The Actor's Art and Craft
William Esper Teaches the Meisner Technique
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The Actor's Art and Craft
Buy Now for $26.99
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Narrated by:
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Michael Esper
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Damon Dimarco
About this listen
William Esper, one of the leading acting teachers of our time, explains and extends Sanford Meisner's legendary technique, offering a clear, concrete, step-by-step approach to becoming a truly creative actor.
Esper worked closely with Meisner for 17 years and has spent decades developing his famous program for actor's training. The result is a rigorous system of exercises that builds a solid foundation of acting skills from the ground up, and that is flexible enough to be applied to any challenge an actor faces, from soap operas to Shakespeare. Co-writer Damon DiMarco, a former student of Esper's, spent over a year observing his mentor teaching first-year acting students. In this book, he recreates that experience for us, allowing us to see how the progression of exercises works in practice. The Actor's Art and Craft vividly demonstrates that good training does not constrain actors' instincts - it frees them to create characters with truthful and compelling inner lives.
©2008 William Esper and Damon Dimarco (P)2019 Random House AudioCritic Reviews
"Utterly inspirational.... The best book on the craft of acting that I have ever read." (Mary Steenburgen)
"As far as I'm concerned, there is only way to learn the craft of acting, and that is through the Meisner technique. And there is only one person to learn that technique from, and that is William Esper." (Patricia Heaton)
"The essence of this book is like William Esper himself: kind/clear, caring/generous, passionate/graceful, brilliant/profound. Inspiring. Invaluable." (Jeff Goldblum)
I have read 5 books on the craft now, Audition being one of them and so far this one kept on being the most relevant to direct working procedures with particular truth of technical usage of the Meissner technique.
I am now doomed to re-read/listen to this book forever as I am yet to find something as potent as this book again.
Some caution, it does start a bit slow and if you aren't involved in theatre or film projects yet a lot of the emotional insights within this book you may not find as helpful until you are on the job.
However, if you are currently practicing the craft in real time, I cannot preach the usefulness of this book enough.
One of the gems that Bill teaches is total sensory focus on a task or object until interrupted by the scene or your partner. The interruption+reaction process is something that I continue to use and has made me a better practitioner with each passing moment in a project.
Among many others.
Enjoy!
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