Cassavetes Meets Chekhov: Improvisational ...

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THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF NEW MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY, AND THE ARTS www.artsinsociety.com First published in 2015 in Champaign, Illinois, USA by Common Ground Publishing LLC www.commongroundpublishing.com ISSN: 2326-9987 © 2015 (individual papers), the author(s) © 2015 (selection and editorial matter) Common Ground All rights reserved. Apart from fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review as permitted under the applicable copyright legislation, no part of this work may be reproduced by any process without written permission from the publisher. For permissions and other inquiries, please contact [email protected]. The International Journal of New Media, Technology, and the Arts is a peer-reviewed scholarly journal.

Cassavetes Meets Chekhov: Improvisational Performance Technique for Digital Cinema Ian Dixon, SAE Institute, Australia Abstract: In the 1960s, independent filmmaker, John Cassavetes, challenged cinematic art by incorporating contemporaneous lightweight 16 mm film and sound technology. The iconoclastic Cassavetes ignored classical form, focus and line-crossing rules drawing upon Cinéma Vérité conventions to show the flawed beauty of the human face. Using such innovations, he created performance authenticity of such raw honesty it remains disturbingly real even by today’s standards. Indeed, Cassavetes’ unique films incorporated many elements akin to Russian theatre practitioner Michael Chekhov’s ideas on improvisational body movement and spontaneity to a degree rarely matched. In this way, Cassavetes used the camera, not just as a box for recording images, but as a kinaesthetic device. This included his own physical gyrations whilst operating camera–effectively imitating the actor’s point of view (Carney, 1994), thus creating a spatial metaphor for the emotional distance between characters. This paper revisits some of Cassavetes’ innovations, illuminating them by reference to: the dramatic principles of Chekhov; a practical workshop in kinaesthesia and improvisation conducted at Sapienza University in 2014. The Sapienza workshop utilised principles of spontaneity and kinaesthetic interaction through simple participatory exercises. In an era when digital film form still mostly emulates classical cinematic form, the workshop demonstrates how the use of modern digital media may plunder such rich history from inter-disciplinary sources to enhance new and alternative filmmaking practices. Keywords: Cinema, Drama, John Cassavetes, Digital

Introduction

I

n 1965, John Cassavetes cast Lyn Carlin, a secretary with no former acting experience in a key role within his Cinéma Vérité-inspired film Faces (1968). Although his professional performers objected to this move, Cassavetes persisted with the novice actress to produce a performance of such raw “authenticity” that Carlin was nominated for an Academy Award. Indeed, Cassavetes believed that, when provided the appropriate tools and kinaesthetic guidance, anyone could become an actor. In seeking to emulate this notion, Cassavetes’ performance-based, filmmaking methodology was compared to the work of Russian master Michael Chekhov in an acting workshop conducted at Sapienza University, Rome. Undertaken for the Arts in Society conference in 2014 the event was entitled: Cassavetes, Chekhov and the Digital Camera. In this workshop, participants engaged in exercises, which demonstrated body-centred performance pertinent to a study of both these artists. The workshop showed: the intimate connection between performance and the technology of cinema evident in Cassavetes films; the efficacy of Chekhov’s theatre as cinematic instrumentation; and how this knowledge might be applied through digital technology. This paper therefore strategically oscillates between direct reportage of the workshop and the formal illustration of artistic principle such that practice remains wedded to theory. The workshop structure was divided into three components. In part one, the group engaged in Chekhov-inspired exercises, which espoused his body-centred approach to performance and established a “feeling of lightness and ease” in the participants. 1 These results were then applied within part two: a Cassavetean laboratory, where group members recited dialogue from his film Faces, with unpredictable vivacity and manifested the discovery of meaning through improvisation and “states of energetic disorganization [sic].” 2 Thus, the group came to realise the

1 Michael Chekhov, Lessons for the Professional Actor (New York: Performing Arts Journal Publications, 1985), 57. 2 Raymond Carney, The Films of John Cassavetes: Pragmatism, Modernism and the Movies (United States of America: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 158. The International Journal of New Media, Technology and the Arts Volume #, Issue #, 2015, www.artsinsociety.com, ISSN 2325-162X © Common Ground, Ian Dixon, All Rights Reserved Permissions: [email protected]

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connectivity between the two artists through the reality of their own bodies. 3 Part three consisted of the application of Chekhovian bodily awareness and Cassavetean filmmaking within contemporaneous technology. This triumvirate structure and the applicability of performance theory to mise-en-scène became the idée fixee of the exercises encountered at Sapienza.

