She also adds some interesting observa-
tions in the categories of direction of movement and area
strength.
a) Direction of Movement.--Humphries maintains the most
powerful movement on stage is straight forward, next is
diagonal, and third is circular; the circular gives the
audience a sense of continuity, but because the body line
keeps changing the body gives a weaker impression.l3
"Straight forward" needs some explanation; Humphries is not
explicit. It seems that straight toward the audience would
be the strongest move, diagonally across the stage the next.
However, the stage director can make another fruitful com-
bination here with the principle of character-audience
12Ibid., p. 91. 131bid., p. 81.
340
identification. A straight move toward the identity char-
acter is also a strong move, the diagonal move in relation
to that same character can be somewhat weaker. If the
director uses the fact of audience-character identification
he may then strengthen or weaken any move in two ways.
This identificatiOn becomes more important in arena theatre
where there is no consistent "toward the audience" move.
b) Area Strength.--Humphries has an interesting
variation for dancers in the order of stage area strength.
To her, the order of strength is center, up right, up left,
down right, down left, up center, and down center.14 Most
directors think of down center as the strongest area, and
generally center next; then the areas become weaker as they
fan out from the center. Humphries feels down center is weak-
est. She does not give a total rationale for her order, but
some of her observations are enlightening. To her, up right
and up left are strong beginnings for movement: they are
supported by stage verticals (such as back drOps or box set
corners) and the right angle support (intersecting corner
lines) of power and excitement.15 From these corners the
diagonal is the strong move. The move becomes weaker as it
approaches the center, strongest at the center, and then
weaker again until it attains some support from the vertical
16
lines at the down stage corner.
6
1“mid†p. 83. 15Ibid., p. 70. 1 Ibid., p. 75.
‘- -...-_
341
There seem to be two weak points in Humphries observa-
tions. First, in the stage play there may be no strong
supporting scenic verticals at the corners, and , second,
possibly a support weakens the body rather than strengthens
it. By the principle of contrast, the body should be
stronger if it provides a contrast, not a concurrence, with
its background. Humphries does not express an Opinion of
area strengths when there are no verticals in the setting,
nor does she seem to reconcile her views on contrast and
support.
It seems to this study that Humphries is mistaking
strength for potential. At the center of the stage the
actor controls the situation and can move in any direction.
At the upstage corners the actor has high potential to
move into strong areas and to make strong moves. At down
stage center the strong move is at an end and can go no
further. There is no potential left. However, lack of
potential is brought about because the actor is already in
the strongest area.
53 Rhythm Considered as A Natural and A Musical Organizer
Rhythm, established by repeated elements in movement,
is considered by Humphries to be "the great organizer"; its
natural sources, from which to abstract in order to decide
which rhythm will be used, are, first, the breathing,
Speaking, singing apparatus which leads to the rhythms of
the phrase; they are second, the semi-conscious rhythms of
342
the heart beat, peristalsis, contraction-relaxation of
muscles, and waves of sensation from the nerve endings; third,
they are the movement of the legs in alternate steps; and,
fourth, they are the emotional rhythms of passion, or the surge
and ebb of feeling.17 The source list provides a director
with natural rhythms he may use with empathic power. Not
all of these sources are in regular use by the stage
director, but through them he can attune a performance to
the feelings of his audience.
Hayes draws attention to the rhythms derived from
music. These, combined, form cumulative, simultaneous,
and resultant meters; these are combinations of rhythms to
provide more complex rhythms.l8 Music as a metaphor, or
direct use of musical rhythms, can suggest ways in which
natural rhythms may be combined into formal unity. However,
the more the director draws upon music as his rhythmic
source, the more abstract and remote from meaning becomes
his communication, since the movement is twice removed from
its original source; music derives its rhythm from life and
movement derives its rhythm from music. The more the director
uses natural rhythms directly, the better chance he has to
produce a controlled empathic response.
The phrase is one natural rhythmic unit of organization.
The phrase originates according to Humphries from the length
1711315.†p. 105. 18Hayes, 22. 0113., p. 76.
343
of a breath when a person Speaks or exhales. The breath
phrase dominates dance movement as it is an easily com-
prehended length of stress. A phrase consists of an
expenditure of energy followed by a rest, or a tension and
relaxation sequence, or a sequence of punctuations of
energy.19 The phrase as a unit of rhythm, according to
Humphries, is essential in order to maintain the shape of
nature. ‘Without the phrase, attention has no focus and
movement becomes exhausting for the audience. Too quick
punctuation in phrasing can also be tedious. It is pre-
sumed by this study that audience empathy with the tedious
rhythm would bring about the audience exhaustion. Without
a periodic rest, or with too rapid a pace, audience exhaustion
may take place.
The basic pattern of Humphries' phrasing is Aristotelian,
consisting of a beginning, middle, and end, followed by a
Slight hesitation or rest. An accent may come in either
part, depending on the connotation desired for the rhythm.20
The phrase may also be fragmented into clauses, phrases, and
punctuation that add up to a small unit of meaning, even as
does the sentence.
Repetition in rhythm has a Special significance for
dance because of the necessity to establish a rhythm in
some relationship to the repeating rhythm of music.21
_—
l9Humphries, pp. cit., p. 66. 201mm, p. 68.
21Hayes, pp, cit., p. 13.
344
Repetition is, in fact, usually shunned by the realistic
director, or else allowed to be tedious through oversight,
to the detriment of his play. Controlled repetition Of
formal elements in movement not only helps to establish a
rhythm but combined with variety of expression and with
recurring groups of movements it helps to provide increasing
tempo, complication, excitement, and climax. ‘Without
repetition of formal elements there would be no comparison
of an early occurrence with a later occurrence in order to
perceive increases.
Tempo, the Speed of rhythm, is calculated on stage,
Humphries notes, as a variation of the Speed of a normal
walk.22
If a person moves faster than a normal walk the
tempo is felt to be fast, if Slower his tempo is felt to
be slow. Her observation gives rise to some other con-
jectures. Normal breathing, heart beat, or phrasing rates
may also establish norms for tempo depending on the context
of the tempo. Her important point, however, is that the
established, normal, regular tempo is neutral; it is too
dull to arouse an audience. Faster, slower, or irregular
tempi are needed to create interest or excitement.
C. Fine Movement Adapted from the Psychologist, the
Pantomimist, and the Dancer: Movement of Individual People
22Humphries, _p, cit., p. 108.
345
The choreographer's abstract elements of composition
fit quite readily into the stage director's picturization
vocabulary. When the meaning of movements as made by
individual dancers and pantomimists is considered it does
not appear to receive such general acceptance. The problem
exists largely, it seems, because of strong claims for a
psychological basis and a universal application of the
movement principles. If the movements are considered as
culturally derived and with meanings dependent partly on
psychological behavior but largely upon a knowledge of the
movement language, many of the problems abate.
ipp Bodprovement: Three Kinds Combined; Mimesis, Metaphor,
Symbol
Body movement as described by authors in this chapter
still follows the categories of mimesis, metaphor, and
symbol. However, it is often difficult to discover what
body movements are derived from which source. Even those
that are mimetic may be an imitation not of universal
psychological behavior but of culturally learned symbols for
feelings and attitudes. Which body movements are reflexive,
which natural to all human beings, which ones learned but
highly typical of the culture, and which ones are symbolic
conventions is not always easy to discover. It may be good
for the director to know the difference in source in order
to know principles for creating new meanings, but it is
often quite unnecessary in order to communicate on the eclectic
346
American stage. Further, as long as the director understands
accepted meanings and has principles of psychology, metaphor,
and convention to derive new moves and meanings, the
audience may receive a unified impression of meaning without
the use of some single mode; the audience probably needn't
even be conscious of which modes are being employed.
2. Mimetic Movement: Meaning Derived from Imitation of
Natural Body Movement
The difficulty in correlating views of the meaning of
body movement derived from human behavior is largely one
of terminology. For this reason although there seems to
emerge a relative agreement in principles and techniques, the
agreement is difficult to evaluate as a whole. The most
valuable agreement between views of artists and scientists
comes with the observed behavior of human beings. The
objective behavior when a man is under the influence of an
emotion, expressing an attitude, or reacting to an expressed
emotion or attitude is described by the artist and the
scientist alike, and in quite Similar ways. The divergences
occur within the vocabulary used and within the overall
classification of the objective phenomena. One man uses
psychological jargon, another uses theological, mystical, or
philosophical jargon. One groups his observations in terms
of kinesthetic responses, neuromuscular sequences, or actions
and reactions; while another groups his findings in threes
347
according to a trinitarian religious vieWpoint, or Spatially
according to the part of the body affected by the movement.
One Speaks of inner motivation and outer stimulus forcing a
neuromuscular reaction pattern; another Speaks of the inner
soul or purpose creating the outer form. However, if the
compiler of ideas can discount the terminology and structure
imposed on his observations by the artists'or psychologists
overview of life there is much that each can contribute to
the stage director. Many of the divergences of view are
more apparent than real.
a) A Psychological View of the Meaning of Body Movement:
The Dancers' Interpretation of Psychological Principles
Combined With Related Psychological Views.--The psychologist
is in part a systematic observer of human behavior. As such
his findings can be and have been of value to the director
and choreographer who wish to communicate by the imitation
of nature. A danger exists, however, in assuming that if
it isn't proven by psychology it doesn't exist. unfortunately,
psychology has not yet undertaken very thorough studies of
what movement means to an audience; hence most of the
material available is the result of clinical study of clinical
symptoms, not of mass communication by movement. Unfortunately,
such material Often uses terminology that is difficult to
translate into theatre terms. For example, when the
psychologist maintains that emotions all have the same
symptoms, his observation is less than helpful for the
348
theatre man. The psychologist in this instance is not
studying everything the theatre man needs to know, namely, the
correSpondence between body movement and attitudes, emotions,
motivations, and learned overt responses. In other words,
the theatre man needs to remember that not everything in
human movement behavior is in the psychologist's domain.
The psychologist's study under laboratory conditions
also tends to devaluate his conclusions for the theatre man
to some extent. The very controls he needs in order to make
valid tests often result in testing emotion under inhibiting
conditions. The more overt symptoms, such as Show up at the
scene of a human disaster, are apt to disappear leaving only
the subvert. His records may well Show only emotion inhibited.
Until testing is undertaken in the field, testing of normal
human beings as they are moved by a real stimulus and are
reacting spontaneously, as much as possible before their
cultural inhibitions set in, will a complete and accurate
survey be possible. So far, only Delsarte has undertaken
such a survey, and his View was perhaps over colored by the
19th century.
Still another survey that needs taking is one of what
audiences understand from stage movement symbols. How much
is communicated to an audience by theatrical styles, as
compared to the psychological symptoms of emotion and
attitudes, may help to uncover some principles of effective
symbols. So far no such a survey has been made.
349
Unfortunately, also, psychologists and those dancers
and pantomimists who apply psychology do not always agree
with each other any more than do stage directors. Each
supposedly witnesses the same, or Similar, sets of symptoms,
but each is apt to put a different interpretation on his
findings. The problem of the reversible process of the
cause and effect of emotion is a case in point.
l-Empathy and Kinesthesia, Reversible Mechanisms in
Communication by Body Movement. Mary Todd says, "Bodily
postures definitely influence the emotions. Certainly the
reverse is also true." She adds that "peculiarities of
postures associated with mental diseases and abnormalities
have long been observed,"23 Her precept is, "we sit and
walk as we think," "living, the whole body carries its
meaning," "for every thought supported by feeling, there is
"24
a muscle change. To her, "function preceded structure."
"Everything moves, and in the pattern of movement life is
objectified."25 In these statements lie the basis for
kinesthetics and empathy, most important concepts for the
communication of feeling through body movement.
Just how the body and the emotions interrelate as
applied to the dance is more carefully stated by Hayes.
23Mary Elsworth Todd, The Thinking Bogy (Boston: Charles
T. Branford Company, 1949), p. 36.
24Ibid., p. l.
251bid., p. 3.
350
Kinesthesis is the study of the movement of muscles as they
provide sensations for recall, recall that is necessary for
the individual to repeat a movement. Kinesthesia is some-
times called by method actors muscle or sense memory. Hayes
points out that the state of mind associated with a move
is also recalled along with the move.26 In performance,
she maintains, a dancer or actor produces a movement, and
the audience reproduces the movement in its own body. In
turn the audience feels or recalls whatever associative
meanings each member has for that particular movement.27
She cautions, however, that the audience may not have the
same associative meaning for the move as the dancer has.
Communications depends upon the degree of universality of
the feeling and universality of the bodily expression of
that feeling.28
It is well to note that several sources are in
agreement concerning the kinesthetic and empathic pro-
cess, Doctor Campbell from the psychiatric field, the
only doctor this study could discover who has written
recently on this particular subject. As has been seen
already, Todd agrees in principle; Stebbins also has been
shown to agree that the inner thought determines the outer
form and the outer form tends to reinstate the inner
26Hayes, pp, cit., p. 22.
28
27Ibid. Ibid., p. 23.
\J-LV
351
response.29 It remains to note that Douglas Gordon Campbell,
neurologist, psychologist, and psychiatrist, is equally
certain of the process. He states, "often our words
contradict our movements, symptoms, attitudes, posture, and
gesture, which can be read accurately if the code is known,
but will certainly register even without conscious
n30
recognition. To Campbell, obviously, movements have
definite meanings, meanings that may be in contradiction to
words spoken at the same time. It is equally obvious that
Campbell feels these meanings are specific enough to be
considered a language, if one knows how to read that lan-
guage. Unfortunately he does not supply the code. Perhaps
his most important idea, for the stage director, though, is
that these meanings will register with an audience even if
not consciously read and understood.
2. Verbal and Movement Communication Contrasted: Symbol
vs. Symptom. Here is where movement language differs from
verbal. Since verbal language consists only of symbols, a
lack of knowledge of those symbols renders the language un-
intelligible. Since the language of movement is at least
29Genevieve Stebbins, Delsarte System of Expression.
(6th ed. rev.; New York: Edgar S. Werner Publishing and
Supply Company, 1902), p. 141.
3ODouglaS Gordon Campbell, "Your Actions Speak SO
Loudly," Impulse 1954 (San Francisco: Impulse Publications,
1954), p. 27.
352
part symptom, however, and these symptoms are conveyed by
empathic means to an audience, and take on an associative
meaning to that audience by kinesthetic means, movement
conveys its meaning in part regardless of the intent of
the director. The challenge here to the director is
obvious. He needs to know how to read these symptoms and
how to have his actors perform them if he wants control
over his communication to the audience.
Campbell complicates the issue somewhat by suggesting
that movement has two kinds of meaning. These are, first,
conventional signs in culture, understood by an audience,
and second, "subliminal" indications of true feelings; both
31 The complication
may, he maintains, occur simultaneously.
does not seem to affect the empathic process, however, for,
as Kempf says, "a feeling consists in the autonomic reactions
"32 and what the audience eye
aroused by what the eye sees
sees in terms of muscle tension and relaxation, body
position, and body movement, tends to be reinstated in its
own body. If the movement symbol has generally understood
meanings, then it will create emotional associations in the
audience Similar to those of the performer, just as readily
as will the "subliminal" movement and meaning of innate and
311bid., p. 28.
322Edward J. Kempf, The Autonomic Functions and the
Personality (New York: Nervous and Mental Disease Publishing
Company, 1921), p. 4.
353
truly felt emotion. The converse can also be true, that
"pure movement," being performed without connotational
interest, will take on connotative meaning as empathetic
tensions in the audience draw on its past experiences.33
As Todd Observes, "we copy postures of emotions and they
"314
become symbols again. The audience and performer alike
are usually unable to distinguish between the "subliminalâ€
movement and the symbol that the culture has adopted for
the feeling. Symptom and symbol alike have become natural.
3-Psychological Support for Contrapuntal Words and Movements.
Campbell's assertion that emotional meanings of movement
can be seen, or felt, to contradict verbal meanings, or even
contradict other movement meanings, is a strong support for
the director's natural use of a movement subscript. In the
chapter on film this study suggests the artistic possibility
of a montage Of contrast, a dynamic dialectical montage, where
the movement carries a meaning apart from the words. Camp-
bell's findings support the psychological feasibility of
the artistic device. One could only wish that Campbell would
compile his language of movement so that all directors could
read the symptoms. Probably if he did, however, he would be
guilty of the same absolutism as Delsarte, and would soon fall
into disrepute because of his over eager "pOpularizerS."
33Hayes, op. cit., p. 91-
34Todd, _p, cit., p. 2.
.2
,_r heir—i
354
4-Retroactive Inhibition a Hindrance to Symptomatic Rein-
statement. "Method" performers usually maintain that no
movement language is necessary because recall of emotional
situations will, through kinesthetics, reinstate the
apprOpriate muscle tensions and relaxations symptomatic of
the emotions. The difficulty this study has is not so
much with the "method" view of the psychological process of
kinesthesia, however, as it is with the process of rein-
statement of a "true" feeling. The process of retroactive
inhibition, or "active forgettery," sets in quite soon
after a particularly strong emotional situation occurs,
making it sometimes difficult even for a trained psychiatrist
to help a person recall the circumstances of an emotion.
For an actor to recall these circumstances clearly enough,
to relive them sufficiently without inhibition, in order to
provide a clearly differentiated set of symptoms to match
the dramatic situation is highly unlikely. The method
performances by and large support this contention. The
Specific symptoms that Stebbins, Hayes, Delsarte, Kempf,
and Campbell all describe simply do not usually occur in
theexperience of this study, under auto-recall of Situations.
A knowledge of what those symptoms are seems to be the best
guarantee of reinstating them in an actor and in an audience.
5-Possibility and Problem of a Specific Psychological Body
Language. The final Opinions used in this section will be
those of Dr. Kempf. His are the most extreme in support of
355
empathic communication of specific emotions by specific
motor response. His views are somewhat old, as psychology
goes, however, and tend to recall the controversial James-
Lange theory of emotion causation. However, he maintains that
the nerve apparatus with which our body receives outer
stimuli compels the body to take apprOpriate postures.35
"An emotion only comes into existence as the peripheral
n36
autonomic reactions become active. In other words, an
emotion is not a product of thought but of a stimulated
autonomic nervous system which sets up feelings of pain,
or other, and results in an emotion. The significance of
this for empathy is that the body's reception of stimuli
always results in setting up these autonomic reactions.
Then there are always apprOpriate bodily reactions that
result in typical postures, or bodily attitudes, which,
together with the autonomic nervous system, enforce an
emotion upon the receiver of the stimulus. According to
Kempf, then, the apparatus is there in the human body
to enforce specific reception of emotion. The problem only
remains,according to this view, for the director to send
the apprOpriate movement message for the reaction desired.
A false, or unintended, message is received as sent regard-
less of intent, and hence it needs to be accurate. In 1921
Kempf called attention to the "need to cooperate between the
35Kempf, pp, cit., p. 1. 36Ibid., p. xiii.
356
physiologist and psychologist in working out the relations
of definite affective traits to particular postural tensions"
which exist but have not yet been carefully codified.37 The
need still exists, though the groundwork has been laid, in
principle by the psychologist and in practice by Delsarte.
b) Delsarte: Body Movement. A Classified Language.--In
a study of natural body movement as communication one name
stands out above all the rest; it is Francois Delsarte, born
in France in 1871.38
l-Delsarte's Present Influence and Interpreters. There is
much of controversy about his name and his methods, but the
bulk of contemporary American dance, and both American and
EurOpean pantomime, depend to some extent upon his findings
and theories. Unfortunately for Delsarte and for the
theatre, he wrote very little, so his "popularizers",
imperfectly understanding his empirical method, over Simpli-
fied, distorted, and made rigid his views until his name
fell into general disrepute. The pOpularizers devised from
his principles simple rules of elocution and exact meanings
for body stance and succeeded in cutting off his promising
empirical beginnings.
