An Actor Prepares

Tortsov asks the class how they would approach a role that they have just been cast to play. They talk about how they would begin to get into the role, and Tortsov offers the summation, “In other words, […] you would all use your inner forces to feel out the soul of the part” (252). He explains that they must read the play multiple times before they will begin to understand the character or the way the playwright has written the part. During this initial period, the actor’s connection to the character will be fragmented. It takes time and work, coming to a “deeper understanding of his part and a realization of its fundamental objective” before “a line gradually emerges as a continuous whole” (253). Once an “unbroken line […] emerges as a whole” (254), the creative work begins. Of course, the unbroken line does not mean that the actor stops existing outside of the character, but the line must remain unbroken onstage. But the actor must, “humanly speaking, live by these unbroken lines” (254). To illustrate the creation of this line, Tortsov asks Vanya what he did this morning. He comes up with a “series of short lines, episodes in [his] life since early morning” (255) that lead to the present.