General Definitions: Chekhovian and Cassavetean For the purpose of this paper, a number of specific definitions are necessary. These include: kinaesthesia; authenticity; improvisation and “emotional improvisation”; 4 Cinéma Vérité; and digital technology (including digital film and digital camera). Firstly, kinaesthesia is the actor’s intuitive ability to perceive the movement of others and respond physically and emotionally with counter-movement. Chekhov’s ideas about acting convey a deep sense of kinaesthesia, especially in his descriptions of internal movement. 5 The term “authenticity” refers to the internally honest nature of naturalistic performance. 6 Both Chekhov and Cassavetes extol the virtues of performance authenticity and rely on improvisational techniques to achieve this. 7 Indeed, Chekhov’s suggestion that actor and writer alike ought to, “Catch the first image” and “follow its independent life,” 8 essentially mirrors Cassavetes’ improvisational procedure known as, “first thought, best thought” and draws upon free creativity. 9 Consequently, although strictly scripting his films, Cassavetes allows his actors licence to experiment with “new ways of playing” with dialogue without changing the words, which he refers to as “emotional improvisation.” 10 This ultimately amounts to the same concept as Chekhov’s use of improvisation, which respects the writer’s text but allows the creative individuality of the actor. “For what is a playwright but an actor on paper?” insists Chekhov, 11 which precisely describes Cassavetes’ performance-inspired authorship. Cassavetes methodology also bears the influence of Cinéma Vérité, a cinematic movement, which grew out of documentary-based filmmaking practices such as Dziga Vertov’s Kino-Eye in 1919. Like Cassavetes’ work in the 1960s, Vérité relied on the development of affordable and portable equipment such as the lightweight Nagra sound-recording kit and Éclair 16mm camera and was designed to achieve greater screen realism. 12 The movement gravitated toward the use of edgy, hand-held cameras, grainy film stock, and non-continuity editing. 13 Although not claiming exclusivity as a work of Cinéma Vérité, Cassavetes’ Faces broke cinematic formalism by drawing on Vérité conventions such as line-crossing and on-screen rack-focus to consciously frustrate the suture process. Thus, Cassavetes created performance authenticity not possible under more defined, conventional means of cinematic construction. Contemporaneously, the “digital revolution” anticipates similar innovation in technique and distribution to Cinéma Vérité. 14 However, as opposed to the Vérité movement’s pioneering use of analogue technology, the digital camera captures the interrelationship of light, shape and colour 3 Raymond Carney, Cassavetes on Cassavetes (New York: Faber and Faber Inc., 2001). 4 Carney, Cassavetes, 168. 5 Suzanne Kersten, e-mail message to author, Melbourne, July 16, 2002. 6 Colin Counsell, Signs of Performance: An Introduction to Twentieth-Century Theatre (London and New York: Routledge, 1996), 54. 7 Lee Strasberg, A Dream of Passion: The Development of the Method (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 1988). The term ‘authenticity’ is most associated with the American Method acting school. 8 Chekhov, Actor, 34. 9 Stephanie Watson, “Spontaneous Cinema? In the Shadows with John Cassavetes,” in The Naked Lens: An Illustrated History of Beat Cinema, ed. J. Sergeant (London: Creation Books, 1997), 59. 10 Carney, Cassavetes, 163–168. 11 Charles Leonard, Michael Chekhov’s To the Director and Playwright (United States of America: Greenwood Press Inc., 1977). 12 Joseph Gelmis, The Film Director as Superstar (London: Secker and Warburg, 1971). 13 Ali Issari and Doris Paul, What is Cinéma Vérité? (New Jersey: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1979). 14 “Making and Distributing from the Grassroots Up,” Dan Edwards, Real Time Arts, last modified 26 July 2014, http://www.realtimearts.net/article/118/11420.

DIXON: CASSAVETES MEETS CHEKHOV

in a “rectangular grid of pictorial elements” called pixels. Manipulation of the image is therefore possible in “discrete, fixed units” rather than the “continuous gradations” of its predecessor in analogue cinema, which relied on random scintillations on celluloid film. 15 Digital invention ensures: lightweight cameras such as those incorporated in mobile phones (thus rendering the camera dexterous for hand-held purposes); computer-generated editing software; innumerable copies of the image without loss of digital information. Although ostensibly liberating filmmakers, Dan Edwards laments that digital technology has not delivered the expected exponential returns. 16 At the Sapienza workshop, however, the discovery of new uses of digital technology emanated from the kinaesthetic and improvisational acumen of the two artists illuminated. Thus, Chekhov’s theatrical principles and Cassavetes’ maverick filmmaking methodology worked in tandem. This included creative interplay between camera and performance and represented a path toward excellence in the craft of screen performance and a hitherto unrealised potential for the performer’s influence on cinematic art. 17

Research Process Research for this paper was conducted via practice-led application of Chekhov’s theories in comparison to Cassavetes’ cinematic ventures. In particular, Cassavetes’ films Faces and A Woman under the Influence (1974) were considered. 18 Extensive secondary literature on Cassavetes from authors dedicated to his craft proved invaluable for the formation of a Cassavetean filmmaking laboratory. For this purpose, Cassavetes scholars such as Joseph Gelmis, Dianne Jacobs, Adrian Martin, Sylvie Pierre, and Stephanie Watson were mined in order to create an inventory of the filmmaker’s practical exercises and to interpret his cinematic contribution. Further, Raymond Carney’s monographs Cassavetes on Cassavetes and The Films of John Cassavetes: Pragmatism, Modernism and the Movies proved invaluable. Cassavetes’ unpredictable kinship with Chekhov’s approach to acting necessitated the study of literature by Chekhov and his devotees. Information derives from Chekhov’s acting workshops of the 1930s to the 1950s as transcribed by his supporters, namely Deirdre Hurst du Prey in Lessons for the Professional Actor, 19 Charles Leonard in Michael Chekhov’s To the Director and Playwright, 20 and Mel Gordon in On the Technique of Acting. 21 Indeed, in attendance at Chekhov’s training sessions in February and June 1942 was Martin Ritt, the director of Cassavetes in Edge of the City (1957), 22 which provides a probable angle for Cassavetes’ received knowledge of a Chekhovian nature. The Sapienza workshop also utilised material from Chekhov’s book To the Actor, 23 and the film Michael Chekhov: The Dartington Years. 24 15 “Digital Hollywood: Technology, Economics, Aesthetics,” Paul Messaris, University of Pennsylvania, last modified 26 July, 2014, http://88.198.249.35/preview/WzurAJuywbXG1JmmvTZFDlqxKLBXuROYONXVHChClgs,/DIGITALHOLLYWOOD-TECHNOLOGY.html?query=DIGITAL-HOLLYWOOD-TECHNOLOGY-ECONOMICS. 16 Edwards, Dan, “Making and Distributing from the Grassroots Up,” Real Time Arts 118 (2013): 21, accessed July 26, 2014, http://www.realtimearts.net/article/118/11420 17 Sharon Marie Carnicke’s paper on performance codes in Stanley Kubrik’s films is a noted influence in this field. Sharon Marie Carnicke, “The Material Poetry of Acting: ‘Objects of Attention’, Performance Style, and Gender in The Shining and Eyes Wide Shut,” Journal of Film and Video 58 (2006): 21-30. 18 Indeed, all Cassavetes films, some notoriously difficult to source, were analysed in multiple viewings, but the two mentioned above represent particular poignancy to this workshop. 19 Chekhov, Lessons. 20 Leonard, Playwright, 35. 21 Michael Chekhov, On the Technique of Acting (New York: Quill, A Harper Resource Book, Harper Collins Publishers, Inc., 1991). 22 Chekhov, Lessons. 23 Michael Chekhov To the Actor (New York: Harper and Row Publishers Inc., 1953). 24 Michael Chekhov: The Dartington Years, directed by Martin Sharp (2002; New York: Insight Media, 2002), DVD.