Few in the theatre field realize that the main positive
use of his principles continues unabated, having evolved
_“M
37Ihid., p. xiv.
38Ted Shawn, Every Little Movement (Pittsfield, Mass:
Eagle Printing and Binding Company, 1954.), p, 14.
i}
‘I
357
under the cultivation of certain leading pantomimists and
dancers. Most of Delsarte's credible and useful findings
were handed down from teacher to pupil without ever becoming
published. Unfortunately, most of Delsarte requires demon-
stration, not words, not alone because words are quite
inadequate to describe movement, but also because of the
outdated words Delsarte's followers use. Ted Shawn has r
tried to remedy this situation somewhat in his book EXEEX.
Little Movement. Shawn's School of Dance at Jacob's
Pillow in the Berkshire Mountains, preceded by his and his
wife's Denis—Shawn school, acknowledges almost complete
dependence upon Delsarte. Countless other professional
and academic dancers, choreographers, and pantomimists have
mushroomed from Shawn's Delsarte import, originally brought
to America by Steele MacKaye.39 The school numbers among
its early students such artists as Ruth St. Denis herself,
Martha Graham, Jerome Robbins, Doris Humphries, Charles
Weidman, Louise Gifford, Jean Erdman, and Agnes DeMille.
Because of Delsarte's great influence and early
empirical methods it is important to outline his views as
sympathetically as possible for a modern audience, largely
as seen through the eyes of Ted Shawn. Shawn not only
learned directly from Delsarte's own students but compared
all the extant sources of Delsarte's work before writing.
39Ibid., p. 13.
358
2-Delsarte's Methods and Findings. Delsarte based his ideas
about the meaning of movement upon years of empirical
study of human beings in a wide variety of emotional
situations. His is the only such systematic attempt dis-
covered by this study. According to all of his followers,
including Ted Shawn, Delsarte went to see mine disasters,
floods, and hurricanes; funerals, weddings, and demon-
strations; to see individuals alone and in groups in order
to take careful notes of what he observed about the movement,
body postures, and voice idiosyncrasies of those actually
involved in emotional situations. After making his observa-
tions he noted that behavior followed certain recognizable
patterns corresponding to the stimulus and to the expressed
attitudes and feelings of those observed. Being a strong
trinitarian Christian, he grouped his Observations easily
into what was for him natural sets of threes.
The form in which his observations were made has been
a stumbling block for many who could have profited from his
Observations. But those who have practiced his tenets have
always been completely convinced of the basic validity of
his empirical observations and of their effectiveness in
performance. His observations must, however, in order to
appeal to a contemporary stage artist, be seen as principles,
as points on continua, as early formulations, and not as
sterile and absolute designations.
His principal dictum became a simple one: The inner
359
purpose determines the outer form.uo Later his observations
convinced him that the process was reversible. An accurate
creation of the outer form will tend to create the inner feel-
ing both in the mover and in the audience.41
3-Delsarte's Three Part Designation: Mental, Moral, Physical.
The first principle of Delsarte's is that various parts of
the body express different kinds of feelings. The head is
the mental or intellectual area, the torso is the moral or
volitional, and the limbs are the vital or physical.42
These in turn each have three parts. Within the vital
physical limbs the hands and feet are the mental, the fore-
arm and lower leg are the moral or volitional, and the
upper arm is the vital or physical. Within the torso the
upper chest or shoulders is the mental, the chest volitional,
and the abdomen and pelvic region the vital physical.
Delsarte's subdivisions are made of the head as well, with
the forehead the mental, the eyes the volitional, and the
chin and mouth the vital physical.
Concerning Delsarte's mental type of movement, in
general if an inner impulse to act is intellectual in
nature the body movement that results seems to originate
from the head. Usually gestures involving such interests
as curiosity stem from the head. It is a favorite expression
of Louise Gifford, pantomime consultant for the Theatre
_—
40Stebbins, _p, cit., p. 141.
41Ibid., p. 141. uzIbid., p. 117.
~
360
Guild and follower of Delsarte, that the eye, the ear, or
the nose leads. If there is an intellectual curiosity one
of the senses is seeking to perceive the situation more
closely and one of the sense organs in the head seems to
lead the body to its object of interest. If the sense of
touch is involved, the hand may lead the body; the hand,
in Delsarte's terms, being the intellectual area of the
vital-physical arm.
Concerning Delsarte's moral-emotional type of movement,
if a person is motivated by moral considerations, by will,
or by Objects that are noble or beautiful, the resulting
movement seems to originate from the torso, especially from
the upper portion of the torso, the chest. When a person,
for example, is moved by an impulse to approach a beautiful
sunset, there is an intake of breath, the breathing rate
increases, the chest seems to start a gesture that may lead
out along the shoulders to the hand and then the hand may
point. In this case it would be said that the chest leads.
The final part of the gesture resides in the hand, the
intellectual part of the arm, and just precedes some speech
concerning the outer stimulus, i.e., the sunset. The
intellectual aspects of the sequence come last, the hand and
Speech. In Delsarte's terms, the mental (hand) is the final
concern in a sequence that originates in the plane of
nobility (the chest).
Concerning Delsarte's physical-emotional type of move-
ment, when the inner motivation is one of physical appetite
361
the pelvis or stomach region seems to lead the gesture.
Such a lead extends to hip movement that flows along the
upper leg, to the lower, to the foot, and ends up in a
walking movement that seems to originate in the pelvic
region. Even a hand gesture, motivated by some physical
appetite seems to originate in the pelvis.
In general Delsarte observed that movements originated
in the torso when some emotion was involved and in the head
when a mental concern was predominate.
4-Delsarte's Law of Successions: Flow and Direction. Delsarte
noted in what Shawn translates as "the law of successions"
that the sequence of movements could be either from inner
to outer or from outer to inner depending on their motivation?3
If a walk, generally using the vital physical legs, starts
with a foot movement, it is an intellectually concerned move-
ment. If it starts with the torso and thighs it is a strong
and primitive movement. In effect, gestures that start from
foot or hand are affected. They are the result of the mind's
deciding the body will make a gesture instead of some inner
feeling determining an outer gesture. If the gesture is
thus "affected," or originates from a desire to take or to
beckon, the hand starts the movement. The movement moves
in succession through the forearm and upper arm to the torso.
Usually when the gesture is outgoing, giving, active,
motivated from inner feeling and not by thought, the flow
_—
43Shawn, _p, pi§,, p. 35-
362
is in the reverse direction.
Generally, when one center is typical of a character,
when only one kind of motivation is involved, sometimes
movement seems to stay centered in the apprOpriate part
of the body without flowing to the rest. As an example, a
primitive, stupid, or highly physical man who is not
particularly noble or mental usually makes his arm and leg
gestures largely with the upper arm and thigh. His gesture
usually originates from the plane of the appetites without
flowing to the rest of the torso. The man who is primarily
moved by intellectual considerations and is in control of
his mind is usually rather unmoving in his torso and in his
larger arm and leg muscles. His head is usually quite
active, even coy, in its punctuating movements, and his
hands and feet gesture usually in affected ways. If a
larger gesture is needed by the "mental" man the rest of
the body merely seems to follow head, hands, and feet with-
out quite the feeling of an organic, healthy physical unity.
5-Delsarte's Nine Laws Of Motion. Other observations of
Delsarte resulted in what he called his nine laws of motionl.“l
These are laws of altitude, force, expansion-contraction,
sequence, direction, form, velocity, reaction, and extension.
His view was that the laws of motion and principles of
motivation held for all peOple. Superimposed on these
uthid., p. 50.
363
universals were personal styles or idiosyncrasies born of
habit, cultural accretion, and personal profession or way of
life. The laws, of course, were not absolute, final, or
even essential, but principles arrived at empirically. With—
in the context of belief that every movement has form, tension,
and relaxation, Delsarte felt the following principles were
Operativezl45
Law of Altitude: Positive moves are always upward,
outward, and forward. Negative moves are always down, in-
ward, and backward.
Law of Force: Conscious strength assumes weak attitudes
while conscious weakness assumes strong attitudes. His
observation pointed to the conclusion that strong men do not
have to parade their strength but often appear physically
humble, while the weak usually compensate for their weakness
by trying to appear strong.
paw of Expgnsion-Contractipp: Excitement expands motion;
thought contracts motion. Emotion, feeling, or overt con-
cern results in larger, more overt, movement. Mental activity
or contemplation usually results in slower, smaller, and
more inward movement.
Law of Seqpence: Body movement occurs in a normal
sequence, what in another context may be called a normal
reaction pattern. In a reaction to an inner impulse thought,
emotion, feeling, or idea come first; in a reaction to an
—‘
â€51bid., p. 50.
364
outer stimulus sensation comes first through some organ of
perception. If the inner impulse is thought or idea, next
comes expression of the face; if the inner impulse is
emotional, next comes a breathing change. Next, in reSponse
to the feeling or idea, comes a new attitude of the body, or
body set; next comes gesture, an arm or leg movement origin-
ating from the new body set; next comes ejaculation, the
emotional, or primitive, aspect of speech; and finally comes
speech, the last, most civilized, and most intellectual part
of any reaction pattern.
Law of Direction: Moves of feeling are toward or away
from their objective. Moves of intellect are up and down
in the achievement of relative heights. Moves of Volition,
those of will, are from side to side. Moves of conflict are
diagonal.
The last three principles of this law of direction
are not so apparent as the first one. They are somewhat
clarified if movement is seen not as floor pattern but as
gesture.
Regarding moves of intellect, perhaps the relation-
ship of height to intellect is one of aspiration. The
reaching upward possibly symbolizes an aSpiring after
something mental and not an effort of will or desire.
Regarding moves of volition, legs spread to the side
and arms akimbo, indicate an open aggressiveness and a
strong base of support. Such a stance shows strong will.
365
Arms by the side and feet together rarely go with a strong
will. Hence gestures to the Side to Delsarte Show degrees
of volition.
Regarding moves of conflict, the line of a body that
is leaning into an activity may show conflict with an
external adversary, while lines of a body crossing each
other may Show internal conflict. To try to make such
directional moves apply to basic floor patterns would
necessitate a method of analogy; because for Delsarte they
are merely classifications of observable body postures and
movements.
ng of Form: The outer form of a movement correSpondS
in special ways to the inner impulse. If the outer reSponse
to the inner impulse is pleasant then the movement is circular,
if unpleasant then angular, if mystical then spiral, if
vital physical then straight, if mental then circular. There
are others but these will suffice by way of example. These
forms at first glance seem to reflect the meanings of abstract
line. However, the reverse is more likely. If Delsarte's
observations were accurate these body forms are really part
of the reason why abstract line forms have their meanings.
It would seem that a pleasant feeling results in less
restricted, more relaxed movement, which is probably move-
ment in circles; while the excess tension resulting from
negative emotions is likely to result in jerky, angular move-
ment. The mystical-Spiral movement is beyond the capacity
366
of this study to conjecture, but the straight line move
certainly seems to correspond to a strong, efficient,
physical motivation and purpose. Whether these principles
of form involve cultural determinants of movement patterns
or not, or whether a predisposition about the meaning of
abstract line patterns influence Delsarte's observation or
not, is something else about which it is difficult to con-
jecture. In any case, if the moves actually occur in human
beings under circumstances such as Delsarte describes, it is
of purely academic interest to the director as to what the
source is. The language is the same regardless of its
causes.
Law of Velocity: The rhythm and tempo of a movement
is in general in proportion to the mass to be moved. This
principle seems to be consistent with the one of physics
whose effects are noted chiefly in pendulum and metronome
movement. Carrying this principle of motion into emotion,
the greater the passion the Slower the movement. The
smaller the feeling, or the more surface the feeling, the
more rapid the movement.
Law of Reaction: The body reacts automatically in a
pattern of surprise and recoil. It is stated in physics
that for every action there is an equal and Opposite re-
action. Delsarte noted that for most stimuli there are
emotional-physical reactions; if the reaction is self
protective there is a recoil, or immediate withdrawal,
367
similar to what might be called a shock pattern of reaction.
Law of Extension: A gesture can be extended in space
by holding it in time. There is a more subtle principle.
An example would be the throwing of a ball where the thrower
leaves the arm extended then follows the ball with his eye
until the ball descends. When the ball descends the thrower
would adopt a new body set, thus indicating the throw was I
at an end and that the extended gesture was also completed.
6-Delsarte's Principles of Gesture. Most of Delsarte's
observations concerning gesture stem from his bodies of
law. Gesture means in this context any physical reaction
from hand gestures to gestures of the entire body. A fair
sampling of principles and illustrations is given below to
indicate the seeming accuracy and far reaching effects of
his work.
In hand gestures, the use of the thumb, observed by
him in life situations, was one of the specifics that led
him to his principle of expansion and contraction.46 When
the thumb is held close to, or is enclosed by, the hand,
there is a negative feeling, an insecurity. When the thumb
is extended there is a love, a positive feeling or an out-
going attitude.
When those same hands are gesturing Delsarte observed
that they seemed to describe a cube in front of the body.47
When extended out beyond the cube with palm toward the body,
â€5Ipid., p. 45. 46Ibid., p. 13.
368
a hand means to include. When held next to the body with
palm out the hand means to exclude, above it means to bless,
and below it means to support. The inclusive gesture is
meant to summon someone; the exclusive gesture is meant to
reject. Perhaps human gestures do not always follow these
principles, but Delsarte provides an interesting memory
system for some basic observations from which individual
idiosyncrasy may depart.
Where gestures of the entire body are concerned,
Delsarte provided the material from which Selden derived his
idea of the giving in to, or the opposition to, gravity.
Falling is a negative expression. Giving in to gravity is
a giving in to Opposition to the forces of life. Over-
coming gravity is joy. Fear lowers, joy raises. The
ultimate expression of joy is the weightless feeling of a
leap.
Related to the downward or upward body moves, were
Delsarte's outward and inward moves. They formed the
principle of expansion-contraction. To Delsarte, outward,
or Opposition, movements Show strife, successive movements
Show love, unfolding movements Show growth and life, and
inward, or folding, movements Show decay and death.47
These observations, as will be seen, closely parallel the
observations of many psychologists as well as of later
47Ibid., p. 55.
~——-—-—
359
writers on pantomime, although it may never be certain how
many of the moves are analogical and how many psychological
or cultural.
The front and the back of the body during movement had
special meaning for Delsarte; his observation was that the
back expresses universal feeling while the face expresses
unique feeling.“8 The back may be bent from sorrow, over-
work, or disease. The back may be straight from pride or
dignity. The back may be bent in protection of the vital
organs or the back may be straight in an expansive and
open attitude. The back is supplemented by the lower limbs
in expressing these very basic, and hence to Delsarte
universal, feelings or attitudes.
The face is in the plane of the intellect. The face
expresses the individual rather than the basic emotions.
Possibly Delsarte places too much reliance on the meaning
of facial expressions in the light of such filmic experiments
as those conducted by Eisenstein to prove context gave mean-
ing to facial expression, but this study is inclined to see
some validity in Delsarte's findings.49 To begin with,
facial expression is usually the most inhibited form of
outward human expression. Hence, a blank face can have
varied meanings dependent upon its context. However, when
the inhibitions are released, laughter, tears and various
_—
48Ibid., p. 56.
*
49Eisenstein, pp, cit., p. 13.
370
broad general classifications of facial expression become
more discernable. To be sure, the exact label placed on
these expressions is Often determined by knowing the context
of the expression, but the unique quality of these ex-
pressions is sufficiently differentiated for pantomimists,
as will be suggested later in this chapter, to codify an
entire language of what is to them recognizable facial
expressions. The expressions are also differentiated enough
for Tolch, in his study of facial expressions, to get a
significant prOportion of recognition of meanings, both in
and out of various contexts.50
When the whole body makes a gesture it seems to Delsarte
that the movement will have a Special relationship to a
center. The relationship will express power, wisdom, or
love.51 Power is displayed by movement grpp a center,
wisdom by movement toward a center, and love by movement
around a center. When an external stimulus results in an
internal impulse to act, the body movement starts at a
center, such as in the torso, and moves the body toward its
objective. When a thought motivates a gesture, often the
gesture is an enfolding and inclusive one originating in the
mind and extending to the hand, and moving into an enclosing
or summoning gesture. When love is the internal motivation,
the center of movement is not located in the mover, is not
—_‘
SOTolch, _p. cit., p. 95.
51Shawn, _p, cit., p. 60.
l1
371
an appetite or a thought of the moving individual, accord-
ing to Delsarte; but the center is external to the individual,
'that is, in the Object loved. Hence the movement is one of
surrounding the object of interest. Of course, Delsarte
differentiates between love and desire, the latter center
being located in the lower torso.
To distinguish between love and desire, and other E
emotions whose centers seemed to be either in or beyond
the self, Delsarte evolved certain workable variables for
emotion. Each emotion, to Delsarte, is composed of either
attraction or repulsion, and positive or negative self
interest. For examples: if one feels weak and impotent
in the presence of something that repels one, the emotion
may be described as fear. If one feels strong and able,
in the presence of something that is attractive, the emotion
can be described as aggression. To Delsarte love involves
negative self feeling, or no feeling of self at all, only
an attraction, or liking for, the object, plus a certain
identification with the object. Desire involves a definite
positive self feeling combined with attraction.
Delsarte also observed a relationship between the
direction a person faces and his attitude. When a person
faces an object directly he is being frank, honest, and
concerned with the object. When he faces obliquely, he is
being two faced. When he faces away from, at a right angle
372
to, the object he is honest and frank, but not interested
in the object so much as in some other subject.52 Delsarte's
rationale for these observations was that a man faced in the
direction of his interest regardless of the position of his
listener. Of course, such facings presuppose an uninhibited
Speaker. When the speaker has a divided interest, divided
between his speech and its listener and some other purpose, 1
his facing is oblique, his speech is not sincere, he is apt
to be conniving or hyprocritical. When he faces his listener
his attention and interest are frankly focused on the same
thing. Whether or not Delsarte's reasons are accurate, the
feelings expressed by, and created in, an actor when he uses
such facings are proof of some basis in fact for Delsarte's
Observations.
7-Delsarte's Principle of Breath in Body Movement. Another
principle that Delsarte derived from his Observations is
that breath is life.53 Breathing rhythms show emotion. If
breathing is strong and rapid then an individual is very ex-
cited, if strong and Slow then alive and peaceful, if
weak and rapid, then weak and excited. If the breathing
stOps for a moment, then life is temporarily suSpended.
If breath is released in a sigh then life is released,
the individual is relaxed and is living at a low
emotional level. Laughter is the result of having so
—_I
521bid., p. 57. 531bid., p. 59.
373
much joy of living, and so much breath, that the excess is
exploded in rhythmic bursts. Laughter is impossible without
a great deal Of breath. Crying is the result of the in-
dividual giving up. He has no breath, but the autonomic
nervous system won't let him die, and the breath is forced
in, in gasping inhalations, or sobs. Crying by bursting
exhalations is either a fake or the result of a positive,
life affirming, emotion of anger and frustration.
