ABSTRACT
Ever since there have been actors, directors, and playwrights, theatre practitioners have attempted to discover the secret formula by which to deeply affect an audience. The wrangling among the proponents of external techniques (voice, posture, and language skills) with advocates of intense inner work for the actor (psychology and emotion) has been never ending and generally circular. An actor attempting to be vocally and physically adept will inevitably be psychologically and emotionally affected. The actor who favors the pursuit of emotion and psychology as his or her means of creating a character will inevitably be physically affected. Even with the over fi fty-year explorations by the greatest theoretician of them all, Konstantin Stanislavski, nothing defi nitive has been found. The nearest we have come is the postulation by him that in order to affect an audience in an emotional way, the actors within the play must themselves be personally involved.