The research process concluded with the Sapienza workshop where participants consisted of a group of approximately twenty people, mostly female, aging from late twenties to early fifties. These included tertiary teachers of drama, cinema and film theory, research academicians from related disciplines such as cultural theory and pedagogy, artists and actors. Their performance experience varied from seasoned professionalism to neophyte curiosity and included willingness to experiment with kinaesthesia and the digital camera as well as the possibility of emulating the incisive performances in Cassavetes films. Exercises began with Chekhov’s theories of improvisation, kinaesthesia and spontaneous groupings, followed by screenings from Cassavetes films to demonstrate the main parallels between the two artists’ methodologies. Participants investigated Cassavetes’ notion of “emotional improvisation” by using his dialogue to locate their genuine emotional investment and spatial orientation in a “moment of unspecified possibility.” 25 This assisted them to discover performance authenticity and subtext behind the dialogue. 26 Participants were led to understand that in an era when digital film frequently imitates Cinéma Vérité conventions as mere stylistic imposition, most mainstream film still gravitates toward classical cinematic form. Thus, without integrated understanding of its kinaesthetic potential, cinema ignores the more visceral potential of its newest technology. Chekhov’s life and ideas became the initial focus for the workshop.

Part One: Michael Chekhov: Background and Concepts For the process of the Sapienza Workshop, participants were introduced to key concepts within relevant theory, and began, therefore, with a brief historical placement of Chekhov. Born in 1891, Michael Chekhov was a passionate believer in the future of theatre. 27 From 1905, Chekhov trained under his mentor and friend Constantin Stanislavsky, director and innovator of acting technique at the Moscow Art Theatre. 28 Chekhov was a rebellious innovator whose delicate sensibilities allowed him to venture into psychological territory formerly unmapped by acting theorists and to question Stanislavsky’s paradigm for good, naturalistic acting. Inspired by religion, Chekhov found solace in the ancient spirituality of the classical Greeks. 29 He was further influenced by Rudolf Steiner’s Anthroposophy, in particular Eurhythmy and Speech-Formation, which encouraged his fascination for music, rhythm, movement and gesture as tools for the actor. In this way, Chekhov successfully amalgamated the deeper psychological expressions of Stanislavsky’s theories with the religiosity of Steiner. In 1924, Chekhov developed liberating exercises including games such as ball-tossing between actors in order to treat the dialogue of Shakespeare like a tangible object. Chekhov insisted that the actor’s body was the central vessel by which this sensitive process should occur. Alternatively, Chekhov’s technique has been accused of merely reinventing Stanislavskian principles and relying on spurious mysticism in place of constructive methodology. 30 Chekhov’s influence in theatre has been well acknowledged. His influence upon cinema, however, despite his accomplishments as a film actor, has been generally elided. He appeared in early Russian film and German silent film during the Weimar period. 31 The legacy of his 25 Raymond Carney, American Dreaming: The Films of John Cassavetes and the American Experience (Berkeley and Los Angeles, California: University of California Press, 1985), 99. 26 Carney, Dreaming. 27 Chekhov, Lessons. 28 Chekhov, Lessons. 29 By spiritual, Chekhov means invoking a light-giving, external force. Chekhov takes inspiration from Steiner’s philosophies here. Chekhov, Lessons. 30 Chekhov, Lessons. 31 Chekhov’s acting in films include Kogda zvuchat struny serdtsa (1914) (aka When the Strings of the Heart Sound), Sverchok Na Pechi (1915) (aka The Cricket on the Hearth), Der Narr Seiner Liebe (1929) (aka A Fool Through Love),


innovations continues to affect actors globally with notable figures such as Anthony Hopkins, Morris Carnovsky, Martin Ritt and Paula Strasberg embracing the Chekhovian method. 32 His relevance to the work of Cassavetes remains an aspect of this veiled knowledge. The workshop, therefore, began with some Chekhovian exercises to liberate the participants, introduce them to imaginative ways to experiment with bodily performance.

