Two editions of "Aesop" in Bolshoi Drama Theatre: a speech style change

Abstract

The object of this study is the speech style of artists of the Bolshoi Drama Theater in the 1950s and 1960s. The subject of the study is the evolution of the speech style from the first to the second edition of G. Tovstonogov's performance "The Fox and the Grapes" ("Aesop"). The author of the article studies in detail two versions of the famous performance, analyzes the acting speech of N. Korn, V. Polizeimako, O. Basilashvili and S. Yursky from aesthetic and technological positions. The author pays special attention to the fundamental changes in the intonation-melodical architectonics of sounding speech in less than one decade. A change in speech style in the Bolshoi Drama Theater is included by the author in the wider context of changes in the art of the "thaw" era. The methodology of this study includes measurement (auditory analysis of the pace of speech, auditory analysis of diction and orthoepia, instrumental analysis of the intonation-melodic score), comparative analysis, induction, historical method. The novelty of the present study lies in the combined use of auditory and instrumental analysis tools for acting speech. The author clearly proves the subjectively obvious difference between the sound of speech in the first and second editions of the performance "The Fox and The Grapes" by conducting a detailed comparative analysis of acting speech in all main parameters: tempo, diction, orthoepia, melodics. From the study of a specific performance and specific acting works, the author goes to generalization, concluding about the powerful influence of screen (cinematic) speech on theatrical speech in the 1950s and 1960s, about the formation of a new standard of audience perception and a new idea of the naturalness of acting speech.