8-Delsarte Evaluated. This study has attempted to give
Delsarte's laws of motion and body area a simple and
sympathetic interpretation. They form the basis for most
contemporary choreography and pantomime, and so are important
both as an early attempt to systematize observation and as
a key to understanding certain contemporary stage movement
forms.
Delsarte's life work convinced him that movement was
rooted in universal human experience and hence communicates
universally. If he was correct, a director cannot arbitrarily
change the meaning of a movement, because movements already
carry their own emotional and universal meanings. The only
place where new meanings may arise would be through unique
idiosyncratic or stylistic distortions of the basic univer-
sal movement. If a director is unaware of the universals,
he may convey their meaning in spite of his intent. For
this reason, a dancer, pantomimist, or actor ought to start
by learning the language of the human body and of the stage.
374
Such learning will not restrict him, but free him if he
learns the language as principles, not poses, as general
and empirical truths, not absolutes. The learning of any
verbal language is imperative for free expressive verbal
communication. Learning the language of movement should
carry the same importance for movement communication.
Perhaps Delsarte's principles and Specifics are not
universal and convey meaning for reasons other than his.
However, the actor need only try to use these principles
sympathetically and in modern context to be convinced of
their efficacy whenever the desire is to communicate
through the duplication of nature. It is up to the
psychologist to determine whether this nature is innate
or learned. All the actor needs to know is that the be-
havior described by Delsarte is natural to the adult human
being. If the human being is using learned symbols for
emotions, the symbols are being used unconsciously as a
part of the heritage of his culture. In any event, Delsarte
will prove rewarding to the director who has the patience to
wade through outworn terminology, to reconstruct, test, and
improve upon Delsarte's empirical findings about the meaning
of movement. Especially valuable is the experience of having
Delsarte's principles demonstrated. Movement's meanings
ultimately must be self evident to be true, for they are
their own language and must speak for themselves.
To replace Delsarte's system really requires that
375
someone replace Delsarte's study using his methods without
his trinitarian prediSpositions. Observations need to be
made in America to correlate movement with emotions,
attitudes, and situations in real life events. Tests in the
laboratory or in the theatre will not accomplish the same
task. The result of field observation will not be a list of
pure psychological symptoms, but it could well be a natural,
cultural language of movement.
0) Pantomimists' and Dancers' Views of Mimetic Bopy
Movement.--From the views of writers on pantomime and dance
emerge three tendencies in mimetic movement: the first is
to accept Delsarte without much question; the second is to
emphasize a more modern psychological concern with motiva-
tion rather than resultant form; and the third is to stylize
mimetic movement into Special theatrical symbols of realistic
behavior.
l-Pantomime and Dance Dependent Upon Delsarte. There is a
strong need to take up investigation where Delsarte left
off. Many dance and pantomime authors state certain agree-
ment with Delsarte's principles without presenting any
Specific approaches as to how to move to convey meaning.
Albright, speaking directly of Delsarte says, "Certain
bodily actions are so directly and universally expressive
of basic emotions or attitudes of mind that it would be
foolish to ignore them."54 He goes on to state that some
—_
514H. D. Albright, William P. Halstead, and Lee Mitchell,
Priï¬ciples of Theatre Art (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1955),
p. 60
376
actions are instinctive and universal and some are derived
from theatre practice. However, without some systematic
formulation of principles and of Specific bodily actions
Albright's statement is useless. The actor and the director
must work not with statements but with Specific movements
on a stage under particular circumstances.
Other authors, when they do become specific, merely
present some updated version of Delsarte, using the triune
designations and often the same body-mind-soul trichotomy.
Humphries states, with Delsarte, "every emotion has a
concomitant bodily movement."55 While Lutz proclaims, "Panto-
mime is the revelation of human emotion through bodily
expression," and again, "bodily expression is less individu-
ally characteristic than verbal expression, but it is more
universal and fundamental."56 Lutz follows up her Delsarte
convictions with a loosely worked out Delsarte system.
However, She does not give any of the credit to Delsarte.
Most Of her discussion concerns establishing the need for
principles in any art form, especially in pantomime.57 Her
chief principles stem from Delsarte's Observation that
expressive actions stem from the intellectual, emotional,
55Humphries, pp, cit., p. 114.
56Florence Lutz, The Technique of Pantomime (Berkeley,
California: Sather Gate BoOk Shop, 1927), p. 3.
57Ibid., p. 9.
377
and vital parts of the body which are the head, torso, and
legs.58 From that point on her system is almost exclu-
sively Delsartian. His point of view is well presented
by her, however, and by a woman who taught pantomime at
the American Academy of Dramatic Art and in the California
University system.
Humphries, whose fundamentals also follow Delsarte
quite closely, has more original interpretations than Lutz.
Her ideas are a combination of general principles of form
and structure in art and of psychology with a firm basis
in Delsarte.
For the above reasons, not a great deal that is new
to this study appears in a survey of Pantomime principles.
However, certain fundamentals do stand out, original or
not, and deserve to be mentioned.
2-Pantomime and Dance Movement Dependent Upon Motivation.
The pantomimists and dancers all agree that movement should
be motivated, but the stress is variously placed either
on the inner feeling or on the outer form. How to achieve
the outer form stimulates a similar controversy in acting,
the method vs. technique controversy. Should results be
achieved by performing techniques or by thinking right?
The way of achieving movement that has meaning is only
of passing interest to this study; however, it Should be noted
58Ibid., p. 27.
378
that inner motivation without attention to outer form can
at best result only in realistic body movement. At best
the actor can only achieve the first, or unstylized mimetic,
means of communicating meaning by movement. In fact, each
of the authors studied assents to the limitation of mere
internal motivation. Either it is recommended that the
performer learns his techniques first before he performs in
a Situation that must be motivated, or else it is recommended
that the result of performing from inner emotion needs to
be stylized before presented on the stage.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of motivation from
the point of view of the theatre man is that many dancers
also insist upon it. Humphries insists on a conscious
motivation for every dance move. Her view is that in
dance, people are communicating to peOple about people, and
as all moves in nature are motivated so should they be in
dance. The order in which her dancers proceed in rehearsal
and in training is from emotion to mime to dance movement.59
Louis Horst also feels the dancer Should have inner con-
viction, that it must be expressed, abstracted, and sublim-
60
ated into dance movement. Ananda Coomeraswamy, Speaking
Of the highly stylized and specific Hindu dances, maintains
59
60Louis Horst, "Louis Horst Considers the Question,"
Impglse 1954 (San Francisco: Impulse Publications, 1954),
p. .
Humphries, pp, pp,, p. 110.
379
that the dance-artist must be absorbed in his theme, not
absorbed in resultant forms.61 He obviously feels the
dancer should know both his technique before dancing and
his motivations while dancing.
Humphries declares that the alternative to motivated
movement is virtuoso technique. In effect, in virtuoso
technique, movement for the sake of movement replaces move-
ment that communicates?2 Her parting advice concerning
motivation is not to intellectualize but to motivate.63
The result she wishes to avoid is the dancer-actor who
ceases to move like a human being who is motivated by a
complex variety of feelings, and begins to move like a
machine dominated by the one center, the brain. The re-
sult, as was mentioned in the section on Delsarte, is
affectation in movement. The specific practice which she
warns against is the imitation of other arts such as
painting and sculpture. Such imitation will do for the
dance what similar imitation would do to blocking techniques
in stage plays, namely "put a blight of immobility on the
dance" and provide only "static relationships."6u
One of the few even partial opponents to Delsarte is
Agna Enters. Enters says "Delsarte had tried to free French
Â¥
61
Ananda Coomeraswamy, "The Dance of Shiva," ibid.,
62
Humphries, pp, cit., p. 110.
63Ihid., p. 165. 64Ibid., p. 165.
380
theatre of its stylized form but had only achieved a
formula himself. His formula, adapted to Opera, theatre, and
dance, succeeded in all but killing mime as a legitimate form
of theatre expression‘l65 It must be reiterated that Delsarte
and his "popularizers" belong in separate categories.
Delsarte intended no formula. However, it seems that most
of what is usable and most of what is stagnating in the stage
conception of the meaning of body movement stems from
Delsarte. The only other significant strain originates
with Stanislavsky; and even his "popularizers" have succeeded
in eliminating much of his insistence on the use of bodily
symptoms. Tharuse only the inner motivation. Both Delsarte
and Stanislavsky insisted on both "inner" and "outer" but
the achievement of both is hard work and painstaking, so
free expression rules the day and the grammar of movement
continues to be in relative disuse.
3-Pantomime and Dance Movement Dependent Upon Stylizing
Mimesis Into Symbol. Although Agna Enters warns against
learning a Specific dance form, She does recommend learning
universal symbols .66 It seems only the modern method
actOr has lost touch with technique. Problems arise, how-
ever, when the universal symbols are made specific. What
Symbols are universal and what ones are pure theatrical
—.__
65Walter Sorell (ed.), The Dance Has Many Faces
(Cleveland: The World Publishing Company, 1951), p. 89.
66Ibid., p. 93.
381
convention; Humphries adds to Delsarte's specific symbols
a four part designation of her own that She maintains is
universal. She calls it her principle of standardized
gestures ("gestures" meaning integrated movements of the
entire body).
In any culture, She maintains, there are four types
of gesture: social, functional, ritual, and emotional.67
Examples of the social are the bow, the handshake, and the
embrace. These are gestures with specific meanings in
social contexts. They are accepted forms of social gesture.
Examples of the functional gestures are those concerned
with work such as burden carrying, climbing, and throwing.
Examples of ritual gestures are the genuflect, the hands
held in prayer, and the prostration. These gestures have
accepted meanings in worship and civil ceremony. The
emotional gestures, Humphries maintains, are less standard-
ized though she subscribes in general to Delsarte's observa-
tions. Her point is that these gestures are less automatic,
less under conscious control, less habitually practiced,
and hence can have a greater range of individual expression
within the universal basis.
Charles Aubert's Specific language of pantomime also
involves a mimetic basis for a symbolic language.68
His
67Humphries, pp, cit., p. 114.
68Charles Aubert, The Art of Pantomime. Trans. Edith
Sears (New York: Henry Holt Company, 1927),
382
book is a catalogue of body and facial expression covering
every nuance of feeling and attitude. The reader's first
inclination may be to discard Aubert's system as being too
categorical and old-fashioned. Then the reader may look at
Aubert's pictures and try to decide what Aubert says is
being expressed. After a near perfect score, allowing for
differences in vocabulary, the reader may decide that
Aubert's system needs a closer look. From the closer look
will emerge two principles: the first is that Aubert's
gestures follow certain sets of matched Oppositions. The
second is that the Specifics of eXpression are exaggerated
realism amounting to accepted symbols of what expression
means. The former principle is not unlike Delsarte, while
the latter is not unlike Delsarte's so-called "pOpularizerS."
However, both have communication possibilities, and should
not be shunned.
Some of the Oppositions that emerge from a comparison of
Aubert's Specifics are as follows: advance-retreat, ex-
pansive-contractive, give-take, expose-protect, and posi-
tive-negative. In effect most of the attitudes or emotions
that.Aubert illustrates divide themselves into positive and
negative expression. The basis for them is not unlike
Dietrich's designations in the first part of this study, nor
unlike Selden's. The only unique contribution is the
attempt to present these principles in usable form.
Other principles that emerge from Aubert's illustra-
tions are the gestures that draw attention to, or originate
383
from, parts of the body. These principles are the same as
Delsarte's principles Of successions. Still another Aubert
principle involves symmetry and asymmetry. His Observation
here closely resembles Delsarte's Oblique facing. An
asymmetrical gesture, or asymmetrical mouth, is supposed to
originate from a conniving or hypocritical attitude. A
symmetrical gesture is supposedly expressive of frank, Open )
honesty. Symbolically, possibly there is a certain meta-
phorical validity. If both Sides of a symmetrical body )
are engaged in the same activity then there is a consistency
of external, hence, by association, of internal, approach.
If one member, or side, of the symmetrical body is denying
what the other Side is doing, the impression of divided
purpose, or affectation, is conveyed.
The variety of terminology used by the various authors
studied is perhaps the major obstacle to comparison and
understanding. Delsarte preferred a trinity, Aubert
preferred a duality, and mystics and modern psychologists
seem to prefer a unity of multiplicity. Whatever the
cataloguing system, or the metaphysical prediSposition,
however, all seem able to add new principles and techniques
to the mimetic movement language of the stage director.
3. Metaphor Applied to the Dancer's Body Movement
The dancers yield more suggestions than the pantomimists
concerning the use of metaphor in body movement, Since it
seems the pantomimists feel their movement is primarily
384
mimetic. The dancers view the use of metaphor variously as:
an analogy through substitution of parts, a kinesthesia of
analogy and abstraction, a non-verbal poetic image, and a
special metaphorical relationship where the script is re-
lated to stage movement as the music is to dance movement.
a) Humphries' Substitution of Part§,--Humphries has a
Special analogical use for her language of gesture. Not ‘
only does her gesture provide a vocabulary of culturally
standardized mimetic movement symbols, it also provides a
point of departurefbr dance movements. Beyond the normal
pantomimic exaggeration and stylistic distortion of the
standardized gestures Humphries also adapts them to dance
by what this study calls analogy. Her term for it is
"substitution of parts."69 One example will suffice. If
a real emotion resulted in rapid, heavy breathing, a normal
mimetic pantomime distortion would merely heighten or
exaggerate the heaving chest and the sound of air being
inhaled and exhaled. In the idea of substitution of parts
first an analytical breakdown of the real life action must
take place. The breathing is composed of a moving part Of
the body, a definite rhythm and velocity, a sound, and an
empathic meaning. Humphries might decide, for dance, that
the legs would take over the role of the moving part and
maintain the rhythm and velocity of the breathing. If the
69Humphries, pp. cit., p. 114.
385
director-choreographer has succeeded in providing an
emotional context for the leg movement-breathing, the
rhythm of the legs should become attuned to the rhythm Of
the audience breathing. The larger leg movement Should
carry better in the theatre than merely heavy breathing.
The problem becomes one of what is communicated. Will
leg movement stimulate audience breathing rate as surely as
breathing rate would stimulate audience breathing rate, or
will leg movement be largely an intellectual symbol instead
of a motivated action? There is no easy answer. Tests
would have to be made. However, at this point, Humphries
has definitely added to the director's possibility for
communication by metaphor, and suggested a direction for
combining metaphor with imitation of the natural.
b) Hayes' Kinesthesia Through Abstraction and Analogy.--
Hayes calls the alternative to literal dance pantomime
"communicative symbolism," what this study means by
metaphor. Examples she presents to illustrate the principle
are abstractions of pleasure sensations such as in Swinging?O
The literal mimetic pantomime of swinging would involve
putting a swing on stage. The metaphorical use would be
to abstract the rhythm and the to and fro movement, along
with the pleasant joyous pantomimic moves, from the swinging
movement. These moves could be translated into the hand
7gayes, pp, cit., p. 91.
i
3
‘
386
swinging and the body dancing forward and backward. This
study maintains such adaptation is metaphorical because it
illustrates the relationship A is to B as C is to D. One
situation is comparable to, has analagous parts with,
another. The rising and falling Shape of the swing is
taken over by the arms swinging. The to and fro movement
is replaced by dancing to and fro. The rope is to the
seat of the swing as the arm is to the hand; the body of
the swinger is to the ground as the body of the dancer
is to the stage floor.
Hayes suggests in her approach to abstraction that
"spacial rhythms and kinesthetic effectiveness" be
abstracted from literal moves and used in the dance. The
stage director may have equal success in abstractions even
to the point of adding new dimensions to his realistic
moves. Realistic actions could also be "swinging" as well
as real.
c) Erdman's Non-Verbal Poetic Image.-—Jean Erdman
thinks of dance not as pantomime, but as "non-verbal
poetic image".71 Hers is a form of metaphorical meaning
where dancers become the embodiment of interplaying forces.
In depicting these forces it would seem that She would
need other metaphors, such as waves or winds of force, to
help her picture her movement. So in effect she uses a
double metaphor.
L
71Sorell, pp, cit., p. 197.
387
d) Music and Dance Analogous to Script and Stage Move-
pppp,--Because dance is almost always performed to the
accompaniment of music, choreographers have depended upon
music a great deal for the form of the dance, as stage
directors have depended upon the script for the form of
the stage movement. In fact, it seems possible for the
stage director to consider the relationship between music
and the dance as analogous to that of the script and the
stage movement. The emotional values in the rhythm, tempo,
and structure of music can be analogically related to the
script, while the dance is related to the stage movement.
To illustrate the use of the analogy, Hayes warns
that a dance Should not "ride the music"; for example, if
there is a rising and falling of the scale the dance should
not synchronize with it in a rising and falling movement.72
The result would be comic, melodramatic, or certainly
redundant at best. Her suggestion is to provide contra-
puntal or contrasting movement, to dance to the underlying
theme of rhythm of the music instead of to match the music
line by line. The same principle is of value to the stage
director who relates movement to words. Contrapuntal
rhythms and meanings between the movement and the words
provide more depth and interest. They also tend to provide
in the play what the bass is to the music, i.e., a solid
72Hayes, _p, pip,, p. 96.
388
foundation to the structure, an emotional plot line, or a
theme line, that consistently portrays the spine of the
play. In any event, pantomime that has strictly verbal
meaning Should be avoided in accompaniment to words, even
more than in accompaniment to music. Two forms expressing
the same thing provide an echo that can be very confusing.
Humphries suggests that the relationship of dance to
music Should be like a dialogue; here she is using the
stage Situation as an analogue for the dance.73 Music, to
her, editorializes on, does not dominate or duplicate, the
movement. The actor should be dominant. Probably here the
analogy between play and dance breaks down, but it is at
precisely these "break" points where some of the best ideas
occur. The analogy breaks down because music, unlike
Speech, is only the accompaniment for the dancer. The
dancer, it is understood, is to be dominant. However,
music and Speech do not have a parallel function. Speech
originates in the actor, and so either speech or movement
would still keep the actor dominant. However, if one
carries the analogy further, the idea arises of considering
the Speech and the movement of actors as having a dialogue
relationship to each other with the movement aspect of the
actor the dominant one. An example of this dominance might
be a Situation devised to make the underlying intent of the
scene more important than the words. Perhaps a casual
73Humphries, pp, cit., p. 80.
389
conversation is being held on stage as a cover for some
momentous action afoot.
A daring application of this analogy could be made,
however, in scripts whose verbal repartee is not all that
it should be. Every director sooner or later must face the
script that is light and fluffy, that has little literary
merit and rather hackneyed Situations. A creative director,
by using contrapuntal and dominating movement, can do
wonders in depth with such a script.
A peculiar result of working with movement alone is
that the artist becomes aware quickly of just what cannot be
expressed by movement, what Situations require words.
Humphries notes that philosophy, statistics, mechanical and
literary themes, and vast scale universals cannot be ex-
pressed in movement.74 Movement primarily needs human
action, not human ideas, to perform. Hayes adds that
words are needed for anything specific and factual; also
that words are much more efficient than stage movement in
bringing two ideas together in quick succession.75 Of
course the filmic montage accomplishes this joining feat
with some ease, but her point is still well taken for the
stage.
7uipip,, p. 36.
75Hayes, _p, cit., p. 125.
390
4. Symbol in Dancer's Body Movement: Meaning Derived From
Dance "Sign Language".