Chekhov’s Key Concepts Instrumental to the workshop at Sapienza University were Chekhov’s ideas regarding: drama as continuous improvisation; 33 the necessity to disengage the intellect; body-centredness;34 examples of his dramatic exercises;35 kinaesthesia and spontaneous groupings. 36 Essentially, Chekhov’s notion that, drama is a continuous improvisation was explored. 37 Both writer and actor should pursue their inner voice and allow the written material to unfold with improvisatory flow. The playwright effectively acts out all the characters in their mind’s eye then relinquishes them to the cast actors for further improvisation within the production. 38 Further, Chekhov’s veneration of theatrical atmosphere and his disinclination toward intellectualising the objective held much in common with Cassavetes’ approach. For both practitioners, the objective should rise from interaction with atmosphere rather than from abstracted pre-planning as in the Stanislavskian tradition. 39 Thus, despite his own cerebral prowess, Chekhov maintained an abhorrence for the “no saying” intellect intruding upon the process of creativity. 40 At the core of Chekhov’s ideas, indeed unifying them, is the notion that the actor’s body is their authority. The body-centre is an awareness of the character’s point of focus within (and sometimes outside) the actor’s body, created from a physical understanding of the character’s balance and weight distribution. For Chekhov, the body-centre should be experienced as a focal point for the character’s physicality and emotion. 41 In this way, conscious impetus precedes any physical movement. This means that the body-centre takes on a life of its own and that the actor should obey its demand. This communication from within also allows the actor to extend the power of performance via “true and firm contacts” with their fellow performers. 42 Consequently, Chekhov developed exercises that engendered joy and exhilaration in his actors. 43 This brings Chekhov’s methodology closer to Cassavetes’, whose process Carney describes as a “playground,” where acting is ebullient, silly and elemental. 44 Through this sense of exhilaration, these exercises allow the actor to fully exploit their body as an instrument. For example, in demonstrating the actor’s need to reach beyond the limitations of the physical body, Chekhov suggests the actor reach above and below simultaneously to a point at infinity. 45 This exercise he labelled, “reaching to earth and sky” and has the effect of opening the participant to their bodily imaginations, as distinct from intellect. 46 In this manner, the kinetic feeling within an Phantome des Glücks (1930) (aka Phantoms of Luck), Spellbound (1945), Specter of the Rose (1946) and Rhapsody (1954). 32 Chekhov, Lessons; Technique. 33 Chekhov, Actor. 34 Chekhov, Lessons. 35 Chekhov, Actor. 36 Sharp, Dartington. 37 Chekhov, Actor. 38 Leonard, Playwright, 35. 39 Constantin Stanislavsky, An Actor Prepares (London: Eyre Methuen Ltd., 1980). 40 Chekhov, Lessons. 41 Chekhov, Lessons. 42 Chekhov, Actor, 9. 43 Chekhov, Lessons. 44 Carney, Cassavetes, 53. 45 Chekhov, Lessons. 46 Chekhov, Actor.


actor compels their partner to respond in similar fashion by extending power to them. 47 This phenomenon occurs as if the performer is “permeated by streams” or waves of kinetic feeling radiating from their partner. 48 As with the actor’s inner-life, the communication between two actors becomes a “language of gestures” read more effectively via the actor’s intuition than if they attempted to intellectualise the process. 49 For Chekhov, there are many advantages to such an approach. It prevents self-conscious performance by creating a body-centred sense of “presence” and allows the actor’s imaginary centre to “precede” their movement. 50 It is this sensing presence, which Cassavetes possesses as an actor and which the film director must be sensitive not to interfere with during the performance. 51 The director must give and receive in continual exchange in order to derive maximum inner power for the actor. 52 All an actor need show is a glance, pause or intonation and their partner will respond accordingly. 53 It is through a magnified awareness of bodily listening and responding kinaesthetically that Chekhov creates one of his most valuable exercises, spontaneous groupings. 54 This is a heightened form of interactivity where a group of actors run about freely then instantly freeze in intricate patterns of interrelated gesture. The actors are effectively reading each other kinaesthetically and intuitively in order to form tableaux of physical shapes created “at the same time without prearrangement.”55 When performed sensitively, the spontaneous groupings exercise results in an aesthetically impressive group performance. 56 As Stephanie Watson points out, this is exactly the illusion Cassavetes sought in encouraging the present-tense responses of his actors. 57 The Cassavetes actor gives, receives, and draws upon their subconscious imagination in ways that transcend the perceived realism of the performance and as such emulate Chekhov’s principles. This giving and receiving is parallel to the listening and responding of Cassavetes’ method, which gives rise to “present-tense feelings and experiences.” 58

Experimenting with Chekhov’s Ideas With an awareness of Chekhov’s theories, the group partook of the first exercise to disengage their “no saying” intellect. Although resistance was anticipated most participants were eager to engage harmoniously. They were subsequently encouraged to reach toward earth and sky simultaneously, thus activating their bodily imaginations. Next, participants were asked to stand alone and stare at an inanimate object while experiencing their body as completely still. After some meditation on the object they were encouraged to step toward it with bodily awareness, rather than self-consciousness. Then returning to their original position they were persuaded to see the object not only in physical space but also in their “mind’s eye.” 59 They were then asked

47 Chekhov, Actor. 48 Chekhov, Lessons, 108. 49 Chekhov, Lessons, 110. Chekhov’s italics. 50 Chekhov, Actor, 8. 51 Judith Weston, Directing Actors: Creating Memorable Performances for Film and Television (Studio City, CA: Michael Wiese Productions, 1996); Carney, Cassavetes. 52 Chekhov, Actor. 53 Chekhov, Actor. 54 Sharp, Dartington. 55 Chekhov, Actor, 42-43. 56 Sharp, Dartington. 57 Watson, “Spontaneous Cinema?,” 55-68. 58 Carney, Cassavetes, 66. 59 Leonard, Playwright.


