And Then, You Act: Making Art in an Unpredictable World

by Anne Bogart

From well-known auteur of the American theatre scene, Anne Bogart, And Then, You Act is a fascinating and accessible book about directing theatre, acting and the collaborative creative process. Writing clearly and passionately, Bogart speaks to a wide audience, from undergraduates to practitioners, and makes an invaluable contribution to the field tackling themes such Following on from her successful book A Director Prepares , which has become a key text for teaching directing classes, And Then, You Act is an essential practitioner and student resource.

Genres: Theatre, Nonfiction, Art, Essays, Film, Drama

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 28, 2007

About the author

Anne Bogart is the Artistic Director of SITI Company, which she founded with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki in 1992. She is a Professor at Columbia University where she runs the Graduate Directing Program. Works with SITI include Café Variations, Trojan Women, American Document, Antigone, Under Construction, Freshwater, Who Do You Think You Are, Radio Macbeth, Hotel Cassiopeia, Death and the Ploughman, La Dispute, Score, bobrauschenbergamerica, Room, War of the Worlds, Cabin Pressure, War of the Worlds: The Radio Play, Alice’s Adventures, Culture of Desire, Bob, Going, Going, Gone, Small Lives/Big Dreams, The Medium, Noel Coward’s Hay Fever and Private Lives, August Strindberg’s Miss Julie, and Charles Mee’s Orestes. She is the author of four books: A Director Prepares, The Viewpoints Book, And Then, You Act and Conversations with Anne.

Reviews

[Hanka Jirovská · Rating 5 out of 5]

one of the most insightful books i’ve read this year. i am convinced that you can learn a lot about life by looking at one area of it in depth and Bogart proves this to be the case with theatre. i am adding “regularly goes to the theatre” to my dream life vision and leaving with a much deeper appreciation of art creation. the last chapter on learning to appreciate the finitude of time and making haste slowly seemed particularly relevant for the upcoming period of my life.

[Nick O'leary · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very much a companion to A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre, but slightly more concrete in its advice. I'd say read A Director Prepares first. I've read it at least three times.

Both books are very personal. They are about Anne Bogart's work and her relationship to art, which you may or may not find inspirational, but I certainly did. Where A Director Prepares tends to be more philosophical, this one is much more about process, her approach to her work etc. It's far from a how to book, but it sparks ideas about how you could approach theater making. It's packed with theory, philosophy, quotations, and anecdotes.

(If you like Bogart's style, but want something more technical, consider The Viewpoints Book: A Practical Guide to Viewpoints and Composition, but I personally find the other two books more useful. I'll also add that I'm not very familiar with Bogart's work in performance. I saw SITI company do Radio Macbeth when I was 18, but didn't get much out of it at the time.)

[Kyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

An insightful account of all the considerations directors must make before sending out actors to make art for them, Anne goes on a nearly metaphysical trip by categorizing these considerations based on Buddhist beliefs, quantum physics, Ancient Greek etymology and thankfully virtual reality. She never stays on any of these topics too long, always making room in her brief chapters to describe the actual journeys she took across the globe and the meetings with theatre-makers who inspire her. Her seven fundamental forces of theatrical magnetism works for part of my own research as I try to capture some of the alchemical elements mentioned throughout this book.

[B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Go slow to go fast, cultivate attitude, find grounding simple human actions, balance the giving and receiving, trust time and time restraints, do the work in rehearsal, don't wait for performance, Anne Bogart dissects the nebulous difficult-to-articulate aspects of directing, performance, and acting. It's pretty depressing to read right now if you are an actor as it's not so much "and then, you act", as it is "and maybe someday in the future, maybe fall of 2021 when everyone has a vaccine, then, maybe, you act again maybe?"

[Pau · Rating 2 out of 5]

No he acabat d'entendre gaire el concepte; una mena de llibre d'autoajuda yankee, bastant buit de significat, ple de cites suades i de llocs comuns obvis. Segur que peco de pollaviejo pero em quedo amb _hilos de tiempo_ de brook, o amb el teatro bajo l'arena de Lorca o amb Passolini i el seu _manifest per un nou teatre_.

[Víctor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Moltes coses, totes complicades, pro molt certes i tentadores.