What the inexact communication by body movement
logically leads to is the prospect of a standardized Sign
language of movement meanings. Dancers and pantomimists
alike realize there is no such language of movement in our
Western HemiSphere. The closest the director can come to
it is with the four types of standardized gesture of which
Humphries writes. Even so, those gestures do not substitute
for words; even though their meaning is Specific, it is
mostly non-verbal.
For a verbal language of movement the director must
turn to the east. It takes a long established culture, or
one that is inbred and relatively immobile, to develop a
dance or pantomime form that has as many Specific meanings
as a verbal language, especially one that is as generally
understood as a national verbal language. Hand movements
of the Hindu, Ceylonese, Burmese, Chinese, Japanese, and
Balinese dancers have approximately achieved such uniformity
of meaning. Even the Hawaiian hula has to some extent
standardized its hand gestures, though its vocabulary is as
small as its verbal language.
Is there any way that the stage director may employ
this third method of communicating by movement, this
movement Sign language of certain dances? To do so would
seem at this point as monumental a task as perfecting a
391
movement ESperanto. The first task would be to devise the
language from symbolic and symptomatic movements already
in the vocabulary of the culture, from pantomime that would
have the most universal associations, and from metaphors
that would be best understood. The next task would be to
establish and standardize such a language through usage.
Even to approximate such a goal would take many lifetimes
and even then would probably not be successful. It is true
that fast moving cultures like to watch movement that they
understand, that is relaxing, diverting, and cathartic.
However, they do not seem to like to add more work to busy
schedules. A language of movement that duplicates, without
improving upon, the verbal language already in use, would
be one tool too many. It seems that busy America would not
be dilletante enough to cultivate such a literal language of
movement, even if it were desirable to do so.
Communication by Bodprovement Starts From Reality
Something that Picasso said will serve to end this
section on communication by body movement. In Speaking of
the source of his art he said, "There is no other point of
departure than reality'l76 To retain meaning in a movement,
that movement's relationship to reality should be apparent.
It can be apparent regardless of whether the stage director's
language of expressive movement relates to reality by
_—
76Sorell, pp, pi§., p- 245.
392
abstraction, mimesis, symbol, or metaphor. If he evolves
his language with as much imagination as Picasso evolves
his paintings, the director should have no trouble in both
reaching and startling his age and culture.
D. Conclusion: Fine and Gross Movement Without Words,
Vehicles for Expression or Communication
Not all dancers feel their role as artists Should in-
volve communication. Some desire to express themselves
either for the joy of expression or for presentation of
formal beauty. Communication of specific plots, ideas, or
feelings is not in their province. Their thought is that
the dance can and should only express itself.
1. Communication Problem: The Uhtranslatableness of Art
A proponent of the "dance for dance's sake" point
of view could well draw upon a concept from aesthetics,
the untranslatableness of art: No art object can be
successfully translated into another medium, or even into
the same medium, without some loss or change. A painting
can be described by literature, but the two media are not
equivalent. A dance can portray a story, but the two are
not the same. A movement can be described in words, or
felt as emotion, but the words or the emotion are not the
movement. The movement is itself, says itself, and can
only be adequately translated by repeating the movement
itself.
393
This point of view about the untranslatableness of art
is valid enough. No two things are equal, and certainly
when a change of medium occurs there is very little equiva-
lence remaining. However, approximate translations can be
made; given the loss or the change as a necessary part of
the process, translation not only can but does occur. For
example, as has been previously discussed, empathy accounts
for a translation of actor body movement, through audience
associations, into audience feelings regardless of the
communication intent of the dancer or actor. Some communi-
cation takes place through empathy with even the most
abstract or formal movement.
2. Audience Reaction to Communication: Diverse or Controlled
Although some communication will take place with any
movement, the more abstract, the more esoteric, and the less
contextual that movement is the more diffuse will be the
reactions of the audience. Each member will respond
according to his own experience; the very esoteric nature
of the dance of "pure eXpreSSion" will allow for diverse,
chance, uncontrolled audience reactions. However, the
more generally recognized the dance movements are the more
they allow for, or even enforce, uniformity of audience
response.
It seems to this study that a dancer or director would
want to control whatever there is in his art he can control.
He would not want to leave anything to chance where he could
394
exercise control. If so, then it behooves the abstract
artist to know what connotations his abstractions have,
and to control the affect they have on his audiences. In
any case, if a performer successfully expresses an emotion
(unless it be by some intellectualized concept of a symbol
that somehow has connotations for himself alone) he will
successfully communicate that emotion as well. In fact, if
he truly expresses the emotion, the expression must first
reinstate the emotion to some extent in himself, by the
process of kinesthetics. If the symbolic or symptomatic
expression does not reinstate the emotion in himself at
all, he is probably not expressing it. If the performer
has been an active member of the human race, and is per-
forming in his own cultural environment, then the pymbolic
expression should be at least similar to that of his
audience, and should be communicated to them. The accurate
pymptomatic expression should communicate itself to any
audience anywhere.
Of course, if the findings of this study have any
validity, even the abstract formal elements of dance will
communicate feelings to, and provide associations for, an
audience. It seems, then, that a strictly expressive, or
formal abstract, pantomimic or dance art does not exist in
any pure state. Hence either the artist controls his
medium and designs his communication or he allows certain
aspects of his art to be out of his control by letting each
395
person or cultural group derive the meanings that are forced
upon it by its particular background experience.
3;. Content of Movement Communication: Musical and
Emotional vs. Ideational
Some dancers maintain that movement can have a pure
empathic communication function without plot content. A
sequence of movements may provide build and climax, vari-
ation and contrast in emotional meanings, much as in
music, without a Specific story line. A movement theme
may be an emotional rather than an ideational one. For
examples; the structure may be according to musical or
emotional rather than narrational forms.
a) Movement Content Structured According to Music.-~A
typical dance and music form is the ABA, where a first
section of music is repeated, with variations, in a last
section. The movement pattern is also repeated with
variations. The familiar section with a new twist pro-
vides satisfaction for an audience; the dances comes full
circle, and the end is tied in with the beginning. It is
tied in largely by way of formal and emotional movement
elements, not by narrational content.
There is a suggestion here for the theatre director.
It is to structure his movement patterns in some way which
will formally and emotionally relate to each other by tying
the beginning to the end, or by alternating patterns
throughout his play in some symphonic way.
396
b) Movement Content Structured According to Emotion.--
A second suggestion from dance to the stage director is to
provide his play with some pure emotion. This can perhaps
help him in two vital ways: one is to unite his audience
with his play, and the other is to give his audience a
cathartic release of tension. No matter what the idea
content of a play, no matter how universal and appealing,
the ideas are apt to be controversial to some extent and
involve the audience in thinking. Thinking can both divide
an audience and tire them. This is not to suggest that
thinking is bad, but a director desires to consolidate
his audience, not divide them, even in thought. So, a
purely emotional scene, carried largely by emotional
movement, such as a dance insert, can help for that moment
to unite an audience emotionally instead of to divide them
rationally. Once they are united, they enjoy the play more,
and it may be easier for the director to direct their think-
ing and feeling with his techniques of communication.
The second aSpect to the emotional scene, the cathartic
release, is implied in the first aspect. The cathartic
release, the abandonment to emotion, really precedes the
unification and provides a healthful empathic exercise and
release of tension. The director has to remember that a
play may be work for him, but it is play for his audience.
In essence, the dancer suggests to the stage director
the playing of the pure empathic scene. In it, symptoms
397
and symbols, symbols that are so well learned that they are
thought of as symptoms, communicate the emotional nature of
man directly to the audience in a way that can unite the
audience in feeling with the play.
4. The Dance Trend: Communication Over Expression
Usually the contemporary dance choreographer, who
deals with silent movement, is compelled to be concerned
with what is communicated by the expressive qualities of
movement. His is the struggle to avoid becoming esoteric,
i.e., moving for the sake of movement, and to avoid merely
perpetuating certain virtuoso dance steps. Ballet, tap,
and acrobatic dances have tended toward this lack of
communication. But when a choreographer is not only an
artist but has a social consciousness and something to
say, communication by movement is essential to him, and
the stage director can learn much from such a choreographer
to enrich the play's language of movement.
The conviction of modern dancers, pantomimists, and
many psychologists is that every body movement means some-
thing. AS Louis Horst puts it, one "can't invent a move-
ment. All have some original emotional meaning and
arouse kinesthetically some correlative of the original
experience."77 When a universal symptom or symbol is
77Horst, pp. cit., p. 5.
398
discovered it will convey a universal meaning, a meaning
much enriched by each individual's experience.
Movement has great untapped potential. A study of
Hutchinson's book on Labanotation convinces the reader of
the vast number and subtlety of possible movements.78 This
system for recording movement also convinces the reader of
how few of these movements are actually consciously employed
on stage. Delsarte's pioneer investigations and the views
of certain present day psychologists show the vast potential
for meaning that the large number of movement variations
have. Together, these studies reveal how much investigation
still has to be made into natural symptomatic and symbolic
movement, into the application of metaphor to movement, and
into the possibilities of a standardized language Of move-
ment. In the meantime, these studies also reveal a great
deal that the practicing stage director already can add to
his craft from the principles and techniques of the
pantomimists and the dancers.
78Ann Hutchinson, Labanotation (New York: James
Laughlin, 1954),
PART III
CONCLUSIONS: TOWARD A LANGUAGE 0F MOVEMENT
CHAPTER VIII
A FOCUS ON MORE DYNAMIC MOVEMENT MEANINGS:
COMPOSITION,PICTURIZATION, MIMESIS,
METAPHOR, AND SYMBOL
Movement variables have been grouped in this study into
two major categories: movement for emphasis, or focus, and
movement for meaning. Alexander Dean, as has been seen,
makes Similar distinctions which he calls composition and
picturization. The first category, composition, draws
attention to the structural aspect of movement; the role
structure plays in bringing audience attention to bear on
the meanings of the whole play, be those meanings conveyed
by movement, picture, or words. The second category,
picturization, draws attention to the meaning of that same
movement, the role the movement plays in supplying meaning
to a play. Composition principles Should enable the director
not only to point to a single element in focus, but to
create an entire range of values in both time and space,
and also to determine degrees of importance in either
simultaneously or sequentially presented material. Once
composition has determined to a large extent what will hold
the attention of the audience, picturization, or the meaning
of moving and pictorial relationships, Should supply the
moving content to which the audience attends. These meanings
of movement seem to be of three varieties: mimetic,
4OO
401
metaphoric, and symbolic.
In this chapter some suggestions will be made to the
director to help him organize and supplement his principles
and techniques of composition and movement meaning.
A. More Dynamic Composition: Through Balance and Flow
One of the challenges of this study is to find more
dynamic movement compositions that will take advantage of
the strong impression movement makes upon an audience.
The crux of dynamic movement seems to be in keeping the
element of balance from becoming static, and in keeping
still pictures from interrupting the flow of continuity.
By combining principles from various media, for the most part
already discussed in this study, certain dynamic balance and
flow compositional relationships emerge. They are presented
here for the scruntiny of the director. He may pick what he
likes and discard the rest; he may recombine to suit his own
taste or production. However, the method of abstraction,
combination, and reapplication may prove helpful whether or
not individual suggestions have for him direct use.
1. Dynamic Use of Balance in Moving Composition
Balance in moving composition provides the director
with additional possibilities for a combination of principles.
Most lists of aesthetic elements include balance as a must
in composition. However, the dynamic use of balance is
rarely discussed, beyond the suggestion that balance should
402
be thought of on the stage as an equilibrium in time, not
just in space; balance may not ultimately be achieved until
the final curtain.
a) Balance in Time as Well as Space.--The general con-
cept of balance in time and space suggests a useful ratio.
In static physical balance, as has been seen, a mathematical
computation is made to assure balance: the distance from
the fulcrum times the weight of the Opposite object. In
moving balance somehow time needs to be considered in the
computation. Given the product of the mass and distance
from the fulcrum of one compositional element, one can
multiply that figure with the length of time the weight is
held at that distance. If the total product of mass, dis-
tance, and time on one Side equals the same product on the
other side of the fulcrum, the total play movement is
balanced.
l-Actual VS. Apparent Balance in Space. Of course it is to
be remembered that impression of weight and distance are
more important on stage than actual weight and distance.
It is also to be remembered that the fulcrum is not only a
center point in the plane of the stage floor, it is also a
center point in the plane of the proscenium. In effect, to
some extent the fulcrum has to be thought Of as being at the
center of a rectangular cubic space that lies within the Six
bounding planes of the stage space. To complicate the
computation still further, it has to be remembered that up
and down stage space does not seem as deep as it really is,
403
that raised and lowered movementStend to find their center
closer to the stage because of the given "weight" of the stage
floor, and that the eye tends to find the center of a com-
position slightly left of the mathematical center.
The above considerations suggest that it would take all
that physics and art can do, together with the help of an
electronic computer to establish when a play actually
finishes in balance. Such a computation is, of course, not
advised. However, the principles and variables that go into
such a computation can be very valuable in estimating the
balance of a scene, of an act, and of a total play.
2-Apparent Balance in Time. Fortunately for the director,
another factor makes an actual balance, such as described
above, unnecessary even in theory. The audience tends to
place most emphasis on that which is most recently seen.
Minutes of imbalance may be compensated for by seconds of
balance; minutes of stage left can be compensated for by
seconds of stage right. So, using the principle that the
last seen creates the strongest impression, the director
can achieve apparent balance in time with relatively uneven
totals in a computation of actual balance or even of apparent
balance in space alone.
To illustrate, in a dynamic balance in time, rather than
simultaneous in space, there is a balance relationship that
may exist between two unequal scenes. The movement and its
speed may give scenes of different lengths equal weight. A
short Scene of more rapid, intense, or massive movement will
404
balance with a longer scene of less rapid, intense, or
massive movement. For example, in a sequence of scenes
that are building to a climax, each scene may be shorter
than its predecessor. The last and shortest scene, how-
ever, is expected to carry the greatest impact, that is the
greatest impression of weight. To give this sequence its
prOper build each scene can have more peOple in it, more
movement, more rapid movement, more volume, and more in—
tense or Violent movement than the preceding scene. An
approximate ratio then is seen to exist. The shorter the
scene, the more mass and movement is needed to maintain
apparent weight.
b) Effect on Audience of Apparent Balance and Imbalance.
--Given the above variables and principles with which to
work there are certain interesting ways in which apparent
balance factors affect audiences. There appear to be certain
static, potential, and kinetic qualities to apparent balance
and imbalance. The relatively static effect of apparent
balance seems to imply rest, poise, equilibrium, and
stability. Imbalance with no potential for change seems to
imply apprehension or irritation. Apparent imbalance with
potential for change implies motion; while imbalance in
motion, or kinetic imbalance, seems to imply a seeking of
balance. These implications result from the audience's
expecting from apparent and pictorial conditions the same
thing that they have learned to expect from actual physical
conditions. The relationship between real and apparent
405
balance is then analogical.
l-Static Nature of Apparent Balance. There are two basic
kinds of apparent balance. The symmetrical kind tends to
be dull and static while the asymmetrical kind tends to be
more interesting, but still static. Apparent balance
appears dull usually because it contains no potential for
movement. Even as no physical movement is possible when
actual physical balance is achieved, so no physical or
mental movement seems apprOpriate out of apparently balanced
stage pictures; only an eccentric moves. When an unbalanced
composition has either potential for movement or is kineti-
cally in the process of achieving balance, it is the most
exciting composition. It would seem, then, that even a
relatively balanced composition needs someslight imbalance,
a potential for movement, to keep it from becoming static.
Hence, a total balance is best saved for the conclusion
of a play. In fact, if the director desires any sort of
continuing thought or feeling after his play perhaps the final
curtain should also contain some elements of emotional,
ideational, apparent, or actual compositional imbalance.
2-Potential Nature of Apparent Imbalance. There may be in
an unbalanced combination of masses the potential to seek
balance. Each imbalance becomes a tipping, a falling, or a
similar upsetting of the entire pattern. If on stage such
upsetting does not actually take place, because there is no
force combined with the unbalanced masses, the static im-
balance becomes not exciting but irritating. The imbalance
406
that is potential, that contains within it the force
necessary to achieve a balance, is exciting. The balance
achieved may again be static, pleasant at first but eventu-
ally irritating; there is no place to go from the apparent
balance achieved unless it, too, has in it some imbalance
to give it potential for movement.
3-Imbalance Seen as Dynamic Balance. When both force and
~n‘W
mass are involved to create an unbalanced stage it seems
that the result can be an apparent imbalance that is really
a dynamic balance of either the potential or the kinetic
stage. The principles are these: an unbalanced stage
picture, with force ready to work on the unbalanced masses,
makes a potential stage while an imbalance in the process
Of becoming balanced makes a kinetic stage. An unbalanced
stage becoming more unbalanced is a stage in tension; the
string of the bow is being drawn back and the stage is
becoming more potential through motion.
Strictly Speaking, both the kinetic and potential
apparent imbalances seem to be in apparent dynamic balance,
if there is some power, or force, either motivational,
ideational, or physical, that maintains a taut imbalance of
masses. A restraint within a character, an outer force
winning a battle, or the force of an argument driving a
character to a wall all tend to throw the mass of a stage
picture off balance, but the mass is balanced by the force.
In effect, then, there need not be any real imbalance on
407
the kinetic or potential stage, when balance is properly
understood. There is only an imbalance of forces or an
imbalance of masses. One side has the force and another the
mass. In effect, then, the only static balance exists when
each side has an equal mass and an equal force.
In action, when the force of one Side overcomes the mass
on another, there exists a sort of Special vacuum in the
composition. To maintain balance, the victorious force,
which also has some mass, expands its mass to fill the
vacuum. The winning force becomes less compact and "takes
stage." If the Victorious mass fills the stage in an
apparent balance, then the conflict is over and probably
also the play.
4-Problem of Static Balance and Kinetic Imbalance. Perhaps
the only way to rescue a play from the static balanced stage
or from the perpetual motion of a kinetically unbalanced
stage is by a compositional form of the deus ex machina. If
static balance does not have a seed of imbalance and kinetic
imbalance a seed of balance it would appear that an external
element needs to intrude to make a change. ‘When perpetual
Off-balance cannot be modified to create a rest, a pause, or
a conclusion then an outside force, or mass, be it physical
or ideational, must be brought in to create a balance. When
forces are in a deadlock of balance only an outside force
can rescue the situation from its static condition.
The director and playwright together need to tread a
fine line between balance and imbalance. There should be
408
enough inequality of mass and force to provide motivation
enough to impel the movement, and enough equality of mass
and force to bring the moving situation to momentary rests.
To be able to provide these conditions within the Situation
itself, without the necessity of bringing in outside forces,
masses, or ideas, is a skill as important to the planning of
the movement as to the planning of the script.
0) Application of Principles of Apparent Balance in
gimp, There seem to be special ways in which mental and
physical movement, seen as movement of force and mass, may
help to create an apparent dynamic balance. There also
seem to be apparent balancing weights to tempo and rhythm
as well as to the emotional tones of stability and instabil-
ity. Each can add to the dynamic balance.
l-Apparent Weight of Mental and Physical Movement. Some-
times the director is faced with building a sequence of
scenes where there are fewer people in each succeeding scene.
The climax may arrive with only a dialogue. To offset the
shorter time and the decreased mass, there needs to be more
and faster movement and possibly a greater amount of mental
movement to offset the lack of physical movement. If physical
movement is difficult to motivate, weight may have to be
achieved with a taut climax using the tug-of-war rope as an
analogy. Contending forces bring the conclusion to a
balanced tension that is powerfully potential, that shows the
result of physical and mental movement, and that carries as
409
much weight, for that instant, as all of the forces and
masses that the tension implies.