to “move inwardly” toward the object while remaining externally still. 60 In this way, they were already allowing their body-centres to “precede” their movement. 61 One participant remained sceptical that their “inner” experience rendered any signifiable shift in their external behaviour. 62 Consequently, the class was encouraged to gather around and observe this participant. All other workshop attendees agreed there was a visually perceptible change in the performer when inwardly still or inwardly moving, despite her own misgivings. The participants were then asked to choose a partner and engage with them kinaesthetically. This required the performers to participate in an exercise known as: “I want to push you away.” 63 This is a Chekhov-inspired game whereby each participant experiences their bodily engagement through gesture and “creative impulses,” either pulling their partner by an imaginary cord or pushing them away without physically touching them. 64 From reports during the workshop, the exercise became an experientially rewarding, aesthetically pleasing and mellifluous engagement between the pairs of performers. The participants then faced their partners again, but instead of push-pulling physically, they did so in their mind’s eye while remaining externally still. 65 Several pairs were then singled out for class observation. Most observers were able to detect which performer was moving inwardly forward and which was shrinking backward inwardly. The perception of visual signifiers in face and body thus confirmed the kinaesthetic nature of stage presence. This step was crucial in preparing participants for the vital Chekhovian exercise known as “spontaneous groupings.” 66 This also introduced a tool crucial to the reading of Cassavetes’ film and subsequently the introduction of the digital camera into the equation. Group participants at Sapienza were asked to incorporate their newly attained kinaesthetic awareness into Chekhov’s spontaneous groupings. 67 However, at this stage the group began to divide between advanced kinaesthetic inter-actors and those who allowed the “no saying” intellect to intrude upon their bodily experience. 68 For example, during the exercise, a group of three participants were converging toward the same physical point. While two of them literally “bounced” off the personal space of the others, the third participant grew perceptibly anxious attempting to squeeze between an impossibly converging space between the others. 69 In this way, the participant in question introduced a sense of “prearrangement,” therefore avoiding the promptings of her “inner voice.” 70 Thus, her personal rhythm became independent rather than enmeshed within the spirit of the group. 71 Most participants, however, came to an aesthetically pleasing cessation point mutually negotiated between them, thus maintaining harmonious, Chekhovian form and beauty, 72 while making significant personal discoveries en route. 73

Part Two: John Cassavetes’ Approach to Acting 60 Chekhov, Lessons, 32. 61 Chekhov, Actor, 8. 62 Falk and Rowlands, Woman; Chekhov, Actor. 63 Suzanne Kersten, e-mail message to author, Melbourne, July 16, 2002. 64 Chekhov, Actor, 2. Chekhov’s italics. 65 Chekhov, Lessons, 32. 66 Sharp, Dartington. 67 That which could not be visually perceived by the facilitator was freely reported upon after class, notwithstanding Chekhov’s forewarning that merely describing an actor’s experience articulately does not indicate an adeptness at performance. Chekhov, Lessons. 68 Chekhov, Lessons. 69 While for Chekhov this represents a relinquishing of the ‘true’ performance, for Cassavetes, such unavoidably embarrassing moments might suggest a ‘moment of unspecified possibility’, Carney, Cassavetes, 99; Chekhov, Lessons. 70 Chekhov, Actor, 38–43. 71 By spiritual, Chekhov means invoking a light-giving, external force. Chekhov takes inspiration from Steiner’s philosophies here. Chekhov, Lessons. 72 Chekhov, Technique, 166. 73 Sharp, Dartington.


In order to orientate participants it proved necessary to outline the major components of Cassavetes’ acting craft, in particular: his training as a listening and responding actor; 74 reverence for performance authenticity; appeal to the inner life; and use of improvisation as a directing and acting tool. 75 Cassavetes’ Stanislavskian acting methodology was developed through his early influences at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts (1949), where his teacher, Charles Jehlinger, made him repeatedly re-enter scenes for hours until his delivery was deemed authentic. 76 From this, Cassavetes inherited a lifelong commitment to authenticity, listening and responding.77 Consequently, Cassavetes films offer performance finesse otherwise elided. As such, Cassavetes protected the “creative impulses” and freedoms of his actors. 78 Like Chekhov, he believed in the “validity of a person’s inner desires.” 79 As an actor-turned-director (and despite some dissimilarities), Cassavetes embodies many Chekhovian principles. For Cassavetes, the atmosphere created on set is crucial to the discovery of cinematic performance. His usage of the term atmosphere suggests an actor-centric approach to scene and imaginary space (as generated at Sapienza). 80 Like Chekhov, Cassavetes recognises atmosphere as a pervasive tension in the air, encasing actors and situation, emanating from imaginary landscapes and overriding the oppression of the film set. 81 Thus, Cassavetes looks at the problem from the inside: as if his performers were engaged in a constantly evolving spontaneous grouping. Similarly, Cassavetes’ emphasis is the emotional point of view of the actors and the interrelationship of their rhythms and performances. 82 This sets Cassavetes apart from the visually orientated director who perceives images, but ignores any participatory kinaesthetic influence on performance. 83 Consequently, for Cassavetes, the moments between lines of dialogue present opportunities for actors to employ “emotional improvisation.” 84 Apart from theses obvious advantages, Cassavetes reliance on acting as central within his filmmaking methodology has received considerable criticism. His work often displays meandering, trivial and indulgent characteristics including faltering, overlong dialogue, which, in Chekhov’s estimation, divides from a sense of good form and therefore compromises the scale and tempo of a scene. Indeed, Cassavetes’ insistence on avoiding the point of scenes jeopardises the very authenticity he seeks. 85

Participants at Sapienza Experiment with Cassavetes Participants’ personal discoveries were then applied through a screening of the loungeroom scene from Cassavetes’ Faces. [This clip can be viewed on the DVD of Faces (1:14:00–1:16:26)] This scene depicts a group of women returning home with a single young man from a nightclub in 1965 and is rife with kinaesthetically charged status interactions and sexual subtext. The clip 74 Carney, Cassavetes. 75 Carnicke’s argument regarding acting styles should be noted here as she considers Stanislavskian performance as inherently patriarchal, while Brechtian performance accommodates modes sympathetic to feminism. Carnicke, “Poetry.” 76 Carney, Cassavetes, 16. 77 Carney, Cassavetes. 78 Carney, Cassavetes; Chekhov, Actor, 2. 79 Joseph Gelmis, “John Cassavetes,” 81. 80 Carney, Cassavetes. 81 Chekhov, Actor. 82 Yana Meerzon, “Body and Space: Michael Chekhov’s Notion of Atmosphere as the Means of Creating Space in Theatre,” Semiotica - Journal of the International Association for Semiotic Studies 155 (2005): 1-4, accessed December 23, 2014, doi: 10.1515/semi.2005.2005.155.1-4.259 83 This visually orientated director subsequently enhances or alters the manifest atmosphere by means of post-production effects such as sound, music and colour grade. This post-production enhancement was mostly ignored by Cassavetes who favoured the visually communicative components of an atmosphere generated by himself and, in turn, his actors. Carney, Pragmatism. 84 Carney, Cassavetes, 168. 85 Carney, Cassavetes.