[Cynthia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Both this and "A Director Prepares" are as much about living, or producing any sort of art, as they are about acting and directing in the theatre. I find myself thinking of this book in every conversation I have with someone who is making something, whether that making be directing a show, making visual art, or writing a dissertation. Bogart is not Stanislavski, she does not explain to you how to dissect a scene or what to think about the moment before you go onstage. She does, however, provide a framework for thinking about the art that you create and what you must do in order to make it happen: can you articulate your goals, your character, your ideas? Do you have an intention? Are you paying careful attention to the world around you and your project? Is the content of what you're making important to your audience- and do you know enough about it? Bogart lists seven elements of theatre: entertainment, empathy, ritual, participation, spectacle, education, and alchemy. If all artists integrated all these elements in their work, then there would be much more good art in the world.

This book does have a strong post 9/11 angle to it which makes it a bit dated now. Not that the issues brought up by 9/11 are any less important now, but because they have matured and changed. Additionally, in my eyes, the effect of the Great Recession on American culture and the production of art has been just as significant- and this book was published in 2007, before the economy toppled. Another flaw is that Bogart often likes to use Greek and Latin etymology to explain concepts, but she sometimes oversimplifies, or even cites a false etymology- she perhaps might have double-checked more carefully. Finally, and this is a minor detail, I wish she had included a bibliography of all the works that she quotes or mentions. Of course, one can go to google to find them, but it would be more professional and more convenient for the reader if she gave more detail than simply the author/speaker of the quote.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

A guide with useful platitudes to spur you on as an artists, And them, you act is an inspiring work that doesn't have much more to offer than those platitudes. The vague nature of Anne Bogart's journey outlines may be helpful in fits and starts, and inspire pride in the artist who sees their function as a life-changing force in stark black and white. But when it comes down to it, there is little here to hone in on process, so if you're looking for more of a guidebook on how to actually/practically keep artistic hope in a cruel, post-911 world, this read might be for you.

Though I will say Bogart's strongest work in this volume have to do with communication and cooperation. Being kind and creative with your collaborators is a must in the theatre world for practical reasons, but she sheds a bright light on how being good to others actually serves a global purpose and increases the richness of a production, thus affecting the world more directly. Like I said, inspiring stuff. As an artist, you feel, at the very least, primed to make an impact by the time you put down this book.

[Marya Sea · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my artistic heroes, Anne Bogart delivers an inspiring call-to-action in this meditation on theater practice in post-9/11 America. Her insatiable hunger for meaning and action are presented in a conversational, almost step-by-step guide to creating relevant art in our culture. This is a book I will keep close as I venture into my next theater project, and beyond. An absolute must-read for anyone who strives to create excellent, relevant performance.

[Jess Hutchinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book charges artists to make work that speaks to the context of a present, sometimes violent, always unpredictable world. I'm using it as a core text in my Directing I class in hopes that my students will simultaneously discover the "why" of their work along with the "what" and the "how."

[Ashley Ho · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the most inspiring books I’ve read, and surprisingly so. Beyond the clarity of its organisation and simplicity of its language, what gives the book its power is the intertextuality it employs and offers – Bogart brims with knowledge from a wide range of contexts, and shares them with palpable ardor and awe.

It is evident that when she affirms her position on the shoulders of giants, she means it wholeheartedly. “If you recognise that your voice contains all the voices that came before you, then you will realise that when you speak you do not speak alone. All the people who made your presence possible on earth speak with you. When you begin to recognise and understand where your voice comes from and begin to explore this, you will realise how immense that voice really is.”

The experience of reading Bogart inspires me to take time, chew on time, stretch myself across time, remain in time; to contemplate my decisions (or non-decisions) in thinking, practice, performance, and creation; “For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business” (T.S. Eliot).

[Caitlin Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

"One of the most radical things you can do in this culture of the inexact is to finish a sentence."

Art is intentional pressure. That is one of the core premises of this collection of essays - a late collection in Bogart's career. Being both intentional and forceful, art is therefore political and requires attention, capacity and the acknowledgement that you do not do this for yourself, nor do you know exactly what might come from it.

The essay regarding articulation was particularly powerful, and Bogart makes a compelling argument for viewing fundraising as an act of creation.