2-Apparent Weight of Tempo and Rhythm. Movement may achieve
force for the potential or kinetic stage also through pace
and rhythm. The slow move is more potential, the fast move
more kinetic. The steady, Slow move has more force than the
erratic or staccato move because of two things: The slow
steady moving object will keep the audience's eye focus more
easily and will connote a large, powerful mass.
3-Apparent Weight of Emotional Tone: Stability and
Instability. There is a special way in which the relative
balance of line, mass, and form may effect the emotions of
the audience, through empathy, to create apparent weight.
If an object on stage, moving or still, is felt to be
bottom heavy, there is an impression of security and
stability. Possibly the reason is that the audience
empathizes with the object as if it were a standing or
sitting man. A man with a broad base of support has a
secure balance, and so the audience feels secure with an
object having a broad base. On the other hand, when an
object appears tOp heavy or leaning, the audience gets the
feeling of instability or insecurity. Again the motor
reactions of the audience are similar to those it would
have in witnessing a tOppling human being.
The object which is stable or unstable may also be
Sympathetic or unsympathetic; it can also appear stronger
410
or weaker than the audience. These variables will give the
compositional element additional emotional connotations.
As an example, if the tOppling object is strong and un-
sympathetic the audience feeling is apt to be fear; if the
strong object is sympathetic and secure the feeling is apt
to be one of joy; on the other hand, if a weak object is
unsympathetic and insecure, there is apt to be a feeling of i
ridicule or comedy.
In essence, the stable base is static while the unstable
base is potential. Strength and lack of sympathy attached
to potential becomes ominous. The extreme Opposite, a
horizontal object in complete balance as a lying man, with
no potential for movement, provides complacency. The in-
stability or stability of the position of a stage actor or
a piece of scenery seems to get its connotations from audience
empathy and motor reSponse. The entire stage seems to make
an audience react by a Similar process. It remains for the
director to take advantage of the excitement and potential
that relative imbalance can create in order to produce a
more dynamic stage movement.
2:219amic Use of Flow in Moving Composition.
Ideas about flow derive principally from a metaphor from
nature, that is the constant movement of life, and a com-
positional element of "one thing at a time" applied to the
two basic flowing movements: physical and psychological.
I
I
i
411
a) Continuous Flow in Physical and Psychological Nature
Applied to the Stagp.--Movement flow in life is constant; in
nature when movement stops life stOps. In a play when move-
ment stops, the life of the play also ceases. However, a
constant flow of movement, with a constant tempo, rhythm,
intensity, direction and magnitude, is both tedious and un-
like life. There are numerous fluctuations for a multitude
of reasons. To further complicate the idea of constant flow
there seem to be two kinds of movement occurring Simultaneous-
ly in human beings, psychological and physical. A play also
has two flows of movement--that which is idea, carried
largely by words, and that which is action or emotion, carried
largely by body movement. To complicate constant flow still
further, there is also a narrative, or plot, flow. However
this script movement of plot does not result in a third type
of stage movement since it is carried by both psychological
and physical movement, by both Sight and sound.
b) One Thing At A Time Applied to Flow.--The director
can devise some interesting compositional relationships,
between the amount of flow of these basic two varieties of
movement, by the principle of one thing at a time. A danger
in the principle that many directors find difficult to avoid
is a predilection toward only movement or only words. The
result is that somehow the movement of the script is almost
always carried by the words, or else always carried by
physical movement. Another danger is that "one thing at a
412
time" becomes such a ruling principle that movement occurs
largely in a sound or verbal vacuum, while words occur
largely in a body movement vacuum. Its opposite danger is
that the meaning is contained simultaneously in both physical
and mental movement and hence results in redundancy. One
thing at a time, applied, really results in degrees of
dominance of mental and physical movement rather than an
absence of either.
c) Flow Relationships BetWeen Mental and Physical
Movement.--Severa1 relationships between the psychological
and physical flow, using modifications of the principle
of one thing at a time, may be useful to the director.
A basic principle is this: When the movement of the
script is largely mental, verbal, or conceptual, i.e., a
movement of idea, physical movement should be retarded pro-
portionately. ‘When the movement of the script is largely
physical, emotional, or active, i.e., a movement of body
action, of doing, then mental movement, or words, should
be retarded proportionately. ‘Words and moves each have mean-
ing separately; each by itself is capable of carrying almost
the entire content of a scene. Radio directors and panto-
mimists can attest to the abilities of each to provide all
that is needed to communicate. ‘When both are together each
must be modified to contribute to a total that is the sum
Of, or more than the sum of, its parts. Otherwise there are
413
two wholes simultaneously presented and focus is confused,
like in a two ring circus. There should be only one whole.
The above principle can be applied in many ways depend-
ing upon the play in question and the director's interpre-
tation of it. Several ratios will be suggested.
l-Ratio Between Physical and Mental Movement. Whenever the
director reduces physical movement he must augment mental
movement such that the two combined will always total a
single whole. The magnitude, tempo, and complexity of
physical movements are all attributes that can be varied in
inverse proportion to the amount of mental movement. The
number of words, the complexity of ideas expressed, and the
tempo of expression are attributes of mental movement varied
in inverse proportion to the physical movement. If mental-
oral expressions are largely sounds, repeated words, and
ejaculations then physical movement can be at its strongest,
for physical movement will carry the focus and the meaning
of the scene. When the sounds are words conveying a complex
plot point, or theme of the play, there can be Significantly
less physical movement, for the words are carrying the move-
ment and the meaning of the play.
The first suggestion for relationship between the two
kinds of movement is, then, for the director to consider
wave-like fluctuations in each medium, i.e., sight and
sound, such that both are flowing constantly and simul-
taneously in an ebb and flow, with one medium dominant, or
414
flowing, while the other is recessive, or ebbing. Thus the
fluctuations will match the degree of mental and physical
activity going on in the script at any particular moment
without any one activity ever ceasing completely.
2-Ratio of Mental Action to Mental Movement, Physical Action
to Physical Movement. The second application of the relation-
ship between mental and physical movement concerns the type
of movement presented to accompany the physical or mental
script action. Using Delsarte's principle that parts of the
body correspond to kinds of motivation this study postulates
that mental script movement can be accompanied by physical
movement of the body extremities, the "mental" parts of the
body, while appetite-satisfying or emotional script movement
can be accompanied by physical movement of the larger
muscles and can originate in torso centers of the body.
Small movement accompanying thought is not only small in
Size but it is more delicate and minute. It is also carried
by the smaller parts of the body that can make more intricate
and rapid adjustments. Larger actions of the physical play
are carried_by larger muscles as well as by larger movements.
The accompanying of the type of script action with the
apprOpriate type of body movement suggests a further relation~
ship that may help in creating potential for succeeding
scenes. Large movement accompanies physical action that has
resulted from thought. Small movement accompanies thought
(mental activity) that will result in physical action. This
415
interrelated statement of the principle is pregnant in that
it suggests a continuity, a dynamic. In each move or small
sequence there lies the seed, the potential, for the next
Sequence. Also in each scene where one medium (Sight or
sound) is predominate there lies the seed of a reversal to
make the next medium predominate. In this way physically
more static sequences are interpreted as preludes to action,
never merely as thought for the sake of thought.
3-Ratio of Cross to Fine Movement: Blocking to Business.
Another relationship between physical and mental movement
can be thought of as the relationship between the two basic
kinds of movement: Gross blocking movement and business.
Each kind of movement can be considered a continuum that
relates in inverse proportion to the other continuum. One
continuum would be the range from detailed, complex, important
business to no business at all. The other continuum would
be the range from no large body movement to large group and
large Space covering moves. In general, when the movement
is gross the business should be retarded prOportionately.
When the business is complex, the gross movement should be
retarded proportionately. In a sense, the ratio is like that
between the verbal and the physical. When mental movement
with business is predominate then physical movement should be
recessive. Again, the suggestion here is to maintain a flow
so that both kinds of movement continue simultaneously, but
in a relationship that does not have more going on at a
416
time than the audience can comfortably take in.
4-Ratio of Physical to Mental Movement in Equilibrium. When
the various ratios are applied there appears to be a large
middle ground where both elements are in approximately equal
focus. The result is a period wherein nothing is really in
focus or emphasized. The simple solution is always to have
some element dominant even though there is relatively equal
portions of both. However, there seems to be one way in
which this unfocused relationship can be turned into an
asset. When the flows are approximately equal, the director
has succeeded in doing in one way what the film director
does in a reestablishing Shot. After a closeup, tension
and attention need to be relaxed. To loosen the shot the
director returns to a longer View and lets his audience eye
move around a more complex, less tightly focused picture where
no one element is so vital as is the total composition. To
accomplish the same purpose the stage director can use his
simultaneous flows of both mental and physical movement.
Neither is large enough, nor important enough, to merit
total attention, and so the total physical—mental movement
composition carries a more relaxed or diffused focus. Then,
when one element does need to come into stronger focus, a grad-
ual or rapid decrease of one kind of movement coupled with
an increase of the other can help to direct the attention.
d) Problem in Flow Relationships: Lack of Punctuation
gpd Phrasipg.--An important problem with the flow concept
417
can be that there is not sufficient punctuation and phrasing
to establish rhythms, to convey units of meaning, or to
allow for staccato sequences. The solution seems to be
that the director ought to vary his ebb and flow to create
phrasing units and to consider inserting the various kinds
of blocks that might normally impede flow. Hesitation, gaps
in either Speech or physical movement, "cornerS of physical
movement where directional changes take place, and punctuation
in Speech, all help to provide internal structure to the
overall interrelationships of waves of movement.
l-Punctuation Derived from Speech. The relationship between
flow and pause may well be Similar to a relationship in
Speech. The important part of speech is the flow of subject
and predicate, coupled with its modifiers and connecting
words. The punctuation takes the least Space and the least
time. So it is with stage movement. The flow of mental
and physical action is predominate. The stop or hesitation
of punctuation Should be for the shortest time possible in
order to keep the action of the script alive. The duration
and variety of hesitation may find interesting analogs in
the variety of speech punctuation.
2-Punctuation Derived from Nature. The director can make
very effective use of "stop action" punctuation if he uses
it sparingly and according to living, moving principles
instead of according to static art principles. In general,
a stop of a flow is the stOpping of life. However, in nature,
418
especially in human beings, there are normal hesitations
that can provide clues. It would seem that the director
cannot stop all action on stage, both mental and physical,
for longer than a man can hold his breath if the life of
the play is not to be killed as would be the life of the
man. The point is, that the play can be considered as a
living organism whose life can flow in fluctuations, now
accenting this aspect, now that, but the organism cannot
cease movement entirely for long without becoming sick or
dying. The director can certainly experiment with the
play whose structure is like that of a man confined to bed,
or of a psychotic whose body and mind remain in a corner of
the room; however, a healthy audience is more apt to be
empathically pleased by a full blown, healthy, living play.
3—Punctuation to Accent Past. A structural advantage to the
momentary departure from life's ebb and flow is that the
unusual draws attention to itself. A gap in the flow
suddenly draws a strong focus, usually to the words or the
action that immediately preceded the gap. Usually the
physical activity, or pose, that remains during a silence
in some way symbolizes, or pictures, what was meant by the
action or words that preceded the Silence. Hence a
hesitation allows the audience to contemplate for an instant
the relationships that have resulted from the movement.
This relationship fixes itself in the audience's mind as a
point, or a fact, or an idea that is now available to be
419
added to the next point and eventually to form a total
complex of meaning.
4-Punctuation to Accent Future. The stop action device can
also draw attention to what follows the gap. It is difficult
to describe the difference between a gap that accents what
precedes and a gap that accents what follows. In fact, it
seems that all pauses must first emphasize what preceded
them for what follows has not yet occurred. The point to
be made is that the nature of what precedes the pause
determines whether the audience looks back or looks ahead.
If the actor says, "Wait a minute," and then pauses, the
emphasis is first upon the words "wait a minute," and then
those words point ahead to beyond the pause, setting up
anticipation for what is to follow. A suspension is created
by the words. On the other hand, a hesitation can follow
"You see what I mean?" In which case the audiences'
attention roams back over the preceding sequence and, in
effect, it reminisces instead of looks forward.
5-Punctuation to Provide Rest. The gap may provide a re-
vitalizing function as well as an emphatic one. In life,
man or nature needs periodic rest in order to move ahead
with renewed energy. During rest some residual activity
is always present; never does all movement cease. However,
if a climax of physical movement is needed, it is well for
the director to find a place to physically rest his actors,
and empathically rest his audience, before plunging into
420
the physical climax. Such an idea as the calm before the
storm might prove helpful. If physical movement has been
building toward a physical climax, mental activity, or at
least its verbal expression, has been waning. Then, before
the actual physical climax takes place, physical rest takes
over for a Short time and finally a burst of physical
activity takes place. Following the flow ratios suggested,
during the pause in physical movement mental movement takes
over, final plans are laid, and thematic thinking takes
place to justify the coming physical action. Audience
suSpense is maintained even as suSpenSion of physical action
is maintained, as long as the thought is handled as the pre-
lude to action, that is, as long as the scene is potential.
After the rest from one kind of flow, the audience is re-
vitalized and eager to plunge into the climax sequence. The
same relationship would also hold true for verbal or mental
rests. After much physical activity on stage the mind has
been resting and the audience is ready for clever witticisms,
complex themes, or involved exposition.
6-Punctuation to Provide Tension. An image may be helpful
to the director in using punctuation to provide tension; the
image is the rOpe in a tug-of-war. When both sides in the
game are momentarily evenly matched the rope does not move.
If an audience saw only the rOpe there would be a static
picture. However, when the motionless picture is combined
in space with the two pulling teams, and combined in time
421
with the memory of physical movement and the anticipation
of future physical movement, the rOpe is seen as tension
and potential. If the tug of war and the held breath serve
as images for any kind of stOppage, even for the large stOp-
page of a whole medium of movement for a necessary rest, the
stage director has in his grasp the potential for very dynamic
and continually flowing life-like production.
3:Summary Conclusion: Dynamic Flow and Balance Punctuated and
Phrased to Maintain Impression of Continuous Life
The challenge of this section is to consider phrasing a
play with minimal stop action, of either the mental or the
physical variety, and to think of movement as ebb and flow.
When the physical movement is kinetic the mental movement is
potential, and vice versa. In effect, there can be some sort
of alternation Of phrases, first physical movement statement,
then verbal or mental movement statement, then physical
movement statement again. One movement can comment upon the
other simultaneously, or one can comment on the other alter-
nately. Units are hence set up, not with walls or moats
between them but with a baton as in a relay race. The baton
of movement is handed now to the words, now to the body
movement, while neither stops completely. The point at
which the transition takes place is punctuation, setting up
memory units without providing gaps in the continuity. Such
structuring, though derived from a life principle, is not
life, it is art. Life does not pause periodically to sum
up, except in very large ways, such as in the change of the
422
seasons. Art carefully selects its meaning, its pointing,
and its hesitation to provide a cumulative structure that
mimics life in part, but primarily provides structure that
allows for a series of meaningful points to be made by the
content of words and movement.
B. MOre Dynamic Movement Meanings Through
Mimesis, Metaphor, and Symbol
The hunt for and the application of moving sources for
meaning through mimesis, metaphor, and symbol can help the
director to create more dynamic movement meanings. To do
this seems to require a closer definition Of the kinds of
movement and some specific and typical applications to the
stage play.
1. Extended Definitions Of the Three Kinds of Movement
Meaning
For convenience this study has said that movement can
be said to convey meaning in three ways: by mimesis, by '
metaphor, and by symbol. The three ways Often overlap both
in category and in experience. To some extent, also, there
is a continuum that ranges through the entire set of cate-
gories including abstraction, without any distinct break in
kind. In short, the distinctions of three kinds are more
for the practical purpose of providing a guide to the
creation of movement meanings than they are supposed to be
philOSOphically distinct categories.
423
a) Mimesis Defined.--The first category, mimesis, may
be simply translated as "this is that." What appears on
stage is made to resemble real life as closely as possible.
Belasco is said to have taken an actual restaurant and
placed it on stage, complete with the working toilet.
Antoine is said to have placed a real side of beef on stage,
possibly complete with the working flies. Contemporary
directors buy real furniture and prOperties to dress their
setting. Several Russian directors are said to have experi-
mented with having plays in their natural settings in a
house, in a garden, or in a factory. The logical result of
trying to present or to COpy exactly is the motion picture
film. Through it the audience may be tranSported to the
exact place at the appropriate time, and the close up can
reveal the details of the real object. Even the actors are
often "real people" who have never acted before. This step
really precedes mimesis in the continuum of types of move~
ment meaning since it presents the real rather than an
imitation of the real. Mimesis really starts at the point
of being "true to life" rather than being life.
Where the director is unable to put the real life
object before the eyes of his audience, he often goes to
great expense to research and duplicate what was existent
in the times. Of course Hollywood is famous for such recon-
struction in its film extravaganzas. Where the real life
human being is portrayed by an actor everything possible is
1
4|
'“H
424
done to make him look and sound unlike an actor. His
motivations and actions must be true to life just as if
his character were real rather than fictitious. His acting
must be an accurate imitation of human behavior.
The achievement of this human behavior gives rise to
two methods. Either the artist duplicates the inner feelings
and motivations which in turn purport automatically to
reproduce the outer form, or else the actor reproduces the
outer form of symptoms and symbols directly, and to some
extent they may reinstate the inner feelings. Whether the
director uses the first or the second method, he still hopes
for the same result, that the acting give the impression of
being a real life experience for the audience. Of course, this
study suggests that a knowledge of the outer form is essential,
in order either to reproduce it or to recognize it when it
appears.
Within the mimetic category of "this is that" fall
movements that mean themselves. Usually business, such as
sewing or setting the table, means itself. In mimetic
performance the attempt is to use the business as itself,
that is to make it as life~like as possible. In effect, in
strictly mimetic meaning, there is only one statement, "this
is that"; life on stage is as near as the director can make
it to life out in the world. Such reproduction of life on
stage is probably communicated to an audience by familiarity
and empathy. AS a familiar activity is duplicated on stage,
425
the audience motor reSponseS are similar to those of the
actors, and the familiar activity reinstates a familiar
emotion. Everyone feels right at home.
Of course, strictly mimetic meaning is incapable of
making comment upon itself except as the audience already
has a point of View about the familiar activity on stage.
To present a comment, a contrast, or a point of View other
kinds of movement meanings, or else mimetic movements that
have established emotional connotations and hence can be
used contrapuntally with script meanings, need to be
employed.
b) Metaphor Defined.--The second category, metaphor, may
be simply translated as "this is like that." 'What appears
on stage may resemble real life or not, but some essential
qualities or dimensions of the move have been abstracted
from some other source, a source other than exactly what
the character would do were he faced with the stage situation
in real life.
The fundamental distinction of the metaphorical meaning
is the existence of analogous parts. Some object in life or
in art serves as a graphic or a moving image for the
director. Rather than merely letting such an image vaguely
influence something he calls the "mood" of his play, he can
let various components of his image be replaced by various
components on the stage; he may duplicate the rhythm, tempo,
kinetic action, potential action, shape, color, or emotional
qualities of the original image.