also demonstrates compelling usage of emotional improvisation. Further, the interaction of bodycentred performance demonstrates the unique establishing of spatial tableaux in the manner of a spontaneous grouping. Participants at Sapienza critically analysed this clip in terms of spatial arrangements and frame construction. 86 However, a further discourse was directed through their kinaesthetic experience within the spontaneous grouping they had just undertaken. As it transpired, the participants physical, emotional and kinaesthetic response to the “language of gestures” contained within the clip preceded their analytical process, 87 thus, they interacting with the screened image with Chekhovian body-centred sense of “presence.” 88 Some workshop members actively gasped at the beauty of the image as their own kinaesthetic rhythms elicited their bodycentred response. In particular, this clip from Faces shows the manner with which the on-screen actors interrelate kinaesthetically by the quantifiable distances and rhythms established between them. Thus, status is demonstrable by ownership of space. 89 Visually signifiable displays of bodycentredness, as read through the language of gestures and movement, were also evident. Participants trained in Stanislavskian performance recognised the more tangible aspects of Cassavetes’ performers. However, even untrained participants listened and responded to the image without further prompting. Emotional improvisation was possible on the basis of participants’ kinaesthetic sensitivity. Participants were asked to read lines of dialogue from Faces without it necessarily making logical sense. For example, in emulating Cassavetes in a “moment of unspecified possibility,” 90 participants were asked to declare how they felt in present tense reality. This constituted a distinctly Cassavetean practice to elicit authenticity in performance: 91 rather than start from artificiality, authenticity was established by honest assessment of their feelings. 92 One Sapienza participant admitted she was exhausted; her acting partner declared she was excited to be in the class. When they engaged in the beat exchange: “Nice house you got here,” “Thankyou, it’s twenty-seven years old,” the scene resonated with authenticity while betraying a subtext of deference and disparagement. Curiously, most partners emulated the freshness of the actual filmed performance of these two lines between Lyn Carlin and Seymour Cassel, without resorting to mimicry. A distinctly Cassavetean-Chekhovian atmosphere arose in the class with participants reporting a physical, ebullient, even spiritual, levity. 93 Participants also experimented with lines of dialogue while engaging in the Chekhovian push-pull exercise. Here, subtext arose from respecting the inner self and body-centre, thus moving inwardly toward the object while remaining externally still. Delivered lines of dialogue became incidental to the emotional improvisation and therefore attained tangibility and avoided self-consciousness in the Chekhovian sense. 94 Participants all gave rich, “representational” performances, 95 which removed any prejudice against non-actors adeptness at performance and proved Cassavetes’ notion that: “anyone can act”: the key to his success in directing Lyn Carlin. 96 For the workshop, it only remained to be seen how the digital camera might capture such aliveness and kinaesthetic sensitivity. This therefore necessitated consideration of Cassavetes’ filmmaking influences and technologically 86 Carney, Pragmatism. 87 Chekhov, Lessons, 110. 88 Chekhov, Actor, 8. 89 Weston, Directing. 90 Carney, Dreaming, 99. 91 Carney, Cassavetes. 92 James Naremore, Acting in Cinema (USA: University of California Press, 1988). 93 Carney, Cassavetes, 53. 94 Chekhov, Lessons. 95 Naremore, Acting, p. 28. 96 Carney, Cassavetes.


determined methodology, which was especially poignant for theatrically trained and academic participants unfamiliar with cinematic movements.

Part Three: How does this affect the Digital Cinema? In the vein of Cinéma Vérité, Cassavetes ignored classical form, focus, line-crossing rules and the limitations of technology relying on the camera as undetected intruder upon contrived happenstance. 97 However, Cassavetes also resisted his inclusion in any filmic movement and therefore remained vigilant against the subterfuge of formalism lurking behind the apparent boundlessness of Vérité filmmaking. Instead, he concentrated on the pain and flawed beauty of the human face in close-up and broke considerable ground in doing so. Further, in its postCinéma Vérité non-style, Cassavetes’ film Faces could be reproduced today with the benefit of digital technology. 98 In other words, digitisation represents an under-utilised potential to revolutionise filmmaking just as analogue equipment did for Cassavetes in the 1960s.

Kinaesthesia and Camerawork in the Truck Scene from A Woman under the Influence Sapienza participants viewed a pivotal scene from Cassavetes’ film A Woman under the Influence as illustrative of the interplay between kinaesthesia and camerawork. [This clip can be viewed on the DVD of A Woman under the Influence (Side 2: 09:53:00–12:00:00)]. This scene depicting children in the back of a truck comes at a moment of narrative change in the film. With the children’s mother (Gena Rowlands) taken to a mental institution, their father (Peter Falk) attempts to reconcile his relationship with them. Cassavetes was fond of making actors into camera operators to exploit their kinaesthetic sensitivity in filming. In this scene, he manipulates the camera himself. Cassavetes’ physical gyrations while operating camera in this scene are indicative of the familial relationship implied through his kinaesthetic alacrity. In a publicity still from this scene, Cassavetes hunches against the children, effectively imitating their point of view within the shot. 99 Cassavetes’ camera communicates via his kinaesthetic presence and physical relationship to the boy, Tony (Matthew Cassel). Thus, the camera creates a spatial metaphor for the emotional distance between father and son. In leaning back on the younger child, Angelo (Matthew Laborteaux), Cassavetes mimics, mirrors and senses them effectively employing an internal kinaesthesia. 100 Thus, like Faces, Cassavetes demonstrates a tiny spontaneous grouping in which the camera is an active participant, not merely a box for recording images. In effect, this classic Cassavetes scene combines experiential material with visual information and relays it using the conventions of Cinéma Vérité. Cassavetes thus extends the language of gestures by the camera as though it could listen and respond in kinaesthetic conversation. 101 This means the camera imitates the actors. Just as they press forward insistently, so too does Cassavetes’ “hyper-attentive camera.” 102

