Michael Chekhov

He was born in 1821 and was an academy award nominated Russian/American actor, a director, an author and a theatre practitioner. His technique has been used by actors such as Clint Eastwood and Marilyn Monroe. He is the nephew of Anton Chekhov and he worked with Stanislavsky at the Moscow Art Theatre in 1912 as an actor. He was forced to leave Russia in 1928 as his teachings were seen as threatening and radical. He exiled to Berlin and continues his practices around Europe.

He wrote his book “To the Actor” in 1953, it was written as a workshop book. There was no other written book for an actor. The themes that most dominant his works were:

• Atmosphere
• Actor’s creativity
• Physicalisation of inner experience

Unlike Anton Chekhov Michael believed that actors were “creative artists, creating characters distinct from themselves”, that they should understand the composition of the play in a directorial way and should be objective (open) in creating roles rather than subjective (biased). The actors should have the ability to work with atmosphere, be able to become a concept of the piece, using imagination to create a character. Michael believed that actors should have a “higher ego”, meaning they are a different self to the everyday self.

Actors should seek characters in imaginative worlds, to not intectualise it and for it not to be based on concrete life stories. Michael wanted to “develop the means of which such images can be created as a shape on stage”. He believed in the actor letting the body and the imagination reveal the character in the play.

“Extraordinary things happen in theatre akin to dreams”

“Profound importance of Chekhov’s work is that its aim is to breed such a race of Actor Poets”

We noted down the differences between our character in the play 13 and ourselves. This was a good starting point as it helped us to realise that our character is not us, and that we are creating someone else to portray.

Michael Chekhov