426
How this meaning conveys itself to an audience may be
part empathic and part intellectual. The Shape, rhythm,
tempo, emotional overtones, and physical action of an actor
or group of actors may provide empathic responses in the
audience similar to that felt when perceiving the original
image from which those qualities were abstracted. When
these components are translated into body movement, the
empathy with the body may set up additional emotional
associations. The director may easily run into conflicting
empathic responses. His image may be calculated to produce
one affect upon the audience, but his choice of body action
to carry that image may already be a natural symptom or
symbol of some other feeling.
The way in which the metaphor carries meaning intellectual-
ly is by making the audience aware of the source of the move-
ment. If a play is set at the sea shore, and moving water
is an integral part of the story, the director may block a
sequence of moves in which people are in some way like ocean
waves. The audience can see, in the context, where the move-
ments were derived. By seeing the analagous relationship,
the audience takes pleasure in uncovering each additional
nuance of relationship. It may also feel the movement
empathically but in addition it can literally engage in the
intellectual comparison of "this is like that."
The advantage of the dimension of metaphorical meaning
is that two familiar things in life can be compared or
contrasted to each other to give depth to the primary meaning.
427
To say people are like waves, or like swings, is to allow
for editorial comment. The audience is forced into a
perspective on the character and the Situation. Instead
of merely empathizing, feeling into, or recognizing human
behavor, it can recognize and feel what a director chooses
to say human behavior is, should be or could be like. The
example has already been given of the comparison between
an adult walking down stairs followed by a child walking
down stairs in adult clothes. Given a careful treatment
and an apprOpriate context, the analogy is completed by
the audience much as a problem in algebra. X is the
personality of the adult. The unknown quantity is supplied
by the comparison. The clothes are equal to the clothes,
the stairs to the stairs, the personality to the personality.
Therefore, by analogy, the adult has a child-like personality.
Of course the logic in analogy is non-existent; proof
by analogy is no proof at all; however, to the audience,
the conclusion is inescapable. A statement Of relationship
has been made by the director and for the purposes of drama
the audience usually assumes the statement is true. An
analogical movement is emotionally much more convincing
than a logical statement, for the audience thinks it is
seeing visible proof.
In searching out additional metaphorical meanings to
movement, the challenge to the director is to make his
moves more alive, more dynamic. To do this best, the
director should locate moving metaphors drawn from Objects
428
or activities in life whose motion is apprOpriate to the
scene.
0) Symbol Definedr-The third category, symbol, may be
translated simply as "this stands for that". It would seem
that symbolic movement in its extreme form would be the
least useful of the three categories; it would provide move-
ments that convey not only empathic meanings already native
to them, but Specifically convey verbal meanings as clearly
as does Speech.
However, in a very important way every movement on stage
is a symbolic one. Even in mimesis a real life move is not
seen. The imitation stands for the move that would be made
in life were the real life circumstances the same as the
circumstances of the play. Again, in metaphor, the wave-like
body movement stands for the ocean waves; of course, the
metaphor makes the additional comment that there is something
to be learned from the comparison of the character to the
wave. However, in a strictly symbolic way, the moves are
not considered for their resemblance to human behavior or
for their resemblance, and comparison, to other moving things
in nature. They are considered for what facts, information,
or relationships they convey directly to an audience.
For the extreme of symbolic movement, it has been seen
that Oriental and Polynesian dances do have an approximation
primarily in a hand gesture sign language. Often the meaning
of the gesture is derived from either a mimetic or metaphoric
movement. The hand makes a circle; it is the world, or the
429
moon. One Shape is analogous to another. The hand rises
and describes an are over the head; it is the passing of the
sun during a day; the arc of the hand is analogous to the arc
of the sun. However, such gestures either need a strong
context to give them Specific meaning, or they need standard-
ization through consistent usage. The point for the stage
director is that he also may give a context to and standard-
ize movement symbols to a limited extent within a given
production.
To achieve symbolic meaning in any complete way would
be to create a language that had a grammar, syntax, and
vocabulary with dictionary equivalents. Such a language
could be translated into other verbal languages. Such a
language would have as its aim conveyance of intellectual
and emotional ideas and would involve movement from which
most of the empathic content had been drained. Such an
extreme, as has been suggested in the chapter on dance,
would merely be a duplicate of a verbal language and
probably undesirable except for those who are deaf and dumb.
However, there are alternatives to a complete language
of movement. In any culture's gesture vocabulary there are
numerous signs with which a director Should become familiar.
The shoulder shrug, the hand point, the hand shake, the fist
shake, or the nodded head all have very Specific meanings
to the American public. There are numerous other signs
that a director might well compile in order to realize the
potential for direct communication by gesture in his own
430
culture. Of course, the director fears he may fall into
cliche movement by the use of standardized gestures. This
will happen only if he is a cliche director. Knowing how
to vary the cliches according to the play's circumstances
and style, the character's personality, and the metaphorical
possibilities will free the director from, not bind him to,
cliches. However, he needs to know the cliches to begin
with. After all, a cliche is merely a standardized form of
communication. To Shun it as a basis for meaning is to
discard perhaps a third of the meaning possibilities for
movement.
d) Mimesis, Metaphor, and Symbol Defined as Part of A
Continuum.--It can be seen that the three categories of move-
ment meaning are really not distinct but form a continuum.
To illustrate the continuum, more significant mid points can
be added. Perhaps a graded sequence of steps could be some-
what as follows:
The most extreme mimesis is really not mimetic at all.
Actual life is presented on the stage. The audience is
looking in on real people whose movement is natural though
inhibited, cultural, unplanned, and incidental. The next
step is exact replica. The performers know they are acting
but they try to forget it and act as they would in real life.
The movement may consist of carefully reinstated body symptoms
of inner feelings or it may consist of the result of the
creation of an inner life of a character. It is seen that
431
each approach has its danger; the symptom may be inaccurate
or the inner life may be replete with an actor's inhibitions
that impose a stilted and repetitive movement pattern
upon the body.
The next step in mhnesis is to distort the real to make
it large enough to be seen and Simple enough to be discerned.
Such a step is often called selective realism.
Still within the realm of natural movement is the
presentation of symbols for inner states. Through social
custom, certain bodily attitudes have become so closely
associated with certain emotions that they are thought of
as being innate, universal symptoms of the emotion. Some
of these attitudes will appear in the actor from simple
internal duplication ofzhelings, but many will not appear
without a specific knowledge of the form of the outer
expression.
The next step is a distortion of the natural symbol. The
body attitude, or gesture, becomes stylized for the stage.
It is simplified, enlarged, and adapted to the circumstances
of the character and the play.
At this point in the continuum metaphorical meanings
begin to be inserted. Perhaps the first is the simple trans-
lation of mental motion into physical motion. The words
Show fear, or retreat, so the body moves back. The move is
still a natural one for fear, but it is not an inevitable
one. The move is both designed and natural.
432
The next coloration of move would be through the use of
line patterns such that lines, abstracted from something
exterior to movement, will provide a mood for that movement.
The next step is the conscious adoption of a Specific
metaphor from which to abstract elements that will un-
consciously arouse the audience; allied is the use of
metaphors which will arouse the audience while it is aware
of the abstraction and can consciously use the image for
comparison.
When the images in movement become habitual, so that no
conscious translation needs to be made, the movements become
symbols. The move is no longer thought of in terms of its
derivation; it conveys a Specific meaning directly.
The next step, hopefully avoided by the director, is
cliche: symbolic moves that are so habitual in the culture
that they cease to create either interest or fresh meaning.
It is at this point that the continuum may come full circle.
The method actor, creating mimetic movement through thought,
without attending to form, is apt to recreate on stage mostly
culturally acquired, unconsciously cliche symbols thinking
that he is creating spontaneous symptoms of inner feelings.
Of course, this study maintains that even cliches of move-
ment may belong on stage if they are the director's conscious
choice from the continuum of possibilities.
2. Application of the Three Kinds of Movement Meaning
When the director has absorbed the principles of movement
433
from his own culture he still has the problem Of designing
specific movements derived from his script, his own ex-
periences, and the continuum of types; principles do not
automatically turn themselves into practice. For this
reason some Specifics of each kind of meaning will be ex-
plored. The purpose will be to provide some typical
solutions, some specific suggestions, and some summary
conclusions, rather than a complete coverage and classifi-
cation in each category. All that is intended is a Spring-
board to creative, meaningful, and dynamic movement.
a) Mimesis Applied.--Most of what this study has to say
about movement as mimesis has beensnid in the last chapter
about dance, pantomime, and psychology. It remains here to
clarify the findings concerning the communication of emotion
and attitudes, and to apply mimesis in three examples. The
three examples are theories of action and reaction, of
three part motivation, and of evolution from inner thematic
and character purpose to outer form.
l-Mimetic Emotions and Attitudes Differentiated. The first
part of this study has shown that both Gassner and Dietrich,
among others, tend toward the point of View that all emotions
have substantially the same symptoms, that the situation in
context is needed for the emotion to be identified. This
study has brought to bear the Opinions of several psychol-
ogists, and others, who seem to Oppose this point of View,
notably Campbell, cited in the last chapter as believing
J
434
that every feeling has an appropriate body expression.1
The conclusion of this study is that the two schools of
thought are not really talking about the same things.
The symptoms of emotion are to the first school merely
the organic symptoms such as heart beat rate and strength,
breathing rate, and perhaps also the results of such tests
as eye pupil dilation, galvanic skin reSponse, or amount
of perspiration secretion. Such symptoms are undoubtedly
present in any display of emotion. Such symptoms are un-
doubtedly at the basis -Of all emotion. However, the
culture, the arts, and some psychology seem to have found
reasons to differentiate emotions on the basis of broad
categories such as joy, fear, hate, or disdain. Psychol-
ogists such as Campbell, pantomimist's such as Aubert, and
dancers such as Humphries seem to feel there is a communicable
body difference in these emotions. This study then concludes
that another term is needed to supplement the term emotion,
to designate what Campbell, Aubert, and Humphries are talking
about. Let the term be "attitude". The term can refer to
the overt symptoms of a differentiated emotion or else to
something that is in addition to emotion. The point is,
however, that such attitudes seem to be eXpressed in fairly
consistent patterns of neuro-muscular response without any
conscious effort on the part of the person reacting. There
seems to be a difference of kind, which may only be a differ-
ence in degree, between this natural bodily expression of
lCampbell, "Your Actions . . ." op. cit., p. 27.
435
attitude and a culturally accepted symbol for the specific
attitude. In any event, such an expression of attitude
is not derived from art; it is distinct from an abstraction,
distillation, exaggeration, or simplification of a natural
attitude manufactured for the purposes of communication.
Such natural bodily forms appear to be based on reflex and
the result of activity of the autonomic nervous system.
They appear also to arouse Similar reactions, by empathy, in
an audience that witnesses these attitudes.
A context can certainly distort or change many meanings.
A relatively blank facial expression, an undifferentiated
body expression of emotion, or a general body attitude that
is basically protective, expansive, negative, or positive
can easily be interpreted in a number of ways given a number
of very Specific contexts. However, this is not to say that
certain gross bodily attitudes, and/or subtle body movements,
are not usually found accompanying certain Specific mental
or emotional attitudes in real life. Studies quoted in the
last chapter tend to establish such typical accompaniment.
In fact, as has been seen, both dramatists and psychologists
alike have noted, or made good use of, the recognizable
difference between bodily attitudes and verbal statements
that provides contrast in meaning.
The basic symptoms for emotion, then (heart beat, muscle
tension, breathing rate) seem to be merely preparation for
action; they are getting the body prepared for whatever
436
physical movement may be necessary as a reaction to a
specific stimulus. Body posture, movement, Specific
rhythms of breathing, the part of the body that starts a
movement, and actual gesture all seem to be motor activities
largely controlled by a combination of the autonomic ner-
vous system and conditioned reflexes activated by what the
sensory perceptors perceive. What is not autonomic still
appears to be typical depending on what motivation is
aroused as a result of perceiving the stimulus. In fact,
a spectator may actually read into another person's re-
action what the basic motivation is without seeing the 1
stimulus. The specific stimulus usually cannot be guessed,
but often the gipp of stimulus is clear. Of course, art-
fully simplifying, spreading out sequentially in time,
exaggerating in Size and shape, or removing inhibiting
influences from a specific reaction will all help to
clarify what is basically a built in and very early
aculturized movement.
2-A Theory of Action and Reaction: Suspense and Power.
The ability to recognize a reaction or a motivation without
seeing the stimulus provides material for a specific mimetic
movement suggestion. In each human interaction there is a
pattern of action and reaction. The reaction becomes an
action for subsequent reaction. The ability to discern in
a reaction its kind of motivation and to some extent its
stimulus provides the basis for a perspective and a suspense.
437
If the audience sees both the action and the reaction, its
view is objective theatre. If it sees primarily the action
the View is normal film. However, if the stage director can
reverse the usual order of procedure and have the audience
watch the reacting person, a new point of View for the
action can be obtained.
‘When only the expression of the reacting person is seen
the audience has a subjective View, to some extent seeing only
what the reactor reveals and accepting his evaluation of the
action. The audience is also held in suspense. Being able
to tell only in general, the audience wonders what the
Specific stimulus is. When it is revealed, audience satis-
faction is attained. A stimulus appropriate to the reaction
usually results in supported drama while stimulus inappro-
priate to the reaction usually results in dramatic irony or
in comedy. For example, adult fear whose cause is revealed
to be a two year Old with a water pistol is comic. However,
to have such a comic result it can be seen that the body
attitude, e.g., for fear, has to be recognizable.
In action and reaction there seems to be a sort of dynamic
ratio at work. This study has already employed the physics
principle, for every action there is an equal and opposite
reaction; a movement appears no stronger than its opposition.
There is an additional application where motivation is
involved; a move is no stronger than the purpose, or the
resolve, of the mover. Power on stage then can be
438
considered a total of purpose, plus mass to be moved, plus
actual movement against an Opposition. In effect, this
relationship is another statement of the ancient idea of
the necessity of dramatic conflict, a statement dressed
up in terms of psychologically motivated movement. The
more purpose, the more emotive and emphatic value there
will be to the power. The more Opposition, the greater
that power appears.
It is seen, then, that if the director plans accurate
symbols and symptoms for an actor's reaction, then reveals
that reaction without revealing the stimulus, he can
create both a unique point of View and a suspense about
the stimulus. If he can also insure that both the stimulus
and the reacting character are part of purposive masses
moving in opposition his action and reaction will give the
impression of power.
35A Theory of Three Part Motivation. The first part of this
study mentioned a three part motivation which will now be
clarified and summarized. Only two of the parts are psycho-
logical. That is why an overview of the script by the
director is necessary to insure that all three kinds of
motivations are present.
Internal. The first kind of motivation concerns the
establishing of an inner need, response, or impulse.
Something interior to the body causes a movement. The
senses may record the smell of smoke, the stomach may create
a feeling of hunger, or the lungs may record a shortage of
439
oxygen. Some internal impulse starts a reaction pattern
sequence that changes body set, breathing, and gesture.
External. The second part of the three part motivation
is external to the body. If the inner impulse was caused
by a body function, e.g., the stomach reacting to a need
for food, the new body set can eventually result in the eye
taking over in the search for food. The external motivation
would be a source of food. For the motivation to be complete
and to communicate to the audience, a body movement toward
the external motivation needs to take place. For complete
clarity the action should be finished, the food acquired,
the beginning of the action tied into the end, and the inner
impulse quieted, or brought into balance.
The inner impulse may be in reSponse to an outer
stimulus, e.g., a door slams, the ear records, and then a
reaction pattern takes place. In this instance the outer
motivation is presented to the audience before the inner.
To complete the action, the reactor needs to do something
relative to the door slam, then both an outer and an
inner focus has taken place again.
igeational. The third part to motivation is an extension
by analogy, movement motivated by the purpose of the play.
The individual's purpose can be said to create the form of
his pantomime; the play's purpose can be said to create the
form of the director's blocking. To be sure, all purposes
derive ultimately from the overall purpose of the play,
’ i
A
d
440
and all movement should seem to derive from the special
purposes of the individual in a particular scene. However,
large movement patterns seem to have a special dependency
on the overall theme and plot of the play.
It is this study's contention that every stage movement
can and should have all three motivations. The play may
motivate a director to get an actor near a door in order
for him to be shot in the next sequence. That actor should
also be motivated by some inner need and some exterior goal
to get to that position near the door. Of course, these
inner needs and outer goals should be integrated into what
the character would want both in the particular scene, and
in his function as a character.
4-A Theory of Inner Purpose Determining Outer Form.
Character movement seems to be the result of a composite of
causes. In effect, ideally each character's every observable
movement should be the result not only of the kind of
person he is and of the situation in which he is at present,
but also of an inner felt need that is expressed outwardly,
of an external goal that is evident to the audience, and of
a theme and plot requirement of a play. Of course the
expressive qualities of the movement (its line, form, mass,
expressed symptoms, metaphor, or symbol) are assumed to be
attributes of the movement that stem from character,
situation and theme. Hence, all these considerations
should result in movement that will successfully depict
the inner purpose in the outer form.
441
b) Metaphor Applied.--The purpose of using a metaphor
for movement is similar to that of using a metaphor in
speech. The good metaphor clarifies, deepens, and broadens
the meaning of a particular scene by adding its meaning to
that of the movement. By careful use metaphor can bring
the same depth to movement that it does to literature. Of
course the director is wise to use a moving metaphor that
will take advantage of movement's greater emphatic and
empathic meaning. An analogy will serve to Show the point
of view of this study concerning the relationship between
the moving and the static metaphor. On stage, movement
derived from a moving metaphor is apt to be as more dynamic
than movement from a static metaphor as the motion picture
is more dynamic than a series of slide projections.
This section will deal with some sources, some problems,
and some examples of the moving metaphor that may serve as
a guide in the director's selection.
l-Sources of Moving Metaphor. This study suggests looking
for more images of objects or processes which move. Move-
ments of water, fire, and air, of machine and growth, and
of basic human maneuvers such as fighting, love making, and
survival, of sporting activities, or of narration in liter~
ature can all provide material for the moving metaphor.
â€When abstraction of pertinent rhythms, movements, or forms
has taken place and the abstracted elements given to
analogical parts of a stage composition, the use of the
i
X-
i
-.:l
442
moving metaphor is complete.
2-Three Poor Metaphors: Mixed, Esoteric, Trite. The poor
movement metaphors are Similar to those existing in liter-
ature; they are the mixed, the esoteric, and the overworked,
or trite. Ultimately, the discretion and experience of the
director will determine how successfully he avoids the poor
metaphors, but some guide lines are in order.
The mixed metaphor is most apt to occur when the theme
of the verbal script carries one image and the movement
pattern carries another. An example may be drawn. from a
particular production of Albee's American Dream. The theme
of the play as written has as its image a strong, handsome,
but emasculated male individual. The American dream is
embodied in a mythical hero. Albee makes the point that
the so-called rugged individual, the handsome hero, the idol
of America, is really a shell. This hero is his symbol, and
a handsome young character embodies that symbol. Here is
the playwright's analogical construction: This character is
to the play and to other characters in the play as the
American dream is to America and to other Americans.
In the production in question the director created a
setting that resembled in detail a monOpoly game board,
with the sets of cards and a die providing furniture for
the room. To some extent the play's movement pattern
resembled movement about the game board. To the director,
the American dream was the dream of going from rags to
443
riches, the Cinderella story, or some such variety of the
materialistic hope.