Camera and Kinaesthesia for Sapienza Participants In this final part of the workshop, Sapienza participants were encouraged to investigate the use of digital camera technology as adjunct to their new kinaesthetic understanding of performance, 97 Watson, “Spontaneous Cinema?” 98 Carney, Dreaming. 99 Carney, Pragmatism. 100 Chekhov, Lessons. 101 Chekhov, Actor. 102 Sylvie Pierre, “Around the Void: Two Faces of Faces,” Cahiers du Cinéma 2, no. 205 (1986): 324.


thus allowing themselves to move inwardly toward the object or partner they chose to film.103 Consequently, participants were encouraged to observe how filmic mise-en-scène could be directly influenced by improvisational invention in a “moment of unspecified possibility.” 104 In this way, the workshop made camera operators out of actors just as Cassavetes had done with George Sims on Faces. 105 Thus, a Cassavetean element of surprise was used to create on-screen authenticity. The workshop armed participants with new usage of digital technology, its inherent miniaturisation and heightened dexterous potential for the creation of the filmic image. This was due to an inner engagement and kinaesthetic relationship with their subject, whether inwardly moving or outwardly still. Thus, instead of moving the camera in response to evolving visual representations in the camera’s field of vision, the operator intuitively sensed the movement before them. This created a real spatio-temporal relationship to the actors and architecture surrounding them. In Cassavetes’ sense, performers were able to guide the rhythm of the drama from the scene rather than determining any transitional beat formulaically. 106 Thus, participants were instructed to follow the promptings of their “creative impulses,” but actors were granted license to embellish through emotional improvisation where required. The Sapienza actors were instantly propelled into hyper-attentive listening and responding, their prohibitive intellect entirely disengaged as per the promptings of Chekhov and their bodycentred alertness assured by the instant establishment of true and firm contacts between them. Like a tiny spontaneous grouping, they pushed and pulled in an evolving rhythm, which involved the camera itself in the unspecified moment. 107 Further, the actors came to a non-prearranged cessation of the action, remaining externally still while moving inwardly toward each other as per their (brief) Chekhovian training. This experiment would not have been possible without a respectful ensemble feeling as evidenced in Cassavetes’ unique on-set organisations and emulated at Sapienza University. In this way, both Cassavetes and Chekhov came together in practice and theory. The workshop also considered developments in digital technology as allowing greater verisimilitude to the illusion of present tense reality than was possible with Cassavetes’ 16mm Éclair. 108 For example: inexpensive digital storage cards allow for much longer takes (Cassavetes was infamous for utilising expensive long takes on celluloid without intervention); greater portability in digital cameras and developments such as movi-cam precipitate fluidity in tracking any improvised movements on the part of the actor; and (although Cassavetes might eschew the idea) realist performances can be readily manipulated in post-production to rearrange time and space relations.

Conclusion Cassavetes and Chekhov’s exercises proved effective in learning new ways of acting and shooting at the Sapienza workshop. Participants of all natures, having allayed their analytical minds, showed preference for the alacrity of performance. Although not all participants were fully engaged in the process, they nonetheless strove to be as present as possible. Feedback after class was overwhelming in that all members seemed enlivened and fascinated with digital technology’s applicability to Cassavetes and Chekhov’s approaches. The workshop also demonstrated through practice and ostension the inter-connectedness of these two theorists’ methodologies. The class showed the similarities between Cassavetes and 103 Chekhov, Lessons. 104 Carney, Dreaming, 99. 105 Carney, Cassavetes. 106 Carney, Cassavetes. 152. 107 Sharp, Dartington; Carney, Cassavetes. 108 Watson, “Spontaneous Cinema?”


Chekhov by considering the effect of exercises such as spontaneous groupings in action. In other words, Chekhov’s spontaneous groupings conjoined Cassavetes’ use of the information-laden tableau to explain their inclusion of group dynamic. Cassavetes and Chekhov exemplify: ensemble-based performance versus power-driven egotism; 109 attention to imaginary atmosphere rather than the intellectual pre-planning of Stanislavsky’s theory; 110 the need for non-verbal, noninterventionist directing; and the spirit of “emotional improvisation.” 111 By concentrating on the visually demonstrable aspects of filmmaking, the class experienced how kinaesthesia can be represented in the camera movement of Cassavetes’ films as well as their own cinematic ventures. In receiving the legacy of Cassavetes and Chekhov, participants were open to an internally generated approach to acting, framing, camera movement and performance’s integration with digitally captured images. Indeed, the evolution of cinematic language suggests new terrain in pursuing performance and movement as inherent cinematic code. This research promises rich terrain for the future of film, yet only begins to illustrate the thematic and kinaesthetic connect between camera and performer. While theorists emphasise alienation between the audience and the filmed text, 112 further investigation is required to move beyond such implacability. Screen performance may transcend interpretation by mere shot juxtaposition as defined by Lev Kuleshov in 1935 to emphasise meaning inherent within cinematic performance. 113 Further, categorising film practitioners as disconnected actors, writers, directors and editors elides interdisciplinary fluidity. Thus, the camera should be considered a “writing” tool for genre practice to intimate new possibilities for its integration with performance. 114 Indeed, Orson Welles (one of Cassavetes’ heroes) 115 famously commented that film is “not exactly fresh” because it “comes in cans.” 116 Accumulatively then, potential exists to study filmic expression with greater alacrity, particularly regarding movement, signification and the kinaesthetic, digital camera.

