The Great Acting Teachers and Their Methods

by Richard Brestoff

With clarity and insight, Richard Brestoff introduces the great acting teachers, explaining their techniques and how ther are applied today. Beginning with Quintilian and Delsarre he guides us to the present with an inside look at what is currently being taught in the major acting schools and private acting studios; The Actor's Studio, Yale University, NYU, Juillard and many more are visited. Great Acting Teachers and Their Methods will help you understand the most important ideas about acting, where they originated and how they are used in training programs today. Some of the teachers focused on are Stella Adler, Stanford Meisner, Lee Strasberg, Brecht, Stanislavsky, and Suzuki.

Genres: Nonfiction, Theatre, School, Film, Theory, Textbooks

208 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1995

Reviews

[Laura Beth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Insightful thoughts form the greats on the acting process. Good for perusal.

[James Scholz · Rating 3 out of 5]

chatpers 7,8,9 were good but the other ones were kinda wack.

[Matthew · Rating 3 out of 5]

It felt like a sparknotes version of The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to Act but to the author's credit, he actually focused on non-American forms of theater training... even if they were the shortest chapters in the book. I found the way the author put the reader as a participant in the classroom somewhat hokey but recognize its purpose. This book was useful in sorting between the similarities/differences of each approach.

The most unnerving chapter was the schools and their cost. Julliard only cost 13,000/semester in 1995. Now, it's free. Meanwhile, my alma mater cost 9,000/semester in 1995. Now its 35,000. Something is horribly wrong with our system. Attention must be paid.

[Tinkerbell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great source for me in school. It also really helped me when I was teaching a unit on Stanislavski and his system in comparison with other acting methods. It has great suggestions for exercises although it only uses them to illustrate. In other words it does not list tons of exercises that you can use, but it does give you at least one example with each teacher. It is also very entertaining to read, which cannot be said for every book on acting.

[J. Wootton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative, helpful, and engaging. Part history of drama, part biography, part criticism and commentary, part instruction. Recommended for anyone who needs to get up in front of an audience and wants to leave a positive impression.

[Baptiste Coulange · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best book on acting history I've ever read. A good way to discover the differences and the history of the different methods that inspired American theater.
(Don't judge too quickly the cover and the title, they are as bad as the book is good)

[Juan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great intro to acting in general. The title kind of says it all. It also provides some cultural background for the history of acting back since the greek tragedy.

[Mariette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book to reread or when you want a quick recap of what you studied as an undergrad in a BA acting program.

[Annie Fang · Rating 3 out of 5]

for a free book i found at the climbing gym, this was a really pleasant surprise. for content, i’d honestly give it a 4, but the writing got a little contrived. but as an actor who has had relatively less formal training it was nice to learn a bit more about what the famous techniques are and their contextual applications. when laid out like this, it becomes more apparent to me that many of these approaches overlap, even when they think they don’t. and acting isn’t really about adhering to a style, but finding what makes a piece come alive. it was validating to read elements of various “great acting teachers”’ teachings that i have discovered on my own through my work. i think this is a solid enough reference book for if i ever need a little inspiration or an exercise.