‘Witness the mixed metaphor in full bloom; the playwright
has one American dream in mind, the director has another.
The particular ideas, themes, and interactions Of the play-
wright are simply not expressed by the static and moving
images of the director. If the director had tried to
create analogical relationships he would have seen that
although his metaphor was derived from the title, the
director's was an American dream, it was not derived from
the content of the play. He could not match his image to
his movement with the A is to B as C is to D formula. There
were no analogous parts. Consequently the audience almost
had two simultaneous and different plays, one the play-
wright's and another the director's, with neither helping
to interpret the other.
An example of what might appear to be a mixed metaphor,
but was so patently and uniquely obvious and original in
context that the mixture went unnoticed, was employed by
Marcel Marceau in a pantomime about a butterfly. Marceau
is the man hunting, net in hand. He sees the butterfly and
his head takes on the motion of the butterfly's flitting as
it darts up and down. Meanwhile, his eyes remain the eyes
of the hunter, looking at the butterfly in flight. ‘When
he finally catches the butterfly his thumb and forefinger
are those of the hunter extracting the butterfly from the
444
net. However, the rest of his fingers become the fluttering
wings of the butterfly. Then, as he watches the butterfly,
the fluttering wings adOpt the rhythm of a human heart beat
as a recognizable metaphor for a living butterfly. Then
the tempo of the beat decreases until the fluttering stOps.
The fingers have become the wings and the wings have
abstracted from the human heart beat its rhythm, and used
the rhythm in its wing movement. Apparent death is depicted
by the wings stOpping beatting, the wings now representing
the heart.
The above example is not in the same class as the mixed
metaphor of The American Dream. In Marceau's pantomime one
body has to portray two beings: the hunter and the butter-
fly. Certain portions of the pantomimist's body, from time
to time, assume the rhythm, form, direction, or tempo of
the butterfly. In effect, there is no mixture Of metaphor
but a metaphor within a metaphor: The hand moves like a
butterfly wing and the wing moves in the rhythm of the human
heart beat.
The fingers have established so well the movement of
butterfly wings that the audience accepts the fingers as
wings. ‘When the wings then abstract from the heart beat
its rhythm, there seems to be no unbelievable jump. Such
imaginative, and accurate, use of analogous parts can
certainly increase the director's and the actor's powers
of communication by movement. However, truly mixed
445
metaphors do not communicate imagination. They only
succeed in confusing or in directly misleading an audience.
The esoteric metaphor is perhaps more common than the
mixed. If the image the director has in mind is too remote
from the audience's experience for the audience to see the
relationship, no comparison is possible. However, the
audience does not have to know what image the director is
using if he has chosen an image that will supply appropriate
empathic response. Perhaps he has in mind a bird in flight.
His actor uses this image; leaping and fluttering about on
stage fulfill it. If a feeling of weightlessness and
effortlessness is achieved by empathic reSponse, the audience
may feel like soaring; its emotions be joyous. However, the
audience may never know the director suggested to the actor
that his arms are like wings, his fingers like feathers, and
his body is as light as air, even as a bird's body appears
to be in flight.
A more remote form Of esoteric metaphor is usual. For
example, should the director choose the image of the bird
for lightness, and the actor use the image to provide a
walk, the bird walk may provide a very un-soaring response
from the audience. A bird stalking about seems proud, moves
in staccato rhythm, and is quick to shy away. In a human
being, who does not have the light appearance of a bird,
nor the fragility that makes quick movement seem shy and
protective, the bird-like movement may appear mysterious,
446
portentious, overweeningly proud, and somewhat obnoxiously
precious. In short, failure to recognize a metaphor may
not be as misleading to the audience as a misapplication
creating empathic response, which is unwanted.
The problems of overworked, or trite, metaphors are so
very relative to the particular play and to the background
of the audience that little can be said. Perhaps one
guiding principle will suffice for the overworked metaphor.
The director needs perspective so he does not fall in love
with his metaphor. If it is one which is used to interpret \
an entire play, then it should probably not be worked out
to its most minute detail in every movement, but merely
provide the over-all shape to the blocking scheme orto the
characterizations.
3-Two Moving Metaphors: The Pendulum and The River. The
pendulum serves as an appropriate metaphor to suggest
dynamic relationships between punctuation and the moving
phrase, while the river supplies interesting suggestions
for dynamic flow relationships among depth, tempo, mass,
and continuity.
The pendulum provides an image to stimulate a partic—
ular conception of the relationship between the dynamic
phrase and its punctuation. Therefore, to apply the metaphor
adequately the director first needs to consider the nature
of the phrase itself. The phrase, according to the dancers,
is a time unit derived from the duration of one Speaking
447
breath. The idea of the phrase has been incorporated into
music and Speech where it is still a unit of meaning of
approximately a few seconds' duration.
The phrase has a beginning, middle,and end. It usually
contains one complete unit of rhythm and one major accent
somewhere within it. Also it usually begins with an attack
and ends with some punctuation. Phrases are sometimes
separated by a time gap; other times they are set apart
from each other by the recognition of a repeated pattern.
Each phrase has a Similarity of structure, if not of con-
tent, that makes it appear as a cell Of meaning.
The phrase has also been used as a metaphor; any
meaningful units of varying sizes, as long as they have
recognizable unity as building units in some larger structure,
can be thought of as phrases. In a sense, an entire play
is a phrase, within which there are acts, French scenes,
speeches, sentences, and clauses or prepositional phrases
which can all be structured as phrases within phrases. To
change the metaphor to an organic one, the director could
think of these phrase units as cells which make up organs
which make up a living body.
The phrase can be thought of as being either dynamic or
static. If the director thinks of his units as still picture
compositions, no matter how often he changes the picture the
meaning is conveyed in static relationships, and the move-
ment to change pictures is fundamentally a dissolve-blur.
a
448
If he thinks of the meaning within the phrase as carried by
moving thoughts, moving bodies, and moving plot, then the
body of the phrase is motion and the punctuation is static.
One way to keep phrasing intact without having static
moments is to employ the metaphorical relationship of the
pendulum. The pendulum moves through a swing that has
certain interesting idiosyncrasies. In perfect gravita-
tional balance it is at the middle of a swing, when it is
pointing straight down. At that balance point it is
Swinging the fastest. When it comes to the highest point
in its swing it is in its greatest state of imbalance and
moving at itssflowest rate, actually coming to a stop at
the tOp of the swing. The pendulum moves from one state of
imbalance, rapidly through the point of balance, to another
state of imbalance. Hesitation takes place at a turning
point, not during the main flow of action.
To see the pendulum remain posed at its highest point
for an instant can create a feeling of imbalance that must
be resolved. If the imbalance is not resolved the Viewer
can become uncomfortable with the defiance of gravity and of
natural expectancy. Extended in time, this discomfort could
become decidedly unpleasant. If the hesitation is momentary,
held only long enough to see the imbalance, the position can
arrest attention and set up an expectancy. In motion, the
pendulum fulfills the expectancy. However, it swings past
the state of balance and proceeds to a new imbalance, a
449
new potential. The actual balanced position is retained
for the shortest period of time. Should the pendulum
remain in its down position, it would be restful, but
ultimately very tedious.
If the director thinks Of his phrase as being analogical
to the swing of a pendulum, he has a dynamic concept. At
the turning point in each phrase, when the subject changes,
when a new breath is taken, when a new character enters, or
when an old character exits, or whenever a point for some
slight change in motivation or theme takes place, there
is where the director can afford his hesitation, or turn-
ing point. The pendulum at that point is the most
potential; the phrase at that point can move into a new
swing of movement and power. The pendulum has the greatest
kinetic force in mid swing; the phrase can be moving the
fastest, or the greatest, or the most meaningfully, at mid
phrase. The pendulum Slows down as it approaches the
turning point and can be seen easier when moving at a
slower rate; the phrase can Slow down just before making
an emphatic point. The pendulum hesitates at the end of
a swing; the phrase can hesitate at its conclusion so an
audience may quickly see what the last phrase meant before
the play moves on to the next one.
In a sense, the pendulum is always in balance. The
force of gravity opposes the inertia of the weight on the
pendulum. When the forces are equal, the pendulum
450
hesitates at the tOp of the swing. Similarly, in a phrase,
an audience must see forces at work making the action
move through the body of a phrase. The audience must see
one force come up against another force such that one or
the other becomes redirected. A body comes up against a
wall and changes direction; a will comes up against another
will and retreats; a resolve comes up against an opposing
resolve and a mind is changed; or a train of thought is cut
off by the intrusion of another train of thought. All
thought is cut off by the intrusion of another train of
thought. All of these, of course, are typical dramatic
conflict situations.
If a pendulum is left swinging, without more power than
inertia and gravity, it soon stOps because of the friction
of air and moving parts. Some basic motive power, weights
or a spring, overcomes loss of inertia and keeps the
pendulum Swinging. The phrase needs within it a strong
motive power, will, action, or underlying purpose, usually
embodied in the main character, to keep the body of the
phrase moving, and to supply the content and direction of
that movement. To keep the phrase dynamic, the "over-
coming" force must seem alternately stronger then weaker
than the "balancing" force.
As with any metaphor, this one breaks down eventually.
No director wants each of his phrases to have the same
length, dynamic quality, force, and location of the fastest
451
movement or turning point. Of course, the connotations
of each swing of the pendulum are of chief interest here
rather than its stable rhythm. Some phrases might climax
early or late, some might have several beats to them, some
might not hesitate even as long as the pendulum and hence
resemble waves of movement while others might come to a
complete stOp for as long as a full phrase. The point is,
however, for phrasing to exist there has to be some
recognizable unit with some principle of repetition within
its structural variety. The pendulum is merely one image
to help provide the director with a dynamic concept of a
moving rather than a static compositional unit.
The river provides an image for dynamic flow on stage
because it also seems to reflect the dynamic flow of life.
This flow may be punctuated, slowed down, or Speeded up,
made to hesitate, to become staccato or wave like, to be
grouped rhythmically, even to be stOpped temporarily.
However, if the flow stops for long there ceases to be
life. The river seems to fit this flow of life and to
interpret life in art. The assumption is that the flowing
water is analogous to the continuity of life and to the
flow of stage movement.
When a river is wide and deep its movement is slow but
massive. When the river is narrow and shallow its flow is
rapid and turbulent. ‘When the flow of life in a play con-
sists of broad interests and deep thoughts or motives the
452
movement pattern can be large, general, slow, and smooth.
'When emotions come to the surface and are restricted by
the friction of opposition on all sides, then accompanying
movement is turbulent and rapid. ‘When a river meets obstacles,
such as rocks, it flows around them, becomes turbulent at
the points of impact or, if the river is deep enough, it
flows over them with only a slight rise in the water. The
staccato movement of the river is analogous to the movement
pattern in a rapid repartee sequence, or a sequence in which
many little obstacles are in the way of the action.
Sooner or later the river comes up against a dam. For
a while the depth increases, the height mounts, the pressure
becomes strong, then either a small amount of water pours
through a Sluiceway or over the tOp, or else the dam breaks.
In scenes where emotion is held back, a smooth surface is
apparent, under which there are Whirlpools of feeling, and
mounting pressure. In pantomime, a large breath is taken
and only a little bit of it is used in Speaking, creating
the impression of withheld emotion, an impression like a
dam withholding water. In blocking, a strong character or
a potential Situation is analogous to the damming of the
river. A continual withholding of movement maintains
potential with just enough water or feeling allowed to
slip by to maintain flow. Too much pressure and the entire
flow of action that had been restricted, breaks loose into
a swirling, dashing, dynamic climax scene.
453
.A scene with a small mental content is the shallow,
wide, rocky river. Many small, insignificant turbulences
occur which are fun and mildly exciting but not vital.
Such movement is typical of comic sequences.
Such comparisons between the flow of the river and the
flow of movement can be made as long as the director chooses.
The important reason for using a river is to replace in
the director's mind the kind of movement the slide projector
suggests, that dissolves between still pictures, with the
movement of a dynamic flow. Throughout the life of the
river, and the life of the play, there are obstacles to
the flow, but flow never stOps for long, and even when it
does stOp it is replaced by turbulent pressures. The
director can have as dynamic a production if he thinks of his
play also as a continuous action into which he may insert
obstacles, conflicts, and smooth passages, an action which
he may shape and restrict or even temporarily retard but
whose flow from beginning to end never really stops in
either emotional, mental, or physical movement.
4-Metaphor Summarized. The director, then, has a special
freedom and a special responsibility with metaphor in
movement. He can draw into his production meanings from
anywhere in the mechanical, natural, or artistic world to
compare and contrast with the meanings in his script. He
also has the responsibility to see that his metaphorical
relationships are pertinent to his total production and
454
can be clearly "read" by his audience. He also has a live
Option to take advantage of the greater attention getting
and expressive powers of the moving picture. The director
can draw his metaphors from anywhere in the universe in
flow around him to keep his production dynamic.
c) §ymbol Applied.--Strict1y speaking, all forms of
stage movement are symbolic; each occurrence on stage
stands for something on stage. But in special ways certain
movements are almost a Sign language communicating meanings
clearly to an audience of any one culture. The director can
try to create symbolic meanings for his audience or use
primarily movements that already have an established meaning.
Doris Humphries' standardized gestures, such as bowing,
genuflecting, or burden carrying, have been mentioned in
the chapter on dance; in the introduction to this chapter
additional symbolic moves have been listed such as the
hand shake, head nod, and shoulder shrug. It may be a
worthwhile project to list a great many such gestures and
to catalog them. However, this study will turn to the
more exciting notion of creating a language of symbols.
l-Limitations of Symbol Creating. By certain special uses
of movement established during the flow of a particular
production, the director may create Special symbolic mean-
ings, movements that say in a moment an entire context, a
complex idea, or a special relationship. Such symbols may
achieve in movement what symbols like The Wild Duck have
455
in the verbal language. Such a Special language may call
upon metaphor, mimesis, or previously held symbolic
connotations to aid in its creation. But fundamentally
such a special symbol language is born from a context and
needs that context to sustain its meaning. ‘Within a play,
or a given series of plays before the same audience, a
limited symbol language can be created. The symbols
can provide single fool for complex ideas, concepts, or
Objects into which whole contexts of meaning are gathered
for the audience.
2-Leve1s of Symbol to Create. There seem to be, then, two
levels of special symbol that can be established, though
the method of establishing them is Similar. One is the
smaller, simple symbol that stands, for example, for a man,
an action, a simple idea, or a hOpe. The second is the
larger symbol, that stands for the play's major conflicting
forces, themes, or ideologies. The former symbol can
often carry little or no meaning at the beginning of a play,
but is established and becomes a symbol by the end. The
latter, to carry so much meaning, probably needs to have
a metaphorical relationship to what it stands for right
from the start.
3-Method of Creating Symbols. The method for creating
moving or static symbols on stage is the Same as the
method for establishing any language or equivalence, that
is, through repeated association and familiarization.
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The totally unfamiliar seems to puzzle and confuse an
audience. If that unfamiliarity continues it can become
boring, irritating, ridiculous, or even fearful depending
upon whether the object seems to be threatening or benign,
strong or weak. This new object can become familiar
through association with an already familiar object and
gain associative meaning at the same time.
A simple static symbol for a character can be esta-
blished quite easily. For example, an old man is always
discovered on stage in his favorite rocking chair. During
the last act the rocking chair is empty. Therefore, the
Old man is dead. The rocking chair becomes a symbol for
the man by constant association. The empty chair draws
attention to the missing element, the man. By such associ-
ation and repetition any Object can become the symbol for
a character. If the object is also functional, providing
a dimension to the personality of the character, the
association is organic and more easily established.
Simple moving symbols can also be established quite
easily. For example, in the song "Happy Talk" in South
Pacific words are synchronized with gestures. The result
is a childlike commentary upon the words, a commentary that
is apprOpriate for the scene but is also a careful estab-
lishing of symbols that can be used later in the production.
A larger moving symbol also may put concepts into
compact understandable units, for examples, a man's
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character, the larger point of View he represents, or the
moving relationships of the theme of the entire play.
The character symbol would be some repeated pattern
of behavior such as a methodical routine for making an
exit, a pattern of clumsy business, or a special moving
relationship to scenery, e.g., a Special way of coming
down the stairs, that would capsulize the character's
dominant characteristics. If a particular pattern is
used each time a particular concept is discussed, a
particular type of decision is made, or a particular
attitude is enacted that moving symbol comes both to
characterize and to stand for the dominant character
trait or typical contribution of that character to the
plot of the play.
By combining patterns of typical character behavior
major character interrelationships can be depicted. By
combining such related character movements with a Single
larger pattern, such as Opposition, solidarity, advancing,
retreating, joining, siding, encircling, rising, or falling,
the specific use of the larger pattern can take on the
specific meaning of the play's thematic relationship. By
the end of the play the movement, such as encircling, can
symbolize succinctly the basic changed or unchanged
thematic relationship in the play.
A single example should suffice. From the beginning of
a play a father is depicted as orderly, punctual, ceremonious,
and self assured. Each time he enters he is tidily
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straightening his clothes, checking and changing the clock
according to his watch, and adjusting a piece of furniture
an inch; all during the movement pattern dialogue is going
on (although the first time the pattern is presented
possibly it should be in silence to become established).
Some part of the routine, such as thumbs in the watch
pocket handling the watch, may be singled out as most
typical and become the master gesture for the character.
Surrounding this character and his character movement is
the movement of the rest of the family. The relationship
of servant to master has been accepted by them. They
enter from all parts of the stage, surround him, then move
in circular fashion around him as the object of interest,
hover, and perhaps even genuflect in their attempts to
cater to his needs. The way in which these characters hover,
combined with the script situation and lines, will create a
movement symbol for the major relationship of the play. By
the end of the play a repetition of the pattern will Show
that the relationship is unchanged; a variation in the
pattern may Show a new trend, a progression, or even a
reversal.
In effect, then, movement patterns can provide master
gestures for each character, master moving patterns for
each major character interrelationship, and a master move-
ment pattern for the most typical, most thematic, moving
relationship in the play.
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C. Conclusion: Principles in The Use and Creation
of Movement Meanings
There seem to be at least two principles Operating
in the successful establishment of new meanings to movement.
The first is that the director must start where the audience
is and carry it to where he wants it to be. He must start
with the familiar and the conventional and by careful
association establish a meaning for the new. He cannot
expect the audience to miss a step in the process and
somehow to jump to the new meaning and both to accept and
to understand it.
The second principle Operating seems to be some
variation of "one thing at a time." To establish anything
new there needs to be a solid basis in the old. If the
movements are new the meanings had better be old. If
bizarre or controversial concepts are being presented, the
movements better be established ones. Too much new at a
time is apt to be confusing, puzzling, irritating, boring
or even fearful. The audience needs to know where it is
before it journeys to a new point of View. It will "go
along" to some extent on a new venture but not if form,
content, conventions, movements, and words are all new to
it. It seems better to vary one element at a time in
establishing the new.
Perhaps the most exciting aspect of creating new
associations, when the director can use a subtle touch, is
460
the audience's pleasure in vicarious creation. The audience
has been a part of a discovery; it has really been the one
to draw the conclusion that "this is like (or means) that".
Using a partial familiarity, a unique meaning, or a new
perspective on an old element the director can make his
production more hOpeful, fearful, and exciting for an
audience than merely by using movement and words in their
established, conventional ways.