[Stephen Hanlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of essays was gifted to me and my fellow theater major classmates when we graduated college in the spring of 2017. I didn’t read it until now.

Anne Bogart has a lot of stuff to say about a lot of things in this collection, and a good deal of it went over my head, but the last essay on Time was so good I had to give the whole thing 4⭐️. In reality for me, it was probably 5⭐️ for the final essay and 2-3⭐️ for the rest of them.

Thanks to my theater professors for this read! Lots of good advice in here about making art, even if I’m not really involved in theater that much anymore.

Overall Rating: 4/5 “Engenders” (B)

[alyssa · Rating 5 out of 5]

From September 2016:
"The more substantial and complex the subject matter, the more will be asked from you in the journey, and the more you will sweat in the process. The cost is real and it is personal." -and then, you act by Anne Bogart
This book. Has changed. My life. Not in the jolting, lightbulb way, but in the small illumination of a candle flame. Regardless if you are an actor or not, involved in theatre or not, as an artist of whatever trade you should read this book. It is about life.

[Alicia Cotillas · Rating 4 out of 5]

He estado en búsqueda de fuentes que me resuelvan la duda de si el arte es, o al menos se puede defender, como útil. Creo que he llegado a la conclusión de que no se puede hablar en términos utilitarios sobre el efecto de una experiencia artística, por muy transformativa que sea.
Lo que si me queda claro es que el arte es necesario, y se hace más necesario según el contexto es más complejo, ya sea por el consumismo mediático que por un conflicto armado. El arte, y en especial las artes escénicas, hace la labor de comunicar lo que las palabras no pueden representar en espacio y tiempo.

[Cooper · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anne Bogart begs us to consider the effect of our art and theatre making in this series of essay on the importance of action in art. I loved that it challenged my conceptions of art and gave me great advice to take my theatre making to a level that brings it from a job to a true art form that can enact and foster change. I annotated every page because there was something to be found every few lines that changed my world!

[Lucy Gallagher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bogart’s brilliance for theatre and the human person shines in “And Then, You Act.” Accompanied by easy language and entertaining anecdotes her practical tips and personal meditations on how and why one should create theatre are both inspiring and educative. I am so grateful that I read this book, and I am excited to continue directing, acting, and making theatre with Bogart in mind. Highly recommend!

[Natalia Ferraz · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has taught me how to use my voice and body as an actor. It emphasizes how being an actor is more than acting, but more of a skill of adapting and absorbing the traits of one’s character and the energy of the audience. It has shown me a new perspective on this skill, and has motivated me to continue to pursue it beyond high school.

[Francho · Rating 5 out of 5]

Maravilla lección sobre el teatro, la vida y la implicación del arte en la sociedad. Ideal para intérpretes, directoras y directores, gentes del teatro y del arte en general. Pone sobre la mesa las relaciones que mejoran un montaje y que son las mismas que mejoran una sociedad: comprensión, escucha y una visión del mundo sin jerarquías.

[Arun Singh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Found this at the height of demotivation in my career. These insights offer a fresh feel to whole dynamic of art. How I look at life, art, ideas about myself and overall world are shifted. I think I will read it once a year in upcoming years. Wonderful.

[Halli Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was great! I will definitely be revisiting and using it as a guide going forward, especially if I ever end up directing. Theatre is so important as an escape and as a mirror, and it couldn’t be more relevant now.

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

i felt like i got the gist in "a director prepares," this one didn't hold my interest.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

An inspiring read with much to ponder over.

[Craig · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

[Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rousing. Resonant.

[Cate Ginsberg · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5. Some of these essays felt so inaccessible in a way that A Director Prepares doesn’t. It was good, I enjoyed, but I liked Bogart’s collections more.

[Sherrice Mojgani · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had never read this book because I thought it was about acting but it's not, it's about the courage to make art as the world falls apart. Seems relevant

[Geronimo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Un libro que pasa a formar parte de esos libros a los que siempre se vuelve. Leerlo fue volver a escuchar a muchos maestros. Sin dudas Anne Bogart hizo escuela, inspiró a generaciones de artistas.

[LilMouseWarrior · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars

[therealiestreal · Rating 5 out of 5]

real good book ms. bogart