109 Carney, Dreaming. 110 Chekhov, Actor; Carney, Cassavetes. 111 Carney, Cassavetes, 168. 112 Naremore, Acting. 113 Carnicke, “Poetry.” 114 Stephen Cleary, “Low-budget Filmmaking” (presentation, SAE Institute, Melbourne, Victoria, August 1-4, 2013). 115 Carney, Cassavetes. 116 A Constant Forge: The Life and Art of John Cassavetes, directed by Charles Kiselyak (2000; United States of America: Castle Hill Productions & The Criterion Collection, 2000), DVD.


REFERENCES Carney, Raymond. American Dreaming: The Films of John Cassavetes and the American Experience. Berkeley and Los Angeles, California: University of California Press, 1985. ———. The Films of John Cassavetes: Pragmatism, Modernism and the Movies. United States of America: Cambridge University Press, 1994. ———. John Cassavetes: The Adventure of Insecurity: A Pocket Guide to the Films. Walpole, MA: Company C Publishing, 2000. ———. Cassavetes on Cassavetes. New York: Faber and Faber Inc., 2001. Carnicke, Sharon Marie. “The Material Poetry of Acting: “Objects of Attention,” Performance Style, and Gender in The Shining and Eyes Wide Shut.” Journal of Film and Video 58 (2006): 21–30. Cassavetes, John. Faces. Film. Directed by John Cassavetes. 1968. Hollywood, USA: Faces International. ———. Faces: Original Version. New York: Signet Classics, The New American Library, Inc., 1970. ———. A Woman under the Influence. Film. Directed by John Cassavetes. 1974. Hollywood, USA: Faces International. Chekhov, Michael. To the Actor. New York: Harper and Row Publishers Incorporated, 1953. ———. Lessons for the Professional Actor. New York: Performing Arts Journal Publications, 1985. ———. On the Technique of Acting. New York: Quill, A Harper Resource Book, Harper Collins Publishers, Inc., 1991. ———. The Path of the Actor. New York: Routledge, 2005. Cleary, Stephen. “Low-budget Filmmaking.” Presentation at SAE Institute, Melbourne, Victoria, August 1-4, 2013. Counsell, Colin. Signs of Performance: An Introduction to Twentieth-Century Theatre. London and New York: Routledge, 1996. Edwards, Dan. “Making and Distributing from the Grassroots Up.” Real Time Arts 118 (2013): 21. Accessed July 26, 2014. http://www.realtimearts.net/article/118/11420 Gelmis, Joseph. The Film Director as Superstar. London: Secker and Warburg, 1971. Issari, Ali, and Paul, Doris. What is Cinéma Vérité?. Metuchen, N.J. and London: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1979. Jacobs, Dianne. Hollywood Renaissance. Cranbury, New Jersey: A.S. Barnes and Co. Inc., 1977. Kiselyak, Charles. A Constant Forge: The Life and Art of John Cassavetes. Directed by Charles Kiselyak. 2000. United States of America: Castle Hill Productions & The Criterion Collection, 2000. DVD. Leonard, Charles. Michael Chekhov’s To the Director and Playwright. United States of America: Greenwood Press, Inc., 1977. Meerzon, Yana. The Path of Character: Michael Chekhov’s Inspired Acting and Theatre Semiotics. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang GmbH, 2005. ———. “Body and Space: Michael Chekhov’s Notion of Atmosphere as the Means of Creating Space in Theatre.” Semiotica - Journal of the International Association for Semiotic Studies 155 (2005): 1-4. Accessed December 23, 2014. doi: 10.1515/semi.2005.2005.155.1-4.259 Naremore, James, Acting in Cinema. USA: University of California Press, 1988. Pierre, Sylvie. “Around the Void: Two Faces of Faces.” Cahiers du Cinéma 2, no. 205 (1986): 324-325. Ritt, Martin. Edge of the City. Film. Directed by Martin Ritt. 1957. Hollywood, USA: MetroGoldwyn-Mayer (MGM).


Sharp, Martin. Michael Chekhov: The Dartington Years. Directed by Martin Sharp. 2002. New York: Insight Media, 2002. DVD. Stanislavsky, Constantin. An Actor Prepares. London: Eyre Methuen Ltd., 1980. Strasberg, Lee. A Dream of Passion: The Development of the Method. London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 1988. Watson, Stephanie. “Spontaneous Cinema? In the Shadows with John Cassavetes.” In The Naked Lens: An Illustrated History of Beat Cinema, edited by J. Sergeant, 55-68. London: Creation Books, 1997. A Woman under the Influence. DVD special feature. Performed by Peter Falk and Gena Rowlands. 2004. Los Angeles: Castle Hill Productions and The Criterion Collection, 2004. DVD. Weston, Judith. Directing Actors: Creating Memorable Performances for Film and Television. Studio City, CA: Michael Wiese Productions, 1996.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Ian Dixon: Senior Lecturer and Unit Co-ordinator, Screenwriting, Semiotics, and Television Production, SAE Institute and Qantm College, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

The International Journal of New Media, Technology and the Arts is one of four thematically focused journals in the DPMMFDUJPO of journals that support the Arts and Society knowledge community—its journals, book series, conference and online community.

5IF*OUFSOBUJPOBM+PVSOBMPG/FX.FEJB 5FDIOPMPHZ BOEUIF"SUTFYQMPSFTUFDIOPMPHJFTPGBSUTQSPEVDUJPO BOESFQSPEVDUJPOPMEBOEOFX JODMVEJOHQIPUPHSBQIZ GJMN WJEFP NVMUJNFEJB BOEUIF*OUFSOFU As well as papers of a traditional scholarly type, this journal invites presentations of practice—including experimental forms of documentation and exegeses that can with equal validity be interrogated through a process of academic peer review. This, for instance, might take the form of a series of images representing artistic practice, together with explanatory notes that articulate this practice with other, significantly similar or different and explicitly referenced practices.

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The International Journal of New Media, Technology and the Arts is a peer-reviewed scholarly journal.