Explain how one practitioner attempted to challenge the theatrical conventions of his day. Support your answer with examples from his theory and practice

The first 200 words of this essay...

Explain how one practitioner attempted to challenge the theatrical conventions of his day. Support your answer with examples from his theory and practice.

Stanislavski was born on January 17th 1863, in Moscow, Russia and is rightly called the 'father of modern theatre'; his System of acting became the backbone of twentieth century theatre craft. Nearly all other practitioners use him as a starting point, either to build from or to react against.

Before Stanislavski Russian theatre was in a poor state and theatre standards were horrendous. The monopoly of the imperial theatre had been abolished in 1882. As a result commercial management threw on plays to make such quick profits. The actors were poorly disciplined and would turn up late or even drunk and would sometimes not even bother to learn their lines. Rehearsals were short and often conducted in the most mechanical manner and actors simply ignored directors and did what they knew best. Experienced actors would simply inhabit themselves downstage centre, by the prompter's box and wait to be fed the lines so they could deliver them to the audience.

The acting was exaggerated and melodramatic, it was believed that each emotion