CHAPTER IX
A FOCUS ON THE PROBLEMS OF COMMUNICATING BY MOVEMENT
In composing his movement for a more dynamic stage the
director has several special concepts that can assist or
hinder his communication process. Those that this study
wishes to explore further in this final chapter concern
aesthetic and psychical distance, communication vs.
expression, and the conventional limitations upon the
stage director's creative role.
A. The Problems of Aesthetic and Psychical Distance
Aesthetic and psychical distance are often used as
interchangeable terms. They refer to the special distance
between an art object and a perceiver that makes him
realize what he is watching is in a special world all of
its own, not a part of the world of action and reaction
wherein he must move and act daily. This Special world in
which the art object exists usually reflects the real
world, in some way mimics, interprets, or abstracts its
forms from the real world, but it is not a part of the
chain of cause and effect in the practical world.
Of course a viewer can observe a practical object as
if it were not a part of his real world; for instance, he
461
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462
can View a landscape in terms of its formal, metaphysical,
or symbolic relationships; he can see it aesthetically as
an object for contemplation rather than practically as it
affects his livelihood as a farmer, or affects the distance
he must cover to reach his destination. In the second
instance the view of the object is as an instrument. The
viewer thinks of the object in terms of its instrumental P
value in his practical, or moral, life. In the first, the
view of the object is as an end. The viewer thinks of the
object as having intrinsic value for contemplation, and
the object thereby becomes aesthetically distanced.
1. Aesthetic and Ppychical distance Differentiated
There seem to be two kinds of distance which fit the
two terms, aesthetic and psychical: distance from
aesthetic, or formal, compositional elements and distance
from psychical, or psychological, motivational elements
of human interrelation.
a) Aesthetic Distance: Felt Distance from Formal
E_ements.--If an art object appears to be continuous with
reality there is insufficient aesthetic distance, or, as
this study will define it, the art object is underdistanced.
For example, if a picture has no frame but is continuous
with the wall of a building such that the picture's
elements are thought of as belonging to the wall of the
building, not to a separate entity called a picture, then
the art Object is underdistanced. The picture is thought
463
of functionally, or instrumentally, as part of the wall.
If the art object is three dimensional and its formal
elements are like those in the building, then there is
also insufficient aesthetic distance, for there is no
discernible individual art Object; the aesthetic object
is again continuous with the practical world.
On the other hand, if the formal elements in an art
object bear no relation to the cultural environment of
the art object, then the art object is overdistanced. The
audience is involved in the object only to the extent of
passing judgment that the formal elements in the composition
are inappropriate to its environment. The properly
aesthetically distanced object contains aesthetic, formal
elements that are recognizably related to life in the
cultural environment of the object. It may interpret life,
distort it, bear geometric relations to it, or contrast in
some understandable way with life's formal elements. How-
ever, this same object is clearly identifiable as separate
from its environment, having a frame or limits to its form
and some internal principle of integration and structure
that is recognizably derived from life but is not continuous
with life.
b) ngchical Distance: Felt Distance from Psychological
E1ements.--Psychical distance, on the other hand, is a term
that can perhaps be best reserved for the emotional relation-
ship between the audience and the human art object. In the
464
case of the play, the audience may psychologically identify
with, or be alienated from, certain characters. This
relationship is apprOpriate psychical distance. However,
should the audience begin to be concerned with the actor
instead of with the character the audience is overdistanced
from the play; if the audience starts thinking of the
character as a real person, and behaves as if he were a
real person, then the audience is psychically underdistanced.
If psychological elements in a play are too life-like,
or physically do not stay within the frame of the play,
then the audience may think of the stage action as continuous
with life, not life-like but actually life. Merely life-
like is apprOpriate distancing; "Life-like" still involves
an awareness of the illusion. When a play is highly
stylized, even esoterically so, an audience may cease to
think of the play as being life-like, and the audience,
becoming overdistanced, may lose interest.
c) Ideal Aesthetic and Psychical Distance. The ideal
aesthetic distance, then, occurs when the forms of a play
are believable and understandably derived from life but
are not continuous with life. The ideal psychical dis-
tance occurs when the actions of the characters could
believably take place in some real or imagined, internally
consistent culture in life, but are not thought to be
actually taking place in the practical world.
465
2. Audience Reaction to Degrees of Distance
Ideal, or normal, aesthetic or psychical distance can
be created or destroyed for an audience under various
circumstances. The norm of audience reaction is for the
audience not to try to interfere with what the characters
do on stage; the audience does not get itself physically
or practically involved even though it is somehow
emotionally involved. If the audience felt it were watching
a real life event the play would be underdistanced and the
audience would behave quite differently. It would take
sides, speak to the characters, enter the discussion, block
the murderer, and generally interfere in the proceedings.
If it were too polite or afraid to interfere it would
still react quite differently to the real murder than to
the stage murder. If the action becomes too real, seems
somehow to be a real life event, not a dramatization, an
unwary audience might try to interfere. If an audience
even felt like interfering the play would be called by
this study underdistanced. On the other hand, if the
audience could not even get involved enough in the action
to suspend its disbelief; if the action were Obviously a
play, and not close enough to reality for the audience to
identify with the action, the audience would soon become
bored. Such boredom is one symptom of what would be
called by this study overdistancing. The problem of the
director is to produce his play in such a way that neither
466
over nor underdistancing takes place.
a) Movement Tending to Over or Under Distance The
Audience.--One way in which this study feels a play becomes
over distanced is by undue audience attention to parts or
details of movement rather than to the whole. Then there
is not even an illusion of a unified reality; the play as
a whole is overdistanced. Sometimes the illusion is
broken and overdistancing takes place because one part
in the whole breaks loose from its context. The determined
audience usually tries to put the part back into its frame,
but sometimes annoyance with the ineptitude of the artist
gets the better of the audience's prediSposition and the
play is overdistanced.
When the stage illusion is so complete that it is
thought to be real, underdistancing has occurred. If a
viewer tries to walk up stairs that are painted on a two
dimensional wall, the painting is underdistanced. If he
tries to stop the murderer from choking the little girl,
the play is underdistanced; if he tries to stop the leading
man from hurting an actress the play is overdistanced.
b) Audience Predisposition Toward Ideal Distance.--
Audience predisposition helps the director in his task.
The audience comes to a play prepared to have a gregarious
good time without interferring with the play's action. It
comes knowing that the play is not a real life event. It
comes prepared for aesthetic or psychical distance and
seeks to maintain the appropriate distance throughout the
467
performance. The director's knowledge of expected movement
conventions helps him to help his audience maintain its
expectations.
In the case of stylization, the audience predisposition
again comes to the director's rescue. Wishing to maintain
prOper psychical distance, an audience can go a long way
toward accepting the symbol as a depiction of, or commentary
upon, a real movement. If the director's movement language
is consistent so that his audience may enter into the
spirit Of it, almost any language derived from recognizable
symptoms, symbols, and metaphors will be accepted by an
audience. Only the unclear, the esoteric, or the in-
consistent fatigues an audience and eventually overdistances
it from the play.
_3. Attempts to Lessen Audience Distance
Many attempts have been made by directors to break down
the distance between the audience and the play, usually in
order to shock or to teach.
a) Attempts to Lessen Distance that Increase Distance.--
Some movement conventions tend to overdistance a play with
the intention of lessening the distance. Movements which
bring the action of the play into the audience in a proscenium
play are cases in point. Normally the audience has already
psychically bridged the gap between the seat and the stage
and has entered into the action of the play vicariously,
as much as it wants or is able to. It retains its anonymity
468
as the audience. The director may feel his audience is
not responding enough. Instead of looking to the inadequacy
of his symbolic, symptomatic, and metaphorical movement
language he decides to bring the actor into the audience
to force the audience to take part in the action of the
play. Such a director forgets his audience pre-diSposition.
The usual response to such a "gimmick" is a withdrawal on I
L
the part of the audience in order to maintain its distance.
They physically pull back in their seats, they mentally
retreat from the meaning of the play. If the actor is
right next to them they tend to look at the floor or
fidget in their seats or laugh nervously. If the audience
likes the gimmick then the play was probably always over
or underdistanced, no stage illusion had been created, and
the audience is reacting to an actor close up, not to a
character in a play.
However, an audience quickly readjusts to maintain
distance. If the aisle is established as a portion of the
stage the audience can accept it, providing the audience
can see and hear the action well enough. When it accepts
the aisle as stage the distance is set up anew such that
the new aisle position no longer achieves any special
underdistancing effect.
Another attempt is to lessen audience distance from
some particular element in the play with the result of
increasing the distance from the play as a whole. For
469
example, a sudden change in stage conventions or tone can
shock an audience into Special attentiveness, but the total
result may not be what the director wants. The too Violent
murder, a swear word, a seemingly pornographic move, an
actor joining the audience, or a physical contact with the
audience will all create a shock and involve the members
of the audience; however, the involvement is rarely, if
ever, in the plot or the theme or the characters. The
audience's morality has been shockedcr the audience's
privacy has been invaded. Such a Shock causes resentment,
breaks the frame of the proscenium, and in effect creates
an underdistancing to the offending element in focus and
an overdistancing to the play as a whole. One part of
the play has indeed become a real life event to the
audience, but the gimmick reaches the audience where it
lives at the expense of the play as a whole. The main
point of the play is often lost.
b) Attempts to Lessen Distance In order to Affect
Audience Behavior.--As long as distance is maintained it
is difficult, if not impossible, to break down audience
predisposition and have a play affect an audience morally.
That is, a play may move an audience because it plays upon
its beliefs and emotions; the play may reach the emotions
through empathy, or reach the intellect through giving
assent to or dissenttn previously held concepts. However,
for the play actually to affect practical behavior would
470
require that the audience un-distance itself and consider
a play as an event, as a practical element in a chain of
cause and effect. Hence, the teaching play, the art object
that is a moral deterrent, is perhaps not possible. How-
ever, this area is certainly one in which much testing
can be profitably made. It seems that a play can support
an audience in previously held beliefs, it can stir up
emotions the audience has already felt, it can muster
these familiar feelings and sentiments in support of some
fictional stage character, purpose, or activity. However,
it is yet to be proven that the "lesson" from the fictitious
Situation is ever learned or applied by an audience in its
practical life.
4. Distancing Devices vs. Theatrical Communication
It is the contention of this study that a director does
well to learn the language of movement, as well as the
language of words, so that he may communicate as completely
as possible to his audience without distancing devices.
The attempt to affect aesthetic or psychical distance by,
for example, breaking down physical distance is an effort
that directly Opposes the predisposition of the audience.
The attempt may merely destroy the unified impression of
the play. If the play has a practical point to make per-
haps the point is better made in an after-the-play discussion
group, or in a lecture where the audience predisposition is
a practical one, unless, of course, the play is understood
471
by its audience from the beginning to be a dramatized
lecture and not an Object of art.
The suggestion for the director is two-fold: neither
underdistancing nor overdistancing seem to succeed in
closing the gap between pure aesthetic interest and
practical, behavior-changing interest; the audience pre-
disposition is against it. Changing practical behavior by
an entertainment form has yet to be proven effective.
The second suggestion is that attempts to vary the
distance by using inconsistencies in stage conventions
usually only succeed in destroying the unity and flow of
a production. Such attempts either alienate the audience
or force the audience to make sudden adjustment in its
way of viewing in order to maintain a uniformity of dis-
tance. The conclusion remains that distancing tricks are
no substitute for a solid foundation in communication by
verbal and movement meaning within the usual aesthetic and
psychical distances from an art object
B. The Problems of Expression Without Communication
Possibly in part because of the difficulty aesthetic
distance presents in movement's affecting human moral
behavior, while movement can affect empathic emotional
response deeply, many artists have gone to an extreme,
saying that pure expression, not communication at all, is
the goal of art. Some artists in the theatre of the absurd
472
go so far as to deny the possibility of communication
even to the point of writing plays to communicate that
idea. Some try to maintain such a strict aesthetic dis-
tance that, not only is there no psychical content left
in their expression, but there is also little recognizable
aesthetic form. However, as has been discussed in Chapter
VII about expressive dance, usually the theatre wishes to
communicate the content of its expression more than it
wishes merely to express it.
1. Proposal: Expression Without Communication Ippossible
This study would like to prOpose a View of the two
activities that suggests that there is no expression
without communication, and those who claim interest in pure
expression have an interest in a non-existent category.
Expression exists, but not apart from communication except
for purposes of analysis. Their relationship is not unlike
that of the two sides of a piece of paper. Each side
exists and can be categorized separately, but in experience
they cannot be separated without destroying both.
The above point of View is to some extent dependent on
the meaning of words, but this study is more concerned with
the facts of experience to which the words refer than to
the word play.
a) Test of Expression: Embodiment.--The most practical
use of the term "expression" seems to involve a process
whereby the artist embodies a feeling, emotion, idea, or
473
fact in some form that can be perceived by the senses. The
process involves a change of media; the change can be
illustrated better than defined. For example, a thought
is expressed as a painting, an emotion is expressed as a
gesture, or a concept is expressed as a building. When
an intangible idea or emotion is embodied in a tangible, or
at least perceivable, form, the idea or emotion can be said
to be expressed.
b) Test of Embodiment: Communication.--The test of
whether or not an emotion is actually embodied in a
stage movement seems to be for someone to be able to read
back out of the movement the emotion that is supposedly
expressed in it. The "reading" may be in terms of a felt
emotion, an empathic response, or an intellectual awareness
that the emotion is expressed. If the person expressing the
emotion is the only one who can so "read" the emotion
out of the movement, then the expression is communicated
but is extremely esoteric and subjective. If a large
number of peOple can "read" the emotion then the expression
is one generally understood by the culture. If everyone
who perceives the expression "reads" the emotion out of it,
either consciously or unconsciously, then the expression is
probably a universal embodiment of that emotion.
The contention of this study is that if an emotion is
truly embodied in a stage movement that is perceived by an
audience, the movement will communicate that emotion to
the audience. The audience may be small, even so small as
474
to include only the artist who created the embodiment, but
the movement will communicate. If the movement does not
communicate the emotion, not even to its creator, either
the emotion is not being perceived or the emotion cannot
be said to be embodied in the expression.
c) Expression and Communication: Two Parts of One
Process.--Hence, if the above reasoning is accepted, the
only basic difference between expression and communication
is that expression is the first part of the process and
communication is the second. The process may not be
completed in some particular instance; in which case the
most that can be said of the first part is that it is an
attempt to express something, the success of which is still
to be tested in communication.
2. The Alternatives: Designed Communication or Therapeutic
Expression
The communication-expression distinction is of
importance to the stage director for several reasons. First,
what would the expression be that did not communicate, not
even to its creator, what was supposedly expressed by its
creator? This study would label it a catharsis for the
artist, a by-product of the therapeutic use of the techniques
of the theatre art. For the emotion would not actually be
embodied in the so-called expression; the emotion would
merely be "worked off" in the process of engaging in the
use of art techniques. The by-product would not be an
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475
expression of the emotion but a waste product from the
process.
To be an art product the expression needs to communicate
what the artist expected to embody. Sometimes an art
product merely connotes whatever subjective associations
each member of the audience has for the form and content
of the art work. If this happens then communication still
has not taken place, for communication is a process of
conveying something from one mind to another. To have hit
upon diverse associations by chance is not communication.
For the theatre artist, at least, art should be no less than
designed communication involving the conscious embodiment
of an idea or feeling in a stage movement, embodied in such
a way that the audience can generally read back from that
movement the same idea or feeling the artist-director
consciously embodied. To achieve this goal the artist-
director should not be content until he has explored all
the possibilities for meaning in movement and until he
has learned to compose in its language. More often than
not there are some meanings, overtones and undertones,
that will be unique to the individual member of the audience
or to the artist-director. But if the main core of meaning,
along with many subtleties, is not communicated to the
majority of his audience, the director has to some extent
fallen short of his potential.
This study is not concerned with communication to the
476
small ingroup, or with therapeutic activity for the artist;
nor is it concerned with communication by accident. There
is no craft, no principle, nor any guidance possible for
the unique and esoterically subjective; nor is there an
audience. Creation of art has pattern, purpose, and con-
trol, and the extent to which this process is completed
without undue loss of the artist's intended meaning along
the way is the extent to which the creator is both crafts-
man and artist.
C. The Problems of The Role of The Director:
Organizer, Interpreter, or Creator
The creative artist is the role which the play director
must adopt if any of the control and responsibility for
, Communication is to be assumed by him. The writer of a
script provides a verbal framework for a production. The
director takes this scenario and combines the talent and
the bodies of other artists into a production. The work of
art is the production in performance, not the script. One
of the basic tenets of aesthetics is that an art work is
complete. Nothing can be added to it or taken away from
it without doing violence to its unity. A script is, at
best, only the auditory portion of a play. It is not
complete; if it were complete it would be an art work
of literature and not a play script.
477
1. The Director's Total Responsibilipyï¬for the Art Product
Again, if the above reasoning is appealing, the con-
clusion is that the director is the only possible controlling
artist in the theatre. All others are what might be called
contributing artists. The total art work, the production in
front of the audience, is the reSponsibility of the director.
'When an artist has this reSponsibility he must also assume
the freedoms that go with such creative duties. He must
be able to shape, build, add, rearrange, emphasize, de-
emphasize, eliminate, and distort anything that may be
necessary in order that the finished art work be an inte-
grated and communicating whole.
2. The Director's Total ReSponSibilipyto The Audience
Some authorities say that the director must be true to
the playwright's intent. The director-artist should con-
sider being "true to" the audience and to nothing else.
"True to" the author's intent, the actor's intent, the
producer's intent, or to the intent of any other contributing
artist in the company may sometimes in practical ways
produce a good play for the audience. But if that be so
then the director is simply not the total artist he Should
be. He is really more an organizer, a traffic policeman,
or a personnel director. Such a director would have little
need for a creative language of movement.
J
478
D. Summary Conclusion: Movement Problems and
Directions For Solution
There are many problems that stand in the way of
providing movement that will have meaning in the director's
compositional context. Among them are aesthetic and
psychical distance, the audience's prediSposition in coming
to the theatre, the foggy artist's reasoning that is con-
tent to communicate partially or merely to express, and the
convention among conservative theatre people that the
director's role is only that of interpreting the playwright's
script. The director himself may err by being esoteric, by
mismatching metaphors, or simply by laboring unknowingly
against or to recreate what has been known and practiced
for years. He may even fail to communicate at all through
having no basis in tradition for his experimentation.
To start solving the problems, the director ought first to
become familiar with the past,the ways the directors,
cheoregraphers, pantomimists, psychologists, and film-
makers before him have found efficacious. He ought then to
experiment in the present with these principles and techniques
to develOp a style of his own best suited to what he would
like to say. Perhaps eventually, in the future, some of the
more scientific minded of the directors can do the others a
great service by subjecting each principle slowly and pains-
takingly to controlled tests. In that way, they may discover
479
what ingredients, or combination of ingredients, in each
compound of movement actually is producing the desired
meaning.
Certainly the most challenging idea for the director
is not only to discover present meanings but to create his
own traditions, conventions, and unique expressions on the
stage. Not the least of these creations could be a new
language of movement. And in creating movement meaning he
should remember that the great directors of this or any
era were not held back by what others thought they should
do, or not do, nor on the other hand, were they content
unless the majority of their audience was swayed Simultaneous-
ly with their intent. Nor need any other director of today
be seriously hindered in creating meaning if he has the
humility to learn what his fellow artists have discovered
before him and the courage to define his role anyway he may
choose.
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