Vsevolod Meyerhold: actor as the texture of theatre

Abstract

Vsevolod Meyerhold’s name has become the synonym of theatricality, the sheer poetry of theatre, totally independent from literature, the perfection of the form and the ultimate expression of the director’s will and imagination. During his whole career, the director was exploring existing techniques of acting and creating those of his own in an attempt to keep the texture of his theatre tuned to the needs of the time. However, although quite a few modern directors have appropriated techniques introduced, adopted or reinvented by Meyerhold (a non-linear, episodic structure of the performance, free association, improvisation, a score of the performance similar to that of the musical score, etc.), they often do not have a Meyerholdian actor to implement these techniques. In this article, we are going to analyse selected metaphors used by Meyerhold throughout his career, such as “actor as the texture of theatre,” “the pattern of movement,” “the scenario of action,” “Theatre of the Straight Line,” “a bridge between the actor and the spectator,” in order to see how, irrespective of the styles he worked in and the techniques he employed, Meyerhold was always concerned about increasing the productivity of acting so that the actor could fully express the spirit of the play, using his body and the structure provided by the director to engage the audience’s imagination.