ABSTRACT
When Meyerhold speaks of theatricality, he implies the kind of a spectacle where the audience does not forget, not for a second, that they are present at the theatre and does not cease, not for a second, experiencing an actor as a master, who plays a role. Stanislavsky, on the contrary, demanded that the audience forget that they are at the theatre and feel themselves in the atmosphere and in the environment inhabited by the characters in the play. He rejoiced when the audience, on coming to see The Three Sisters at the Art Theatre, came as if to visit with the Prozorov family—not to the theatrical production. He considered it the highest achievement. Stanislavsky used to say this: “As soon as the audience sits in its place and the curtain is open, we immediately take them in, we make them forget that they are at the theatre. We take them into our world, into our surroundings, into our atmosphere, into our current stage environment.” 1
